Pocket diapers vs traditional cloth

[wheels5894]

Papa,

You have forgotten something here. Each time a cloth nappy is used, it has to be washing. That costs the environment in terms od water use, electricity use (electricity is even needed to pump the water to the house), and chemicals in the form of washing powder / liquid. Studies I have seen on baby nappies suggest that the costs od using cloth bersus disposable for a baby are pretty even. I suspect that might even be the case for the environmental issues too.

For what it's worth, I haev been forced back into nappies for night and I use a Tena nappy and cover it with a double layered terry nappy my wife sewed for me that is basically just the same as a disposable in shape etc. Add plastic pants and most of the time the disposable is thrown out and the rest stays dry - but it caqn cope with quite big leaks.

[B Brian]

It is bad when those three cloth diapers also required someone cutting down an acre or more of trees to get at those replacement minerals. Yes, and absolutely yes when you consider the trucks and trains used to transport it all also pollute majorly.

And this all occurs even before getting that raw cotton material. The real problem we face isn't just what we put in the ground so much as how much carbon we put into the air while also removing the trees that can also take it back out too.

And like I've already said, plastic diapers are not environmentally friendly in the least either. I'm not trying to make that case at all, I'm just saying don't pretend like one is greener or better than the other. They are both bad, so just use what works best for your needs. If your concerned about which one to use has pollution as a deciding factor, then you need to actually look at different ways to reduce pollution overall to offset it from the diapers you do use (hence the mention for solar or whatever).

[sociologygeek]

I guess I don't understand.. how exactly are minerals needed to be mined to make cloth? we are talking about cotton, doesnt't cotton grow naturally?

[B Brian]

Yes they do, but as I said the cotton plants strip the earth of the minerals naturally found in ground. Within about 3-5 years there isn't enough natural minerals left for the cotton plants to grow any more (or most other plants for that matter). The farmers must replace those minerals in order to keep growing cotton on their same fields. Those minerals are taken from the ground in other areas, and transported then spread onto the cotton fields.

Cotton is a very resource heavy plant. In fact, they are also one of the most water heavy plants too, usually requiring lots of extra water to be piped in or taken from a well that deletes aquifers.

It kind of sucks too given how much more we use cotton for clothing- which greatly out strips the cloth diaper industry.

[Porkchop]

Has there been any move to using things like bamboo cloth to replace the cotton for diapers? Not sure if that is possible, but I know bamboo is more sustainable.

[B Brian]

The padding of a disposable is made from wood pulp. The cotton were referring to is for the reusable cloth diapers. You wouldn't really be able to make them out of bamboo, but there are a few lesser used options out there (like wool fleece).

[JDinVirginia]

Newer diaper fabrics include bamboo, hemp, Zorb, minky and micro fleece. These fabrics have become popular for diapers with the new generation of young mothers. Unfortunately these fabrics have found themselves into the mainstream only for infant's diapers, usually in AIO styles. By combining the different properties of the various fabrics an enormous increase in performance can be attained with both more and faster absorbency.

--John

[B Brian]

Yes. I tried to have a custom cloth diaper made for me on etsy. It had zorb, fleece, and cloth. It also cost $60, and she messed up the design enough I couldn't even use it. Couldn't get a refund or remake so I had to toss it out. Went back to disposables after that.

[JDinVirginia]

Brian,

$60? Wow. I guess that's the price of progress, but that would exceed my budget.

--John

[B Brian]

Yeah, mine too which is why I only tried for it once. To be fair though, it was supposed to be a countoured and multilayered diaper with zorb (which is very expensive on its own).

I was hoping to get it shaped so the material would be evenly distributed, instead of like with prefolds which would force my legs apart and was causing soreness in my hips/groin area. Oh well.