Environmental Leader

Stacey Griffin, founder of Aqua2Go, which sells boxed water, is finding that labeling a product green is often fraught with difficulties, CNNMoney.com reports. Griffin believed boxed water was clearly a friend of the environment when compared with water sold in plastic bottles. What she’s finding is that that isn’t necessarily correct.

The company’s water boxes are made of 20 percent polyethylene, which imposes the same environmental costs as 100 percent plastic bottles, though in reduced proportion. Like plastic, polyethylene depletes oil and emits greenhouse gases during production.

While the boxes are made from lumber harvested in accordance with the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, environmental groups say SFI is a timber industry front which allows damaging practices under the guise of ecological concern.

Nor can the product claim a recycling advantage because only one in five Americans lives in a community that offers curbside recycling program for water boxes.

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