In today’s environmentally conscious society, certain behaviors are becoming faux pas. Driving Hummers, not recycling, asking for plastic bags, and using Styrofoam cups are all behaviors that are frowned upon by people committed to living a green lifestyle. However, I was quite surprised after seeing the data on the environmental impact of using a Styrofoam cup vs. using a ceramic mug.
After being given a prompt on which cup is the most for the environment, I assumed that the popular notion on Styrofoam cups might be wrong. However, I was surprised to see actual numbers on how bad (or not bad) Styrofoam cups were. According to treehugger.com, the energy cost for making a ceramic cup is 640x higher than the cost for making a Styrofoam cup. The waste and pollution created by making a ceramic cup is 125x more than the cost of making a Styrofoam. Additionally, Ceramic cups cost more in water usage, due to the need to wash them after use.
The conventional wisdom that ceramic cups are better for the environment is, however, technically correct. Ceramic cups can be reused over 3000 times while it could be a little extreme to even use a Styrofoam cup over 10 times. If one was to use a ceramic cup enough times, the higher costs of production and pollution could be overcome. However, I feel that Styrofoam cups have been given a bad rap in this green age. Ceramic cups may be more environmentally friendly in the end, but over 600 Styrofoam cups can be produced with the same energy it takes to make 1 ceramic cup. Many households have multiple ceramic cups, and in some homes (such as mine), many are not used often or at all. If one were to only use one ceramic cup, for all of their drinks, it would easily be the better environmental choice. However, because not everyone uses one ceramic cup for everything, Styrofoam cups should be considered a convenient and relatively (compared to a ceramic cup) environmental neutral way of holding ones drink.
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