Paper free: Love it or leave it?
The Book Industry Environmental Council proudly reports that they plan to cut the industry’s greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020. (Probably because the book industry will cease to release books in the traditional paper format, much to the joy of treehuggers and illeterates alike.) The council, representing more than 60 percent of the market, says they’ll cut the gases down to 80 percent by 2050 – but we shouldn’t hold our breath.
This decision was made at the request of publishers, booksellers, librarians, and paper providers, to name a few. It’s less of a matter of banning books than it is a matter of overprinting, forcing booksellers to send thousands of “unbought” books back to their publishers each year. Pete Datos, chair of the B.I.E.C.’s climate subcommittee, and the VP at Hachette Book Group USA, elaborates:
“The tools at our disposal have dramatically improved — providing better insight to improve our forecasts, reducing lead times to get books printed and distributed faster, and increasing our flexibility to print just the “right” quantities.”
The movement includes not only using recycled paper in books, a trend used by the likes of the Harry Potter series, but also reducing the amount of energy used in corporate buildings and production companies. No word yet on the impact of Amazon’s Kindle or Sony’s eReader, though we imagine there to be unpleasant thoughts. Dig deep, bookworms. Those e-books’ batteries must be more toxic than chopping trees? (But, ladies, can we really put a price on Edward Cullen?)
XO, The Green Gamine
P.S. Follow my tweets, please.
