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Written by Blair Berson   
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Wednesday, 23 November 2011

Green Beauty
There are a variety of harmful chemicals used in the production of beauty products.1 When thinking about your makeup and other skin and hair care choices, it is also important to make note of the expiration date. It is easy to get lazy and keep using old mascara rather than going out and buying a new and fresh bottle. However, when these products get old and pass their expiration date, they become a host for harmful bacteria.2 Luckily, we now have easy solutions to greening our cosmetics, benefiting our personal health and the environment at the same time!


BENEFITS FOR THE ENVIRONMENT: Organic products are made with very little or no chemicals. Therefore, by making the choice to use organic beauty products, you are helping cut down the release of toxins into the environment.

BENEFITS FOR YOUR HEALTH: When choosing which makeup line, skin care product, nail product, or hair product to use, it is important to know that you may not only be harming the environment with your choices, but also your own health. These products are not regulated by the FDA, seeing as they are not considered edible products. People who use makeup everyday apparently average out to absorbing about 5 pounds of chemicals per year.3 And do you check to see whether or not your beauty products have expired. If not, then think about how many harmful bacteria are growing and reproducing in your old makeup… yikes!

Cost: Moderate
Clearly, when disposing of expired products, and replacing them with new fresh products, you will be spending more money than if you were to finish out the whole old mascara vile, lipstick, perfume, eyeliner, etc.. Yet if you continue to use expired products may be putting your health at risk, and on a more vain note, you will be more apt to develop skin infections, acne, allergic reactions (i.e. rashes and redness), eye infections, and possible skin discoloration.4 You can always make your own products which is extremely friendly on your wallet!

Time and Effort: Moderate
Yes, in all honesty, it may take a bit more time and effort to go through your makeup bag, check your products, and dispose of your favorite items that have just expired. However, it is well worth keeping yourself healthy and bacteria free!

Step 1
Go through your makeup and see which products you need to dispose of once past expiration. Here is a little cheat sheet for how knowing how long you have to use your products. The time starts from the time you open the product.

Mascara

3-6 Months

Blusher

12-18 Months

Lipstick

18 Months

Tinted Moisturizer

12 Months

Foundation

6 Months

Eye Shadow

12 Months

Liquid Eyeliner

3-6 Months

Eye Pencil

24 Months

Shampoo

24 Months

Shower Gel

24 Months
5


Also, make sure to clean your brushes! You should be washing your brushes and sponges every 2-3 months, for they can also carry harmful bacteria if not cleaned regularly.

Step 2
Look at ingredients in the products themselves. Sometimes organic skin and hair care items may contain real fruits, so it may expire in as little as 4 weeks. In addition to making sure that your beautifying and hygiene products are still within a healthy time frame to use, you may want to also check out the chemicals used in your products. Here is a great and helpful link for your investigation: ewg.org/skindeep.

Step 3
Time to get some new concealer and/or foundation? I know that we all want to cover up our tiny blemishes, so if you feel you really need these products, try to find products made with very little or no chemicals so that you are protecting yourself as well as the environment. Here is a great link for tons of eco-friendly concealer/foundation brands:
goodguide.com.

Step 4
 If you are trying to look for organic makeup products, there are different labels out there, but look for the label “USDA Organic” because as it is one of the most trustworthy labels regulating ingredients found in food and some cosmetics. The label can only be applied to products that contain agricultural products, as these are the only terms to U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates and enforces standards for.6 The problem is that there really is no regulation of ingredients used in beauty products that are not “agricultural” and thus you mainly need to look at the list of ingredients. A good rule of thumb is to avoid products that list ingredients that sound like they were made in a science lab—stick to products with ingredients you know. For a more thorough set of guidelines to follow when looking for chemical-free beauty products, read this Green America article . This article also has links to many natural beauty care companies, so check it out before you go to the store!

Step 5
If you are interested in making your own organic cosmetics and hair care products at home, check out these Greeniacs Guides:
Browse all Greeniacs Guides Browse all Greeniacs Guides        Browse all Greeniacs Articles
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1 http://www.hallgold.com/toxic-chemical-ingredients-directory.htm
2 http://www.dailyglow.com/dangers-of-using-expired-beauty-products.html
3 Id.
4 Id.
5 http://www.ourvanity.com/beauty/makeup/expired-cosmetic-products-are-dangerous/
6 http://www.thedailygreen.com/living-green/natural-beauty-cosmetics/natural-beauty-product-labels




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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 23 November 2011 )

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Green Facts

  • It takes 6,000,000 trees to make 1 year's worth of tissues for the world.

  • American workers spend an average of 47 hours per year commuting through rush hour traffic. This adds up to 23 billion gallons of gas wasted in traffic each year.

  • Washing your clothes in cold or warm instead of hot water saves 500 pounds of carbon dioxide a year, and drying your clothes on a clothesline six months out of the year would save another 700 pounds.

  • Refrigerators built in 1975 used 4 times more energy than current models.

  • A single quart of motor oil, if disposed of improperly, can contaminate up to 2,000,000 gallons of fresh water.

  • If every U.S. household turned the thermostat down by 10 degrees for seven hours each night during the cold months, and seven hours each weekday, it would prevent nearly gas emissions.

  • Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild our entire commercial fleet of airplanes every 3 months

  • An aluminum can that is thrown away instead of recycled will still be a can 500 years from now!

  • One recycled aluminum can will save enough energy to run a 100-watt bulb for 20 hours, a computer for 3 hours, or a TV for 2 hours.

  • Glass can be recycled over and over again without ever wearing down.

  • Due to tiger poaching, habitat destruction, and other human-tiger conflicts, tigers now number around 3,200—a decrease in population by about 70% from 100 years ago.

  • You will save 300 pounds of carbon dioxide for every 10,000 miles you drive if you always keep your car’s tires fully inflated.

  • You’ll save two pounds of carbon for every 20 glass bottles that you recycle.

  • Plastic bags and other plastic garbage thrown into the ocean kill as many as 1,000,000 sea creatures every year.

  • Recycling for one year at Stanford University saved the equivalent of 33,913 trees and the need for 636 tons of iron ore, coal, and limestone.

  • Recycling 1 million laptop computers can save the amount of energy used by 3,657 homes in the U.S. over the course of a year.

  • For every 38,000 bills consumers pay online instead of by mail, 5,058 pounds of greenhouse gases are avoided and two tons of trees are preserved.

  • You will save 100 pounds of carbon for each incandescent bulb that you replace with a compact fluorescent bulb (CFL), over the life of the bulb.

  • Turning off the tap when brushing your teeth can save as much as 10 gallons a day per person.

  • Nudge your thermostat up two degrees in the summer and down two degrees in the winter to prevent 2,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere.

  • Every week about 20 species of plants and animals become extinct.

  • Current sea ice levels are at least 47% lower than they were in 1979.

  • A tree that provides a home with shade from the sun can reduce the energy required to run the air conditioner and save an additional 200 to 2,000 pounds of carbon over its lifetime.

  • In the United States, automobiles produce over 20 percent of total carbon emissions. Walk or bike and you'll save one pound of carbon for every mile you travel.

  • Recycling aluminum saves 95% of the energy used to make the material from scratch.

  • 77% of people who commute to work by car drive alone.

  • Shaving 10 miles off of your weekly driving pattern can eliminate about 500 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions a year.

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  • A laptop consumes five times less electricity than a desktop computer.

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  • Recycling 100 million cell phones can save enough energy to power 18,500 homes in the U.S. for a year.

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  • In California homes, about 10% of energy usage is related to TVs, DVRs, cable and satellite boxes, and DVD players.