Threads of conversation often begin as our crew settles in to help Jelly, the Keep Chadron Beautiful recycling coordinator, unload cardboard (sometimes paper too) from their trailer twice a week.
One comment that caught my ear recently: Did you know American Spirit has cigarettes that grow flowers when you toss the butts? Wow! At least if somebody is intent on smoking and littering there will be pretty plants to show for it. Unfortunately, based on my online research anyway, the brand, owned by Reynolds American and made by Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Company, does not include biodegradable filters or seeds. The one advantage I give them from a recycling standpoint is that the used pack is entirely paperboard. Competitors include an outer layer of plastic and foil inside that must be disassembled before going into the baler.
However, a select group of tobacco companies now offer cigarettes with biodegradable filters, such as Karma Tips, Cigg Seeds and Greenbutts and among those are products that contain herb, wildflower or even grass seeds. Plant-based Greenbutts are made of “A proprietary blend of all-natural, food-grade filters utilizing a starch-based binder.” (greenbutts.com) The former contain no seeds though are biodegradable within a month, the fruit of technology perfected since 2010. The company website claims that 65 percent of cigarettes are littered each year.
Cigg Seeds, and others, piggyback seeds that are protected against nicotine and heat by specially designed paper according to homegrown.co.in.
My feelings are mixed. Biodegradable cigarette filters represent a huge win if tobacco companies would all sign on and make the technology an industry standard. Instead of languishing on sidewalks, gutters, alleys, roadsides and elsewhere for more than a decade in many cases, the litter would disappear in no time. Yet, if that alternative filter has seeds, are the manufacturers playing to smokers who litter and want to leave their mark along the highway shoulders? Would anyone buy a pack or carton containing honey bee- or butterfly-friendly blooms that would not purchase/smoke another brand? If the plant would not have arrived otherwise it may herald littering tendencies as flowers bloom under the feet of spring highway cleanup volunteers.
Bottom line – I do not see an end to smoking or littering in the foreseeable future. Vaping and its litter is another topic. So, any progress in protecting the environment against one of the country’s most prevalent sources of litter is a win. Though discarded cigarette filters may eventually disappear from view, the Cigarette Litter FAQ in Surfinder San Francisco (March 15, 2017) reminds readers that almost all of them are “composed of cellulose acetate, the same plastic used to make sunglasses and clothing buttons. Filters are composed of 12,000 strands of this plastic and break down into microplastics, but do not biodegrade.”
A post on X popped up while pursuing the web for cigarette seeds. It chided: Save the planet, kill yourself. It is always a blessing when somebody drops a habit harmful to their health. Maybe taking steps to be nicer to the Earth will lead there. The Marlboro man (initially) showed guys that smoking filtered cigarettes was not a girly move. He could come out of retirement today and ride the range with Johnny Appleseed. Mr. Marlboro could smoke (and thereby promote) a new biodegradable product – nothing to clean up or even recycle. He’d flick the seedlined butt after planting another orchard with Johnny leaving the West stocked with apples and flowers.