Green Options

A common theme on Eco Child’s Play is toy safety. We like to tell you about safe, natural toys, as well as the latest news in toy product safety.

That’s why we find the latest efforts to keep our children safe by the Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) alarming, as it will actually prevent safe, natural toys from small companies from reaching the US market.

Due to under staffing at the CPSC and the flurry of toy recalls that have occurred, the agency passed the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) in August, 2008. At first glance, this seems like good legislation, as it bans lead and phthalates in toys, mandates third-party testing and certification for all toys and requires toy makers to permanently label each toy with a date and batch number.  Such requirements will be easy to fund for large toy companies; however, small independent natural toy companies will not be able survive these extra requirements. 

The United Nations Educational, Scientific & Cultural Organization (UNESCO) teamed up with designers, teachers, and technicians from more than 15 nations to develop Bamboo Collection toys, smart toys made from natural bamboo.

Bamboo-indigenous to many countries-is an extremely fast growing giant grass that is easily renewable when harvested. This new use of bamboo will provide stimulus for economic growth & support for many people across the globe.

Simran Sethi and Sarah Smarsh are writing a series on the surprising journeys of everyday things. They will be posting previews on Green Options before launching the posts on Huffington Post. Here’s a sneak peek at the desk you threw away.

How can a mahogany desk, made of slow-growing hard wood plundered from the Amazon, be eco-friendly?

When it’s re-used.

Often, the greenest consumer route is not buying new products made with Earth-friendly methods but rather scoring used products made with traditional, possibly heinous methods. Reduce, reuse, then recycle.

This rule of thumb certainly applies to office furniture. Unlike energy-consuming products such as appliances, furniture is somewhat innocuous to the environment during that period between factory and landfill known as “in use.” The impacts on indoor air quality, however, are like Britney: Not that innocent.

Parents looking for organic and natural toys won’t have to go quite so far to find them according to an announcement released today. On Earth Day, April 22, 2008 Toys R Us and Toys R Us online will start selling a private label brand of toys.

The toys will be packaged in earth-tone colored boxes that bear a stylized “R” seal featuring a green leaf, encircled by the words “Recycle, Renew, Reuse, Re-think,” and signifies for parents that the toys are eco-friendly. The packaging itself will be made from no less than 70 percent recycled materials, according to the company.

27 year old Joe Harmon and several students from North Carolina State University wanted to see if it was possible to build a performance car out of wood.

It may not be in the showroom soon, but their creation, the Splinter (what else?), with a top speed of 240 mph, should be completed this year.

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