Paper cup left (but plastic lid), Styrofoam cup right
Call out the SWAT team, the Dunkin' Donuts on University Drive is still serving their hot coffee (and presumably tea and hot chocolate, oh my!) in Styrofoam containers in defiance of the Amherst ban which went into effect at midnight.
Well, maybe defiance is a tad strong. Since Amherst is one of only four communities in Massachusetts with such a ban, maybe the big multinational corporation was simply never aware -- although they are home based in Massachusetts.
With the college aged youth demographic (59%) so prevalent in our little college town we are probably a highly profitable market segment.
And yes, since the Board of Health can only fine them $100 - $250 day, that would probably only require a half-hour's worth of sales to cover.
12 comments:
fortunately not one of DD's 354 menu items contain peanuts. (but they of course warn customers against cross-contamination.) I wonder why that is. there are plenty of items with milk and eggs and wheat, and people have allergies to those.
i think (tee hee) that their decision (i can't stop giggling over this one!) is "NUTS"! tee hee hee! get it? do you get the play on words?
I want to scream -- learn your damn science before trying to save the planet.
I can accept well-intended people when their facts are right -- but saying styrofoam damages the ozone layer is like talking about the toxic nature of Hydrogen-Hydroxide and not realizing that each and every one of us would be quickly dead without it.
Fluorocarbons used to be used to make the bubbles in the styrofoam, and the issue was the CFCs and the Ozone layer. Not only have fluorocarbons not been used in twenty years for this, they are not even allowed to be used for asthma inhalers and people's lives are being jeopardized because of that.
Furthermore, even if an evil & greedy corporation wanted to use them, they'd be way too expensive -- they'd go broke quite quickly.
Oh, and the scary-sounding chemical known as Hydrogen-Hydroxide? Yes, it is quite corrosive and will dissolve a lot of things. It's also known as "water" and the things it will dissolve include sugar and salt.
Learn your science Ed. Not one of the cups or plates in question is made of Styrofoam.
The foam cups are being eliminated for no other reason other than no one wants to recycle them because by weight they don't bring in much of any profit. All the myths of them polluting etc are jut that. To this day all the foam plates and cups account for less than 1% of all landfills by volume and weight. No one wants to bother to recycle them. The recycling business is a for-profit business and if you ain't profiting from a product you push to eliminate it completely.
I didn't even think DD had a paper cup that they could use. Glad they do. OK tell them to get rid of polystyrene, Larry!
I bet Sarah Palin is behind it. She always seems to be thumbing her noise at people are trying to do something for our health, or for the health of the environment. It's unclear why she's fixated on this self destruction thing, .....some of her hick followers seem to worship her for it. It would be handy to know the name of the manager of that store, and the owner of the DD franchises around here.
Funniest part is that most states don't have a foam recycling centers or foam collection centers. Massachusetts has five. In fact it's the only state in the northeast or eastern seaboard for that matter that has as many.
Anyone that tells you they are saving the environment is seriously ignorant to the facts. It actually takes more energy to make paper cups and the environmental costs for paper are far greater. But like the myth of man-made global warming, some towns and cities are jumping on the bandwagon of ignorance because as I've heard the rather ignorant argument is, everyone knows foam cups are not recyclable and really bad for the environment. About as smart as saying a Prius is better for the world.
But what are we going to do to recycle the cups, put a nickel deposit on them? It's "possible" that at some point in time DD will have trash cans specifically for styrofoam, but I can see them being about as immovable as the bottlers a few years ago when we proposed bottle and can deposits. And we still don't have deposits for all the containers we should have. I can hear the excuse machine from them revving up and getting ready to go into high gear now.
I am still laughing about what Sarah Palin did at CPAC last year -- she walked in with a Super Big Gulp -- probably 64 ounces, and said something to the effect of "Mayor Bloomberg, you're not telling me what I can drink."
She then held the cup up like Lady Liberty holding her torch. It was a defining moment -- the people have had enough.
Um, global warming is not made up. Sorry to burst your bubble (the one that you live in).
Walter, you are truly cracked-- biomedical animal studies have no relevance for human health and global warming isn't caused by human activities. You've got some really stupid ideas. You're an example of why Republicans don't want better education- they want their supporters to stay stupid- why else would they vote against their own best interests and keep electing them.
Amherst, what a joke. The world will someday be burning / collapsing around them. The good people in Amherst will still be debating Styrofoam, Guantanamo bay detainees, the percentage of minority educators in the school system, 32K for the library budget, 60K for human services, or the value of each tree based on type, size, and age. Get a life people. Start doing something and stop debating it. Forget the theoretical and try doing something practical. If you do this the communities around you and the rest of the state might stop laughing at just how ridiculous and hypocritical you really are.
"Call out the SWAT team, the Dunkin' Donuts on University Drive is still serving their hot coffee (and presumably tea and hot chocolate, oh my!) in Styrofoam containers in defiance of the Amherst ban which went into effect at midnight." (emphasis added)
Walter, much preferring that of McDonalds (which is also cheaper), I can't honestly even remember the last time I purchased coffee at Dunkin Donuts.
But I do know how to read and the word "Styrofoam" is the word "Styrofoam", is it not?
Although I do agree with you about how this "recycling" stuff is little more than corporate welfare for well-vested interests.
And a personal note to the tree-huggers -- those damn CFL lights produce so little light in cold weather that I have to supplement them with gasoline-burning Coleman lanterns. Now which do you think does more damage to the air -- when you realize that Coleman lanterns have NO pollution controls on them...
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