I’ve gotten asked this before, and I tend to agree with Grist’s “Ask Umbra”:

[I]t doesn’t matter very much whether you use the blow dryer or the paper towel. The impact of how you dry your hands is so small that you’d be far better off spending your time and energy on more important issues, and those where the environmental payoff is clearer — such as converting the lighting in all those public restrooms to energy-efficient light fixtures (or convincing the powers that be to do the converting).

Posted by TheGreenMiles on 23 August 02007 @ 9am

Uh huh, now what I’d like to see is a study determining how many people just give up on the damn things and wipe their hands on their pants.

Posted by Bubby on 23 August 02007 @ 9am

I’ve noticed that the new interstate rest stop on 64 west just prior to Richmond has the loudest blow dryers I’ve ever encountered. Seriously they sound like jet engines. I was going to submit a comment in the box provided, but of course they were not stocked.

Posted by zen on 23 August 02007 @ 4pm

It may not matter whether I use the hand dryer or paper towels, but it does matter whether 300 million people use one or the other collectively.

Posted by Waldo Jaquith on 24 August 02007 @ 12am

I’m with Bubby. Electric hand dryers are useless crap.

Posted by Jack on 24 August 02007 @ 9am

what about Penis-melting Zionist cyborg combs?

Posted by james on 24 August 02007 @ 8pm