January 27, 2020
Pittsburgh-based startup, PittMoss, explains the benefits of switching to upcycled soils.
Pittsburgh, PA — PittMoss, revolutionary manufacturer of upcycled paper products, has released the study, “The Positive Environmental Impact by PittMoss in 2019.” The company calculated that its customers’ use of its various PittMoss products resulted in a net savings of 597 metric tons of C02 emissions in 2019. That much CO2 is equivalent to burning over 628,000 pounds of coal, over 23,000 propane cylinders, or 13,882 barrels of oil, or driving cars over 1.4 million miles.
PittMoss was able to make this calculation thanks to an independent study conducted by Good Company Ventures, which revealed that digging up a cubic foot of peat moss (the primary competitor to PittMoss products) emits the same amount of carbon dioxide as burning eleven pounds of coal. This release of CO2 happens when the highly acidic peat is exposed to light and air, oxidizing the carbon. The UN Environment’s Global Peatland Initiative has found that “Peatlands cover less than three percent of the Earth’s surface but are the largest terrestrial organic carbon stock – storing twice as much carbon as in the world’s forests. In fact, greenhouse gas emissions from drained or burned peatlands account for five percent of the global carbon budget.”
Incorporated in 2015, PittMoss was the invention of Mont Handley, whose vision was to create an alternative to peat moss, the main ingredient of potting soils in the US horticultural market. Instead of using peat, which is typically mined from wetlands in Canada and trucked into the US, Mont invented a way to engineer recycled paper into high-performing growing medias. Thus, by using recycled paper, PittMoss has the additional environmental advantage of diverting paper waste from landfills. In 2019 alone, PittMoss upcycled over 67 tons of paper and 70 tons of cardboard.
PittMoss’s current CEO, Brian Scott, is excited about bringing the founder’s dream into reality, stating “It is so gratifying for our team to see Mont’s vision come to light in such a measurable way. We are thrilled that more & more customers join us every day on our quest to provide a superior solution to the soil problem, to better protect the global environment.” Since its products initially hit the market in 2014, in the past 6 years PittMoss has diverted over 3,000 metric tons of CO2, a staggering feat that’s equivalent to burning over 3 million pounds of coal or 7,000 barrels of oil. The company is energized to continue this progress into the new decade.
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