While most of today’s one billion cigarette smokers realize the damage being inflicted upon themselves with each draw from their treasured cancer-stick, the majority have no idea of the harm their bad habits are inflicting on the environment.  Sure they feel bad about the inability of their toxic butts to biodegrade, the enormous amounts of trash that their packaging and plastic lighters create, and the fact that they continuously take first place on the most littered item list, but there’s much more to this picture.

The tobacco plant is responsible for massive amounts of soil degradation and erosion as it draws nutrients from the soil quicker than every other plant crop.  Aside from the 200,000 hectares of land cleared annually to grow the tobacco itself, nearly 5 million hectares are brought down each year to cure the leaves and enable them to be processed, stored and transported.  This curing process oftentimes takes place within wood-constructed curing barns, placing further demand on the forests. Moreover, each rolling machine utilizes six kilometers of paper per hour, averaging an entire tree for only 300 individual cigarettes.  Smoking has also been convicted for initiating nearly one third of the world’s accidental forests fires, allowing us to confirm that forests indeed take the brunt of this tobacco induced beating.

Next in the ring, we find chemicals.  No, not the 4,000 chemicals inhaled upon its ignition; but instead the enormous amounts of pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers that enter the environment in order to protect the fragile plant from pests and disease – oftentimes 16 different applications during only a 3 month period. Other chemicals (namely greenhouse gases) are created when oil, coal, or charcoal are used (in place of wood) to provide heat during the weeklong curing process.  Topping this chemistry experiment off are the 210 billion metric tons of chemical waste created during cigarette manufacturing.

Now that the smoke’s been cleared away, I encourage you to inform others about how leaving one’s habits in the ashtray is a significant way to help preserve this planet’s health.