With all the negative talk around green marketing claims, L. Hunter Lovins, coauthor of “Natural Capitalism,” has decided to turn the concept on its head and point out the good in greenwashing. And she makes an interesting case. (Thanks to the Ecolabelling.org blog for the tip)

There’s a spectrum of change. First companies recognize the marketing benefits of going green. Then truly green businesses and posers alike try to take advantage of the trend by hyping green products and practices. The consuming public starts out by buying into the claims, but then questions the new marketing as activists cry foul. Ultimately companies have to back up their claims to avoid charges of greenwashing.

In other words, Lovins claims that greenwashing eventually leads to greener companies.

The argument sounds rational, but it doesn’t mean we should encourage greenwashing. Truly effective greenwashing can and often does go unnoticed, with companies proliferating their own ecolabels and generally adding to consumer confusion. On the other hand, substantiated green marketing is worth encouraging. The more companies can help customers make smart environmental choices, the more pressure there is on the market to make a range of environmental choices available. There may be some unavoidable greenwashing along the way to a greener market, but we should mitigate it wherever possible - with transparency, with positive reinforcement of eco-friendly practices, and with the help of trusted, accredited ecolabels.

Word from a customer company clued me in today to further news on the plastic bag front. In addition to San Francisco’s ban and efforts underway in Maryland, activists and legislators in the city of Santa Monica and the state of Wisconsin are also pushing for an end to traditional plastic bags in retail locations.

Diamant Corporation is promoting the news because of its biodegradable plastic alternative, which is used as food wrap and can be made into grocery bags as well. This EcoLogo-certified product (the only one currently in the category of packaging film) contains no plasticizer or chlorine and is completely recyclable. The company also just announced that it has commercial levels of inventory available, enough to produce in the range of 1.5 billion grocery bags or 16.5 billion pounds of biodegradable plastic.

Want to buy Diamant plastic wrap? The company makes it available for individuals on its website. You know you’ll be in good company too. Last month, Google ordered the plastic film as part of its commitment to environmentally-friendly practices.

New products receive EcoLogo certification every month, and I thought it might be instructive to look at the last several months to see if there have been any trends. Turns out there have. While I knew green cleaning was a hot topic, I had no idea how hot. Roughly one third of recently certified products fall under the EcoLogo category of hard-surface cleaners. And that doesn’t even include the handful of other products like detergent and hand cleaner that support the green cleaning trend.How does a hard-surface cleaner meet the EcoLogo standard? Here are some of the criteria:

• No glycol ethers or their acetates
• No alkylphenol ethoxylate surfactants (APEOS) (Note: environmentalists are trying to pass a bill in Connecticut that would phase out these suspected hormone disruptors in all products)
• No toxic metals, including but not limited to arsenic, cadmium, chromium, lead, silver and mercury
• No more than 1% by weight of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) as used (after dilution if applicable), or more than 12% by weight if sold in concentrated form

Among the other categories of recently certified EcoLogo products are green power, personal care products (like shampoo) and toilet tissue.

I try to avoid using plastic shopping bags. For small purchases I decline a bag altogether, and for larger ones I try to remember to bring along reusable bags. But I’ll admit that I don’t always remember my reusable sacs, and sometimes it’s just easier to let the grocery store clerk load my stuff up in plastic. Which brings me to the question: why do grocery stores carry plastic bags at all? When I go for the monthly run to Costco, I take everything out in a cart, no bags. If plastic weren’t available, we wouldn’t use it.

In the US, San Francisco is the only city to outlaw plastic bags, though apparently the state of Maryland is considering a ban in some retail stores. According to a local news story, retailers like Safeway are against a ban because paper bags cost more. But who says you have to offer paper bags?

My local grocery store offers reusable bags for sale, and then gives me pennies back each time I use one instead of a plastic bag. Since the bags are only $1, they should pay for themselves within months.

Eco-friendly, reusable shopping bags are also easy to get. Buy them yourself, or better yet, pass the word on to your local store. EcoLogo-certified Oasis shopping bags are available in stock or for custom orders. Maybe your local grocery haunt just needs a nudge in the right direction.

Eleven influential environmental groups in Canada - including the David Suzuki Foundation, Greenpeace Canada and Sierra Club Canada - recently put together a roadmap for change called Tomorrow Today: How Canada can make a world of difference. The document reports on seven key issues, and I highly recommend giving it a read through. The information included is generally not surprising or new, but the authors lay out detailed recommendations for what the Canadian government should do in the short term to lessen the country’s environmental impact.

Among the topics discussed in the report is a whole section on “human health and toxic chemicals”. Canadian law today does not ban certain hazardous chemicals including polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) and phthalates. Once again, environmental standards are far ahead of legal mandates, but if the groups behind the report have their way, Canada is on a path to bringing environmental standards like EcoLogo and the law closer together. As stated recently, EcoLogo bans PDBEs in products like office machines and phthalates in a number of floor care products. The new Tomorrow Today report recommends that the Canadian government immediately ban or phase out these chemicals in all or nearly all products. It would be a welcome move.

Meanwhile in the US, federal law is also far behind what environmental groups recommend. PBDEs, for example, are still allowed, though legislators are starting to ban them at the state level. In 2007 Washington became the first state to ban PDBEs and other states appear to be following suit.

There is something immensely gratifying about writing about a product one day, and then seeing it in “real life” just a few days later. As I wait for my delayed flight in a New Hampshire airport, the one thing to put a smile on my face (aside from the free snacks) is the sight of an Xpressnap dispenser system in the nearby bagel shop. Wonder what controlled dispensing looks like? Click the thumbnails below for a close-up view. These EcoLogo-certified products make it easier for customers to take just the napkin(s) they need, saving on waste and business supply costs.

Yes, the cashier did look at me funny when I whipped out a camera to take shots of his napkin dispenser.

Phthalates have been a hot-button issue lately because of a study published in Pediatrics showing elevated phthalate levels in babies’ urine. This is a concern because phthalates, which are man-made chemicals, may alter reproductive development. (Yet another example of the convergence of environmental and health issues)

Not surprisingly a lot of the focus on phthalates has been on baby care products applied directly to babies’ skin – lotions, shampoos, powders, etc. However, that’s not the only place phthalates are found. I scanned some of the EcoLogo category criteria documents and discovered that phthalates are used in some floor care products – floor finishers, sealers, restorers, etc. It seems likely that this would have less of an effect on health given that floor care products aren’t generally absorbed through the skin. However, given a choice, I’d go for a floor care product without phthalates. Check out the EcoLogo-certified list.

One other note, phthalates are also used in some electronics, including, according to Wikipedia, the iPod.

I started buying organic milk recently, and while I love that I’m lessening my environmental impact, I’m not wild about the higher price. The fact is that buying green is not always the cheapest option, at least in the short term. However, there are different ways to look at pricing. What’s the value of the product? What’s the life cycle cost? What are the long-term implications of the cost of a product? Most of these considerations won’t help with my milk buying, but they do help with other kinds of purchasing.

In talking with Scot Case (long-time environmental professional and TerraChoice VP) a while back, he pointed out that a lot of organizations use different kinds of pricing calculators to facilitate the procurement process. For example, if you measure the life cycle cost of a range of products, you may find that the cheapest one in the short term is the most expensive over the lifetime of that product. Think about compact fluorescent lights (CFLs). They cost more outright, but they last longer and use less electricity, making them cheaper overall.

Less common than life cycle calculators are value pricing calculators. These calculators take into account different product factors like price, performance and environmental impact. Products get points for each category, and the total scores are compared for the product with the best value.

For a real-life example of pricing analysis I talked to the folks over at SCA Tissue about how they sell their EcoLogo-certified paper products to their business customers. I was told that one of SCA’s popular products is something called the Xpressnap system. It’s a controlled-consumption dispenser that limits consumer napkin usage. Less waste = good for the environment. Less material needed = good for the business bottom line. In a life cycle cost review, Xpressnap is less expensive overall than other competitive products. It’s a good selling point, and one that SCA has used very successfully with big-business customers.