From the Polygon UR team attempting to go carbon neutral for the 2020 season to Trash Free Trails helping to keep our favourite places to ride clear of litter, it is increasingly interesting to see how brands are tackling the climate emergency. Here are three of the latest announcements on new eco-initiatives that will hopefully help lessen the impact of our sport.
Endura:Endura has announced that from this year onwards they will aim to plant one million trees every year.
The Scottish brand recognises that the global textile industry is having an increased impact on the environment with people becoming more aware of the damage clothing manufacturing can have on the planet and from 2020 onwards they want to help lower their own impact.
| We would hate to look back and think we could have done something and we didn’t...that’s really, I suppose, what’s driving these efforts. It’s not tinkering around the edges. It’s not a gimmick. It’s not a jacket made out of fishing rope. We need to focus on the real things that will make a difference. If we don’t stop climate change, we won’t have a world to clean up.—Pamela Barclay: Endura's Co-founder and brand director |
Currently, the majority of the trees will be planted in Mozambique to restore mangroves in the Maputo Bay region. But they are also looking closer to home with a plan to eventually plant native species of trees in Scotland. But Pamela Barclay, Endura’s co-founder and Brand Director, does admit that the brand still “has a long way to go.”
Previously Endura has removed PFC from their kit, they also offer a repair service and donate 1% of their net profit goes to good causes.
Muc-Off:Another UK company that is trying to boost its eco-credentials is Muc Off, who have announced a whole load of different initiatives over the past few months.
From refill stations in shops to recyclable packaging, the cleaning brand has been looking at many different ways to lower their effect on the planet. Most recently Muc Off announced their new ‘Project Green Initiative’ which aims to deliver environmentally focussed improvements across the business. The main focus is to eliminate 30+ tons of plastic from the company by 2030.
Alex Trimnell, CEO at Muc Off said: “Muc-Off is a company whose business depends on the natural world as our playground, we are focused on preserving our surroundings to ensure everyone can get the same level of freedom and enjoyment out of the great outdoors as we do.”
The program currently has three focuses; ‘Product Initiatives’, ‘Recycling and Refilling’ and ‘Partnerships’. The ‘Product Initiatives’ mainly revolves around how they can improve the environmental effect of their products whether that is making the formulas biodegradable or removing PTFEs from products. The ‘Recycling and Refilling’ stage is more obvious as this involves creating systems that make it possible for customers to refill their products rather than having to buy more inside a new plastic bottle.
Finally Muc Off has partnered with 1% For the Planet, a group founded by Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, and Craig Mathews, founder of Blue Ribbon Files. 1% For the Planet takes 1% of annual sales from a company and donates it to non-profit organisations focused on the environment.
Schwalbe:Schwalbe is also set to expand its inner tube recycling program this year with a shop run system being launched at CoreBike show this weekend.
The new program will incorporate bike shops in the recycling system by allowing each shop to be able to return a 15kg carton of inner tubes at a time to local collection points.
Once collected the old inner tubes will be returned for free to Schwalbe to be made into new inner tubes. The scheme has already been successful in Germany and the Netherlands and a full-scale rollout is expected to begin this summer in the UK.
Tim Ward, from Schwalbe UK, said: “Schwalbe have been leading the way in Europe with this green initiative and sustainability is very important to us as a company. In a world where natural resources are increasingly exploited and under pressure, including rubber supply; it’s important to develop and support recycling technology. It’s estimated that 10-20 million used inner tubes are discarded into landfills each year…Schwalbe are determined to reduce this”.
It won’t just be Schwalbe tubes that can be recycled as they are willing to use any brand, including Slime tubes and those with latex sealant inside.
You'd also open up the ability to use paper based packaging, which would replace the plastic bottles (most of which will never get recycled anyways).
It's good to pay attention to environmental impacts, but there are bigger issues to worry about than carbon vs. aluminum.
I just looked it up, it starts after about fifty minutes into this documentary:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTzsv_OwR2I
nsmb.com/articles/uncle-dave-saving-world-bicycles
And for humans CO2 is a pollutant. That’s why we get rid of it by exhaling it after we produced it by breaking down carbohydrates and fats
Same with water, which is a greenhouse gas too. The altitude at which aircraft exhaust water, it is a bigger issue than the CO2 in their exhaust. I'm still surprised how little attention this gets. After the 9/11 attacks all big aircraft worldwide were grounded. It really made a massive difference during that time.
Fertility rate per female is Down to ~ 2.4. So it is going down but we survive more and longer, so this adds up.
Historically war and disease have controlled the population but it has roughly doubled since the 50's which is an extremely short space of time relatively speaking. Consumption has also increased which, combined with globalisation is creating a perfect storm. Feels like we are reaching a critical point now by many accounts so here's hoping that enough people can see the bigger picture before it's too late (sorry to be such a doom monger).
The biggest challenge though is that even though it is CO2 neutral, it still requires soil which could also be used to grow food for those who need it. Or soil that could just be left to nature (and with trails for us to ride on ). So that's where the conflict lies. Same with running cars on plant-based fuels. It raises the prices for food to the point that the people can no longer afford it. Ideally the fibers used in consumer products are the waste product from food production. We see it with rice bran though on the other hand that may be a cultural thing (with these people assuming that white rice is more refined hence better) as of course the rice bran is actually where the nutrients are. At the end of the day, it just makes a lot of sense to keep our consumption in check.
charleseisenstein.org/books/the-ascent-of-humanity/introduction
Can't recommend this book enough...
charleseisenstein.org/books/the-ascent-of-humanity/introduction
I recall watching an interview with a NASA scientist presenting a concept for an aircraft running on hydrogen.
Journo: "So this aircraft doesn't pollute?"
NASA: "It only emits water."
J: "So that's harmless?"
N: "Hmm, it is just water."
f*cking SOB. He knows damn well what the effects are and working for a government funded organization he just has to be honest. But a lot of funds and effort went into the development so he just wasn't eager to admit that it was a bad idea. Luckily I think the whole concept of having aircraft burn hydrogen at high altitude has gone out of the window now so that's good. Fact remains that our current aircraft also dump water at that altitude and it doesn't go away that easily. Not at those altitudes. You can do something about CO2 down here, but there isn't much you can do about water at 11km.
One solution I read about today is to grind down rocks and dump them in the ocean. These rocks contain olivine which then absorbs the CO2. Challenge currently is that rocks also contain nickel which could be harmful to aquatic life so they need to monitor that first before going large scale. And the obvious challenge of course is that you need to perform the operation in a way that it doesn't also emit massive amounts of CO2 just through mining, grinding, logistics etc. It could potentially be much more effective than planting trees (which isn't all that effective) but the technology isn't yet mature either.
smartstones.nl/research/publications
So yeah, it just isn't all that simple. We don't just have CO2 emissions to worry about (or water at altitude). Intensive farming emits excess methane, diesel engines may be fuel efficient but they do emit NOx which kills nature too. Even though plastics could actually help reduce the waste of food (which includes all the logistics of the crops that gets ditched once it has reached the destination or just isn't being sold because it has more speckles than the crops just next to it) and obviously plastics allow for lighter products (which also make sense outside sports), plastic soup turns out such a bigger issue than we thought. It seems people here blame it people in Asia still using plastic bags etc. But much of these plastic pellets are being wasted during transport and also end up in the sea and gets mixed with sand and pebbles. No way anyone is ever going to sort those out again.
So is it too late? Well, there is definitely some damage done that can't really be reversed. We've dumped highly toxic teflon all over the place that will never go away. Heck, until fifteen years ago or so I even used a chain lubricant that contained teflon. I've used Green Oil ever since but especially areas near rivers with chemical industry upstream are still heavily polluted. So that, teflon, plastic pellets, water in the higher atmosphere, nuclear waste, that's all stuff that is going to stay for hundreds if not thousands of years. Sea water is too hot now and as slow as these mechanisms are, temperature won't drop anytime soon. The Great Barrier Reef is f*cked. And this won't be the only massive fire in Australia in the next couple of years. As for the CO2, that's actually the doable part. All it takes is a shift in mindset. Silly thing is, apparently this is quite hard. Awareness was already there in the seventies, almost half a century ago. And well before teflon and plastics got so prominent. If the movement would have held its momentum back then, then yeah we'd have been in a much more convenient position.
@kiksy : A product should just cost what it takes to make it, logistics, profit etc and also what it takes to fix the damage it all has caused. And that part of the money actually goes into fixing the damage. See, there are already taxes on fuel etc but these taxes aren't actually used to fix it. Governments think it is good enough that it keeps customers from using too much of it.
I had a short ideological romance with green lefties and quite frankly, find them just as much righteous as full of shit just like righties. Sorry. In no way I find making money from money worth anything, I despise it. But I also piss on marxist philosophies...
One thing is sure. We do lots of weird things that are heavy on the environment, both in terms of toxicity and emissions. Like air cargo, like shitty ship fuel. Like eating cows - I don’t buy vegan mental disorder and social deficiency deepened by their shitty, nutrient poor diet that at best can suit a tiny bit of population. But If we at least stopped at drinking milk, eating milk products, eating chickens and farmed fish, situation would improve. Cows are much better alive in smaller numbers, producing milk and fertilizer (and liberty caps...) The sweets industry, all the people over eating. It’s insane. If Fat people would cut their caloric intake by 1000cal a day, we would save money and cut more emissions. Packaging? All that crap?
If we push on our governments we can
Make them spend money on doubling the existing railroad infrastructure, instead of drowning money in asphalt and allowing airways expand. Trains be turned into hotels on wheels, offering comfort in return for longer travel time which BTW could be shortened if countries invested in super fast trains.
But the current reality is that train trip takes more time, is often less comfortable and what is fkng ridiculous, if is more expensive than taking a plane. And majority of fkng stupid green lefties think that it shouldve a personal decision to do the right thing! For fks sake!
And that is my problem, I doubt that intentions of most greenies and leftists are pure. I am not convinced they do it Mostly because they care about the planet. I think many of them are social misfits and ascetics. They simply found a way to make other people feel bad about something. I do see malice and/ or will to gain power in many folks. Like that dude who made “The Game Changer” - that’s a one intense bastard.
And this is what also creates the problem. We have a hard time pushing meaningful solutions when “aim justifies the means” logic is used by representatives of the movement. We need careful and precise actions not fear mongering. These people are not the best ambassadors for the planet...
They should also look at, and pressure, the countries that provide the raw material, or already made plastics, to reduce their pollution.... I'm looking at you Asia...
Although to your point, my point was governments like those in Asia should should enforce pollution laws to help the environment, but then we can have a long chat about how that will impact business and all the economics behind that. government doesn't always know the best way some company or person can help, so these companies doing what they know will help is far better than others just protesting. We just have two different ideas of how to get this done.
I honestly believe other countries do not care that much about the environment, and they dont put in as much as we were for the cause, so, yes we back out a little... I have seen it in my travels... I think if we convince countries to match what we put in to help the environment, then I am all for a untied front, and not us solely leading the charge. I think there are examples of countries who are doing a good job doing their part, what can they do more to influence the change.
Side note - i dont think the govt represents us - there are too many life politicians in the house and senate who just want power and money while doing nothing.
What if all those companies, or even just a percentage of them, followed suit? It would not be long until the number became very significant.
Your attitude of "eh I'm just one person/company" justified apathy is sad.
1. If you're going to do that math, please do it correctly. But hey you're only off by a factor of 1000, so close enough? Jesus.
2. Do you really not understand how trees inherently process CO2 and clean it from our atmosphere? It's a fundamental operation with respect to how the plant deals with greenhouse gases.
3. Trees are not like your lawn. Of you plant the appropriate species of trees in the appropriate areas, they pretty much sort themselves out, I mean, they're f*cking trees it's what they do.
4. Are you a product of the US educational system? Wait, I'm not sure I even want to know.
Holy shit people are painful maybe the world deserves to shrivel is up and start over. Lol