Expertise

The holiday season brings relaxation, quality time with family, good food, and a chance to reflect on the past year. With all the joy this time brings, there are also end-of-year projects, financial recaps, deadlines, and, unfortunately, a lot of waste.

Every day, more people and companies dedicate time and effort to sustainability. Whether through personal actions or company projects, each step is important and impactful. However, it's unfortunate that some undermine the movement through greenwashing. Greenwashing is defined as misleading or deceptive marketing and data to present an inflated environmentally responsible image. When this happens, it casts a shadow over genuine progress.

Back in the day, people didn't wear seatbelts, cigarettes were marketed to teenagers, trash was thrown to the side of the road, the agriculture industry sprayed harsh DEET pesticides over fields and people, toy manufacturers painted cars and dollhouses with lead paint, and reusable water bottles were made with BPA (carcinogen-laced) plastics. What do all these have in common? Easy: They are bad for you and the environment.

What if your next-door neighbor was a landfill? Studies show the common environmental response to that question is "not in my backyard." The truth is that most people participate in environmentally damaging practices as long as the impact lands outside their radius, you know, in someone else’s backyard.