The hand drying question...?

Question

Most public toilets/washrooms have either a hand dryer, paper towel or one of those big rolls of towels. Which is the most environmentally friendly?!

Answer 1

The hand dryer. Even though paper is made from trees it takes so much chemicals to make paper and these chemicals are dumped straight into the environment in streams, rivers, oceans, or holding ponds which still lead into our drinking water.
I know the hand dryer requires electricity which requires either coal, or gas or other material to burn unless it's generated by Neclear enegery. But the amount of waste of one kilo of electricity damage to the environment compared to paper is nothing. paper mills use large quanities of electricity and chemicals, and the environment damage is about 1000 to 1 with paper being the worst of two evils.
and that is not to mention the smell or fumes into the environment.

Answer 2

The most environmentally friendly method is the hand towel as is washed in big washing machines in large batches, as they are washed in large amounts they are the most economical and environmentally friendly to re-produce.
The paper towel is usually made from recycled paper (but not always,) which use chemical processes and electrical power to produce. They do cause negative environmental effects and sometimes ecological harm.
The electric hand driers collect and recycle germs, they also use quite a lot of electricity which adds to global warming and a higher increase of the greenhouse effect, (how often have you you seen them still running after the user has walked away!).

Answer 3

I guess a fair amount of fuel goes in to transporting, washing & drying the roll-towels. There's also the detergents to consider which pass in to rivers.
On that basis, I'd say the hand dryers (with short 20sec timers) are most environmentally friendly, even though they will use a fair amount of fuel. This assumes they are reliable & don't need replacing too often.

Answer 4

For reasons already mentioned the warm air blower is most environmentally friendly.

When using one, however, DON'T constantly rub your hands together. This prevents air from getting to large areas of skin. Waft them in a figure of eight around each other in the air stream to maximise the evaporation rate from the entire skin surface, only give quick rub to spread the moisture about again if you feel one area getting dry.

THIS WORKS; it will halve your drying time so halve the energy usage.

Answer 5

Just NEVER wash your hands in public toilets. Do you know that the dirtiest part of the whole procedure is the flushing handle, the taps in the washbasin and finally, if that is not enough, the door handle on the way out. I handle everything in there with toilet paper including the door handle.

Filthy places.

Answer 6

Just shake your hands!
Incidently I recall reading about about a study done to determine which method of hand drying left your hands cleanest. The people in the trial placed their hands in some sort of gel I think which detected bacteria.
The dirtiest way was to use the blow drier - think they thought the warm air helped blow germs onto your hands. Cleanest was paper towels.

Answer 7

hand dryers are the most environmentally friendly, but they are not that good

Answer 8

neither,wipe them on your jeans,or sleaves or shake them dry that way is the most environmentally friendly to dry your hands,total fact, you want the best answer you got it.lol.just keeping it real.

Answer 9

that is a very good question i think i would go with the paper towel as it has allready been recycled ... does not use fossil fuels and doesnt pollute with detergent .

Answer 10

the dryer is more enviro friendly less trash no cutting trees but those things suck when it comes to drying your hands