Tobacco Companies Cleaning Up Their Act (But It's Still an Act)

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Three words: Eco-friendly cigarette.

Oh, don’t worry, we haven’t seen one yet. But it’s heading that way. And why not? There’s enormous scope for "greening" cigarette production. There’s already a move towards getting some brands of cigarettes included in the Fair Trade movement. There’s room for recycled paper and less notorious chemicals used during production. Two students from northern England have already utilised vegetable oil and recycled hemp to make biodegradable cigarette butts (and good for them too: stubs take an appalling 12 years to disintegrate).

And have you considered the eco-friendly ashtray?

These are all admirable moves to minimize the impact of a pollutant already in place, and on those grounds, they’re "eco-friendly". There are two ways to phrase the same thing: a product that is preventing further harm to the environment – and a product that is helping the environment.

Lest we forget, cigarette smoke is ten times more polluting than diesel car exhaust fumes, and aside from the damage it does to the smoker, it’s pumped full of nitric oxide, the smoking gun in the worldwide growth of urban photochemical smog. A more accurate pitch would be: how about less eco-hostile cigarette?

Not quite as marketable. I think the "eco-friendly cigarette" will be more popular”¦I can smell it in the air.

Image: dim gm

Mike Sowden

Mike Sowden is a freelance writer based in the north of England, obsessed with travel, storytelling and terrifyingly strong coffee. He has written for online & offline publications including Mashable, Matador Network and the San Francisco Chronicle, and his work has been linked to by Lonely Planet, World Hum and Lifehacker. If all the world is a stage, he keeps tripping over scenery & getting tangled in the curtain - but he's just fine with that.