ColumnThe Amazon Kindle versus paper books: who wins when it comes to sustainability?

In just a matter of years, e-readers like the Amazon Kindle have fundamentally changed the publishing industry, replacing traditional paper books with digital downloads that can be accessed in a matter of minutes.

For many, the Kindle-versus-“real”-book debate boils down to a sense of nostalgia. For years, I refused to even entertain the idea of purchasing an e-reader, preferring instead the look, feel, and experience of reading a paper book.

But there are environmental implications to each option too. Some claim that e-readers are preferable to books, since they don’t require the plentiful amounts of paper and high costs of transport. However, the environmental cost of mining, energy use, and e-waste in the lifecycle of a Kindle shouldn’t be discounted. Add to that equation Amazon’s notorious secrecy surrounding its manufacturing practices, which makes it difficult to make any real comparisons between the two.

The first-generation Kindle debuted in November 2007 and instantly sold out, remaining out of stock for five months. Currently, the product line includes the classic Kindle ($69), Kindle Paperwhite ($119), Kindle Fire ($159), Kindle Fire HD ($199), and the 8.9” Kindle Fire HD ($269). Though the Kindle is often promoted as the world’s best-selling e-reader, Amazon hasn’t released much in the way of true sales data, preferring vague press release statements like “more than double” or “4x over last year.” TechCrunch’s MG Siegler feels comfortable saying that “sales are somewhere between zero and infinity.”

The Good

Although Amazon doesn’t release much information about the Kindle, analysts and think tanks have stepped in to give their best guesses. The most recent comprehensive study of the Kindle was produced by the Cleantech Group in 2008.

The study estimates that the Kindle generates roughly 168 kg of CO2 over a four-year lifecycle, but that carbon emissions are fully offset after the Kindle’s first year of use, assuming that the reader consumes 22.5 books annually. Using historical carbon emission data and e-reader sales projections, Cleantech estimated that e-readers purchased from 2009 to 2012 would prevent 9.9 billion kg of CO2 from being emitted over the four-year period.

Cleantech compares the emissions of a Kindle to the emissions of traditional books, which were estimated to generate up to 1,074 kg of CO2 over the same four-period. But the environmental impact of a book isn’t limited to carbon emissions. According to the report, the U.S. book and newspaper industries consumed 125 million trees and 153 billion gallons of wastewater in 2008. Waste is prevalent at the end of a book’s life too; approximately 36 percent of hardcover and 25 percent of softcover books are returned to publishers after not selling at bookstores, and they are ultimately recycled, incinerated, or sent to landfills.

The Bad

While the data in the Cleantech report is intriguing, it’s difficult to ignore the fact that they are based on guesses rather than fact. Amazon is notoriously secretive about its business practices, particularly about the production and environmental impact of the Kindle. It has repeatedly declined requests for information from think tanks like Cleantech, publications like the New York Times, and even its own investors.

“When it comes to its own footprint, Amazon is consistently more secretive than the CIA,” said Raz Godelnik in Triple Pundit.

Although Amazon doesn’t provide public information about its manufacturers, one thing we do know is that Foxconn, the Taiwanese electronics manufacturer lambasted for horrible working conditions after an Apple expose last year, is one of Amazon’s main production partners. According to various reports, Foxconn is behind the second-generation Kindle Fire, the new Kindle smart phone, and other e-readers in the collection.

But where Apple was subject to consumer backlash and took immediate steps to improve working conditions along its supply chain, Amazon escaped relatively unscathed. It is not part of any working groups, nor does it provide data to organizations seeking to bring about positive change in the industry, like the Cleantech Group or the Carbon Disclosure Project.

Even a call from shareholders for greater transparency was rejected. During the company’s annual meeting in 2011, Calvert Asset Management, whose investors then held about $62 million worth of Amazon shares, called for a report describing the impact of climate change on Amazon’s business, as well as the impact of its business on climate change. “We own this company and want it to do well, so we wouldn’t want any poor performance to come from the release of a document,” Rebecca Henson, Calvert’s sustainability analyst, told the Seattle Times. “We just think it’s something that would be beneficial and could save money in the long run.”

Amazon’s board urged shareholders to vote against the measure, saying that the report would not be “an efficient use of time and resources.” The measure was ultimately rejected.

The Questionable

It’s difficult to fathom that a multi-billion dollar company like Amazon can’t find the resources to conduct an assessment of its environmental impact, particularly when you look at the efforts of its peers.

After the Foxconn expose, Apple tripled its social responsibility unit, publicly released the names of its suppliers, and joined both the Fair Labor Association and the Sustainable Trade Initiative, according to the New York Times. Other tablet competitors, like Sony and Samsung, have long published extensive social responsibility reports. Amazon, on the other hand, won’t even produce a report for its own investors.

As an environmentalist and avid reader, I want to embrace the Kindle. Surprisingly, I enjoy the feel and ease of my Paperwhite (which, full disclosure, I received from an Amazon-sponsored event). I think it’s perfect for travel and handy on the subway.

But I can’t recommend the Kindle enthusiastically until Amazon follows its peers in promoting transparency and social responsibility in its operations. Hopefully the recent firestorm around electronics transparency will convince Amazon that it’s a worthy use of time and resources.

Images: Amazon, The Cleantech Group

The post Behind The Label: The Sustainability Of The Amazon Kindle appeared first on EcoSalon.

Sssssh.

In some parts of the country, going back to school has been fraught with turbulent debates. Luckily, there are supplemental educational tools lying all around — and they’re free, if you have a library card. Take a quick look at these ten infographics, and then snuggle in a corner or a carrel with your latest novel.

Most Targeted Books: The Catcher in the Rye is just one of a list of books that librarians and parents have found objectionable over the years.

Orwell Vs. Huxley: Huxley’s depressing dystopian future seems a bit more accurate than Orwell’s.

The DNA of a Successful Book: Surprisingly, books with a female protagonist are more likely to be successful.

Teaching Us to Read Again: E-readers may be our ticket back to a literate public.

Ray Bradbury Predictions Fulfilled: Science fiction’s predictive powers are truly amazing.

Battle of the Bookworms: In this digital age, e-readers might be overpowering traditional readers.

Do Self-Published Authors Make Money?: A lot more than we thought.

The Top 10 Most Read Books In the World: Over the last 50 years, Harry Potter has outpaced Anne Frank.

Plot Lines: This interesting infographic traces the elements of every successful novel.

What Should You Read This Summer?: Maybe you won’t be luxuriating in a book poolside, but there are still plenty of hours to get some reading done.

Image: the pale side of insomnia

The post 10 Infographics on Books and Reading appeared first on EcoSalon.

E-readers are spineless compared with hardcover books, lacking the soulful carbon fingerprints of readers past. You cannot fold the pages of the wafer-thin gadgets, or make your mark with splotches of food or wine. And the idea of clutching the casing to your chest after reading the final line of a novel just leaves me cold. As one book club friend of mine waxes, “There’s just something about the smell of a book.”

Still, we all can smell and see the writing is on the screen when it comes to these devices outsourcing print media, sparing trees and saving money. According to ID TechEx, the total market size in 2010 is a whopping $131 million, and is expected to soar to $1.7 billion by 2014. Much of that growth is attributed to huge success of Kindles and other portable e-readers. “In 2020, the market value will reach $7.45 billion thanks to the availability of flexible, color displays and faster refresh rates,” the market analysts predict.

Why do users find them so friendly?

“I bought one for my wife for her birthday and enlarged the fonts so she can read the words on the screen without squinting or wearing reading glasses,” says Steve Montoya, a Bay Area IT consultant. “She’s an avid reader. Recently, she read a series she couldn’t get in e-print, and couldn’t wait to finish it and get back to her Kindle.”

While you can’t download all desirable titles now, the Amazon library and others are growing every day.

“You can get books, magazines, newspapers, even audio books to listen to with headphones,” Montoya says.

The graphite feature also is a huge power saver, he finds, noting you can get several days of reading on one charge. And since it works on a cellular network, it also makes it easy to instantaneously order books and have them appear on your library. Plus, the e-readers never seem to lose connection.

“My brother-in-law is in Afghanistan and his iPhone doesn’t work, but his Kindle does,” says Montoya.

If the prequel of our paperless future is the tragic death of magazines and newspapers, will the sequel be the disappearance of paperback and hardcover reads? Are there upsides to this plot? Here are some of the pros and cons of e-reading devices:

Cost

Pro: If you are a voracious reader without a library card, you probably will save money on an e-reader. If you are a voracious reader with a library card, you probably will save on late fees.

Con: You have to spend a lot for the cheapest iPad, which is wifi-only, holds 16GB of storage and sells for nearly $500. The Que is $649 and has a 4GB of data storage. The 3G wireless Amazon Kindle is more affordable at $250.

Storage

Pro: When the Kindle was introduced in 2007, travelers loved the benefits of of storing up to 1,500 books on a device the size of a small paperback read. And the library of available books to download keeps expanding (the first chapter of any book is free). Let’s face it, we are a storage-challenged human race with too much junk and not enough apartment and home space. This eliminates the need for shelving.

Con: Our private libraries are important for sharing with our friends and children and passing down treasured collections – classics and complementary fiction that rocked our world. Plus, it’s a lot easier to lose a gadget than an entire dusty collection.

Green

Pro: Many green publications, including Inhabitat, sing the praises of e-readers because they ultimately aid the environment by requiring no deforestation to manufacture, compared to the traditional paper publishing industry. This doesn’t even include the energy, materials, dyes and carbon from shipping that shames the print industry. According to a study by Cleantech, the carbon emitted in the lifecycle of  a Kindle, for example, is fully offset after the first year. And more earth-friendly models are on the move, like LG’s Solar ebook introduced last year, boasting a thin photovoltaic cell which keeps the juice pumping so your novel won’t go kaput during the climax.

Con: What is being offered is a new thing to buy, to keep you busy on the subway. High tech by nature is incompatible with green with exceptions such as solar panels, which also require an investment in energy to make. Green means a return to what your grandparents did, a return to simplicity: Walk a few blocks to school and work. Open a book on your front porch and snooze. That’s 18th Century technology. Also, the effectiveness of reducing emissions by popularizing these gadgets is dependent upon the publishing industry standardizing its adoption of the technology while committing to cutting down the production of physical books and other print media. Is this likely to happen anytime soon, other than by default?

Convenience

Pro: Toss the paper thin, lightweight, wireless device in your bag and you’re good to go. The new generation of Kindles is lighter than a paperback at 6″ and 10.2 oz. and you can hold it with one hand, which aids those carpal tunnel issues. This is why so many e-readers are the new companions of commuters. Hopefully, driving laws will keep users from biting into New Moon while behind the wheel. If you thought texting was was a dangerous distraction while driving…

Con: The tactile experience of gripping a book, magazine or Sunday paper can outweigh the fact it might be heavier to lug. It is this experience that is woven into our cultural wiring. No matter how hard technology tries, the tendency for consumers to prefer print over e-readers will endure for many years to come. With regard to our cultural connection to books, a graduate student at the University of Toronto wrote that his first experiences with a reader felt like “a courageous betrayal of every word written from the moment papyrus gave way to paper.”

Connection

Pro: We are a society that needs to stay connected now more than ever. In terms of signal range, e-readers never seem to drop out.

Con: Losing connection might be easier on the eyes. Having your head in a book just isn’t the same as having your peepers fixed on a screen for hours of pleasure reading. Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS) cases are rising in people looking for relief from fatigue, strain and irritation caused by focusing on worlds and images on a surface without well-defined edges contrasted against backgrounds. Eyes simply respond better to most printed text of bold black letters on a bright, white background.

Images: E-readers

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