165 billion packages were shipped in the U.S. last year — using about 1 billion trees worth of cardboard https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

‘Tis the season for gift returns, and there sure are a lot of them.

In December, Americans will return more than 1 million packages to e-commerce retailers each day https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

E-commerce returns are a hidden environmental crisis. Those tens of millions of packages accounted for:

5 billion lbs of landfill waste in the U.S.
15 million tons of carbon emissions https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

Consumers are returning more and more every year. In 2018, Americans sent back 10% of their purchases, or $369 billion worth, up from 8% two years earlier.

It’s a global trend: In Sweden, return rates can be as high as 60% for some products https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

In 2017, only an estimated 10% of returned merchandise ends back on the shelves. The rest is sent on to:

Discounters
Recyclers
Charities
Landfill
Incinerators https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

That’s right: Billions of pounds of returns end up in landfills and incinerators.

Making matters worse, getting those products from customers’ homes to wherever they end up is a carbon-heavy process https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

Because online items are returned at a much higher rate than traditional ones, emissions exceed what they'd be at brick-and-mortar outlets.

Even as companies like Amazon transition to sustainable packaging, returns will keep adding to their resource usage https://bloom.bg/32G5S60 

A ban on free returns would naturally meet stiff opposition. But a few other steps might help the problem:

- Adopt carbon emission labeling
- Stop providing ready-made return labels
- Returnless refunds for products that can’t be sold again https://bloom.bg/32G5S60