Climate Pledge Friendly

As a bit of a departure from my usual "second hand is the best", let's talk about NEW products. There are some things you just want to buy new for hygienic reasons (I'm looking at you, toothbrush) or quality reasons (many electronics). 

For these items, the next best thing is to look at responsibly sourced products with quality and/or renewable components, and lightweight plastic-free packaging. 

It can be hard to find these products or make the right choices, understanding what is a better choice vs just greenwashing. 

This is why I was happy to see Amazon's "Climate Pledge Friendly" filter. I'm going to be honest. I may have rolled my eyes at first. Doubly hard when they revealed the name of Climate Pledge Arena. It doesn't roll off the tongue does it? What was this whole climate pledge anyway? Is it just a good PR move, or will it mean actual results from the big players with the capability and responsibility to make change? Despite my doubts though, I'm pretty excited about the shopping experience. 

There's a couple ways to find the products you want: 

1) Search then filter. First, search for what you're looking for. Once your search results are up, select the "Climate Pledge Friendly" checkbox on the left side, and your results will be filtered. My "paper" search dropped from 3000+ results to 188, making my search for a better product much simpler.

I can tell it worked because each of the products also have the Climate Pledge Friendly badge displayed. Further, you can expand on which certifications led to the product being included.

2) Start from a certification. One of the reasons I like this program is that it's not a made-up Amazon-defined certification, but rather, a collection of independent certifying agencies that are providing their designations.

Visit this page to learn about Climate Pledge Friendly and the various certifications. Here are a sample: 

 

Some you may recognize, like Energy Star, which you'll see on many of your modern appliances and Forest Stewardship Council, which we've talked about before for responsible logging practices. Find the certifications that are the most meaningful to you (do you care about recycled content? organic?) and then click the link to shop all their products. 

After doing some browsing, it appears it's still early days, and you still may have to make some compromises. For example, some of the certifications claim the products are improved in at least one-stage of manufacturing. Meaning you may get recycled content toilet paper, but still in plastic wrap. However, this is a step in the right direction to finding better choices.