To Diaper Pail or Not to Diaper Pail

Posted on Wednesday, June 4, 2008 by bbb-admin

Recently we had a customer ask us what we thought about the environmental sustainability of commonly used diaper pails such as the Diaper Genie. I hadn’t really thought about it before. All I did know was that I got a Diaper Genie when I was pregnant and used it for a few months when the girls were born, got tired of having to buy the special bags for it and ended up using a normal garbage can with bio bags. After giving this some more thought I realized just how much using a diaper pail like the Diaper Genie encourages the use of nonrenewable resources and creates a lot of waste. Not to mention the costs of buying the special bags. Ouch.

The “ring” that you purchase that contains the bags sends a lot of extra waste to the landfill. Not only do you have to dispose of it once it is empty, it also is contained in its own plastic packaging when you purchase it. The bags are petroleum-based plastic and the long and narrow nature of them does not allow many diapers to be squished into the bag.

While many of us use a diaper pail for odour purposes, my current set up of a regular kitchen-type garbage pail with a lid with bio-bags works well with minimal odour. By using bio-bags I am not throwing away unnecessary packaging, the bags degrade, and the packaging of the bags is biodegradable as well. Check out our bio bags from Nature Babycare at http://www.betterbabybums.com/product-p/006db50.htm

Anyone want my Diaper Genie? Maybe I can make a planter out of it.