It’s a hard statistic to nail down, but a person uses between fifty and seventy gallons of water each time he or she takes a bath. This number includes water wasted waiting for the desired temperature as well as hot water used to return the cooling water to the desired temperature. Compare that number to a five minute shower, which uses around twenty five gallons of water, possibly half that if the shower uses a flow restrictor. Clearly, if water conservation is the main goal, a quick shower is the answer, but let’s not throw out the bathtub with the bathwater just yet.

Many people don’t limit themselves to a five minute shower, and without a flow restrictor, it won’t take long for a shower to cross the fifty gallon mark. Plus, many people really like a nice, long, relaxing bath. As green has come to incorporate the mood and feel of a house, a nice place to take a bath fits in well in a green house. There are a few things we as consumers can do to make our baths more conserving. But we’re going to also need some help from bathtub manufacturers. One idea that’s gaining traction is a whirlpool bath with an in-line heater, so water that’s being moved around gets heated in the process. I can’t speak to how much energy this uses as opposed to heating the water with a water heater, but it will lead to less water wasted in the reheat process. When filling the tub, don’t let all that cold water at the beginning be wasted - you can either close the drain and let the hot water balance it out or get a pitcher and use that water for something else, like watering that plant you’ve been neglecting. Manufacturers can start to design the tubs with conservation in mind. Clearly they can’t make a human-sized mold for a bathtub because we’re all different sizes, but I don’t need all that extra space for my rubber duckies. I can see some sit-down bathtubs gaining popularity both for their efficient use of space and their potential for water conservation.

Go ahead and do a search for luxury bathtubs and you’ll see the disturbing trend of massive tubs. There are tubs with a water capacity of 200 gallons! That number is a little misleading because 200 gallons would fill up the entire tub, which shouldn’t be possible with spillover valves. Sometimes companies use the term “operating capacity,” which means how many gallons are necessary to get just over the jets to be able to operate a whirlpool tub. For most baths, a tub filled to operating capacity wouldn’t cover half a human. So even if that 200 gallon tub is only filled half way, that’s a ridiculous amount of water to use on a bath (unless there’s several of you in there, and then all bets are off.)

Here’s my challenge: Find or design the most water efficient bathtub while maintaining the comfort and appeal of a nice, long, relaxing bath. Post your findings here and the winner will get the thanks of concerned environmentalists. And I’ll post your picture - I promise.

For more water saving ideas, click here.

Photo by Jyn Meyer

While I can take a reasonable guess at what was on the kitchen floor, the actual ingredients in that soapy water were a bit of a shock. An article from the Cox New Service published early in 2007 reported that up to 57 percent of all baby soaps may contain a suspected carcinogen, 1,4-dioxane.

FDA recommendations request that cosmetic companies limit the concentration of this substance to 10 parts per million or less in any given product. However, cosmetics are not regulated and compliance with this recommendation is completely voluntary.

1,4-dioxane is a known animal carcinogen, and is a known eye irritant as well as suspected of causing damage to the central nervous system, liver and kidneys.

You won’t find the ingredient on the product label, either. It is typically a manufacturing byproduct, thus, is not required to be listed. Ingredients that could be potentially linked to the presence of 1,4-dioxane include “sodium laureth sulfate” and ingredients that include the clauses “PEG,” “xynol,” “ceteareth,” and “oleth.” The chemical may be present in adult products like deodorant, shampoo, toothpaste and mouthwash. The concern isn’t so much the use of one product that contains the chemical compound, but the number of different products that a single person uses, all containing 1,4-dioxane.

The article quoted David Steinman, head of environmental publishing company Freedom Press. Apparently Steinman commissioned an independent lab test on various products and found some of them to be at or above the FDA recommended limit.

Products tested included ones made by Johnson and Johnson, Disney, Kimberly-Clark, and Gerber. Two of the specific products named in the article include Hello Kitty Bubble Bath with 12.3 ppm of the chemical and Johnson’s Kids Shampoo Watermelon Explosion with 10 ppm.

Once I learned this, I decided our house needed to go green along with our table. I started by changing my child’s bath soap to one that is made for infants with all natural ingredients, food grade oils, natural minerals and herbs for scent. Then, I started looking for shampoos and other products that were safer options.

The Environmental Working Group has a tool on their web site that can be used a shopping guide for personal products, everything from shampoo and soap to sunscreen and toothpaste. I refer to the list anytime I need to look for new personal care products, especially those for my child.

Your might remember Rodale’s Organic Style Magazine, which ran from 2001 to 2005, acting as a vital source of information for consumers during the early stages of the second coming of the environmental movement. Bought by sustainable flower innovator Organic Bouquet in May of this year, I interviewed Organic Bouquet’s CEO Gerald Prolman not long after the deal was made public. Launched just a few days ago, Organic Style is primed to become a top eco-shopping destination.

“All the products sold on the site will be either certified organic, transition to organic, bio-dynamic, sustainable, Fair Trade or a new category we call ‘not certified but worthy.’ To help get the word out, we plan re-launch the Organic Style magazine in the second quarter of 2008. We plan to initially publish the Organic Style magazine quarterly and offer it as a free OrganicStyle.com customer benefit. We want to give our customers information that will be valuable in their lives, that will help them make informed decisions about a balanced and responsible way to live and celebrate life,” said Gerald Prolman in our August interview.

As expected, Organic Style offers a breathtaking variety of flowers, wreathes, and plants - my personal favorites are the charitable bouquets, which give a percentage of each purchase price to each bouquet’s non-profit organization. The holiday section offers seasonal gift baskets, wreathes, and gifts for your favorite canine (hopefully they’ll had some feline offerings too). As a bit of a sweets fiend, I was instantly drawn to the organic holiday sugar cookies and organic gingerbread cookies gift baskets. If gift baskets are your favorite way to give gifts, make sure to check out the gourmet section of Organic Style, which has nearly 30 different eco-combinations.

Even after the holidays have passed, Organic Style is a bookmark-able shopping destination for green wardrobe, gardening, and bed & bath goods (I’ve already got my eyes on their beautifully colored organic blankets). With my eco-fashion business focus, I couldn’t help but be impressed by their apparel category that offers non-nonsense, well-designed garments and accessories.

Though most of us don’t need an extra incentive to shop, Organic Style has a built-in eco-points program. Every time you make a purchase on the Organic Style site, your earn eco-points (1 point for each dollar spent). For every 10 points your earn, you can use them for $1 off a future purchase. Upon reaching a few hundreds points, you can also redeem your eco-points for free flower bouquets to help brighten your (or someone else’s) day.

Do you have a favorite online green store? Share your choice shopping destinations in the comments section and they will be considered for the next installment of Green Shopping Spotlight.

If having a gift-free holiday is not something your family would go for, why not get them something sustainable? Just by looking through the eco-links collection on my website, one can easily see that there are cornucopia of green stores to choose from. For the next two months, I'll be featuring some of the freshest shopping destinations the world wide web has to offer, helping you get to the bottom of that twice-checked list faster than ever.

Trying to decide who to feature in my first Green Shopping Spotlight was a darn tough decision, but the answer came to me in a snap, or an e-mail as it were. Two days ago, I got a delightful message from Jennifer, half of the two-woman team that started Max and Zane, the other half being April. I'd never heard of the online outlet before so I quickly clicked on over to see what the scoop was, and boy (or girl, haha) was I in for a treat!