Holding tobacco companies accountable for environmental harms caused by cigarette butt waste

A new study co-authored by Kelley Lee, Tier 1 Canada Research Chair and health sciences professor, calls for tobacco companies to be held accountable for the environmental harms caused by cigarette butt waste.

Cigarette butts are the most common waste product in the world with up to 5 trillion cigarette butts disposed each year worldwide. The study describes how two-thirds of butts from smoked cigarettes are discarded in surrounding environments, buried in landfills, or washed down storm drains. Inappropriate dumping of cigarette butts leads to costly cleanup and, in some situations, requires emergency response.

“Discarded butts are a major fire risk,” says Lee. “The Vancouver Fire Department extinguished more than 35 grass fires caused by discarded butts in just one week during last summer’s dry weather. Municipalities spend millions of dollars each year trying to clean up discarded butts and it is still not enough. A new regulatory approach is long overdue.”

Other industries that produce hazardous consumer goods, such as paint, fluorescent light bulbs and unused pharmaceuticals, are legally responsible for safe disposal. The study argues that tobacco companies ignore the responsibility of butt disposal.

“We have to remember that this is ultimately an industry-created problem,” says Lee. “The tobacco industry has designed and marketed a product that is, not only deadly when used as directed, but generates substantial and dangerous environmental pollution.”

Lee co-authored the paper with Clifton Curtis, Policy Director for the Washington DC-based Cigarette Butt Pollution Project. Curtis says, “The new approach would mandate the industry to prevent, reduce and mitigate the unacceptable environmental harm caused by tobacco product waste.”

In addition to her research, Lee is working with colleagues to update SFU’s tobacco control policy. “We collected over 45 kilograms of cigarette butts in three one-hour student-led butt cleanups. We need to strengthen university policy so that our campus communities can be cleaner, safer and healthier.”