Green Christmas stocking fillers are not always so sustainable

Bamboo straws and beeswax wraps, among others, carry a higher planetary footprint than you might think.

- David Fickling

How do the ecologically minded make it through the annual festive orgy of frivolous consumerism? Nearly a fifth of non-automotive US retail spending happens in November and December.

If you consider Christmas presents in terms of the emissions and pollution crystallised in manufacturing them and then powering and cleaning them while they're used, Santa's sack can carry a pretty hefty carbon footprint.

One easy way out of this quandary for those who don't want to be labelled as greenie Grinches is to buy something with conspicuous environmental credentials. Wrap it in a hessian bag, get a seed-paper tag and print a leaf on it. Voila! Saving the planet can be merry.

If only it were so simple.

In truth, many of the products that market themselves on their eco-friendliness fall down badly when you look at them more closely.

Since the 1970s, scientists have been developing the practice of life cycle assessment to calculate all the ways that consumer goods affect the environment. The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, the main academic publication for the field, produces hundreds of peer-reviewed articles a year doing the numbers on everything from household washing machines to coffee beans and merino wool sweaters.

If there's one truth that runs through all of those studies, it's that there's more to making a product sustainable than packaging it in brown paper.

Here are five examples of popular "green" stocking fillers that carry a higher planetary footprint than you might think.

BAMBOO STRAWS

The market for reusable straws exploded after a heartrending video of researchers removing a plastic one from a turtle's nostril went viral in 2018. You can get glass, metal and silicone versions, but none look more obviously eco-friendly than the types made out of bamboo.