THE GOODS : ECONOTES : Pining for the Perfect Tree for the Holidays?

It’s trim-the-tree time, which brings up the annual debate: Artificial? Live? Cut? Potted? There are even a few rental places.

The good news is no matter what type of Christmas tree you choose, these days you can find some environmental benefit. “People have more options every year,” says Stephanie Alpting-Mees at California ReLeaf in San Francisco.

Cut trees are back on the acceptable list, she says, because 90% of California’s cities now have tree recycling programs. “We think it’s fine as long as you consider where it comes from--grown on a tree farm as a crop, not dragged out of a forest where it was part of an ecosystem--and where it’s going.”

One warning: trees with flocking or tinsel are nightmares for recyclers.

The Sierra Club weighs the pros and cons of tree choice in its new “Green Holiday Guide.” Artificial trees, which can be quite realistic, are non-biodegradable plastic and metal. If you buy one, suggests the Sierra Club, make it last a lifetime.

Cut trees can be recycled into your city’s curbside pick-up and mulching programs, the group says, but too many still end up in landfills.

The Sierra Club warns that if you get a live tree to plant in your yard or donate for planting, you should check to be sure the species can be replanted and realize it needs more care and attention than a cut tree.

Los Angeles’ TreePeople (which doesn’t accept post-Christmas donations of trees) suggests the Norfolk Island Pine as a good species for replanting in Southern California.

TreePeople is promoting its Tree Dedication Program for gift shoppers, says Karen Johnson. “For $15, you can have a tree planted, and the recipient gets a beautiful greeting card saying a tree has been planted in their name. Sometimes the recipient wants to go with us to plant it.” Information: 1-800-753-TREE.

Potted trees top the shopping list from the California Public Interest Research Group, which issued its annual “Buy Green” report in Los Angeles last week. The report identifies 10 clean and green alternatives to environmentally unsound products that abound during holidays, such as solar-powered toys and strings of popcorn and cranberries instead of tinsel and plastic foam.

“We added trees to the list this year because our shoppers found a lot more available at nurseries,” says CALPIRG’s Adam Skolnick.

The ultimate in eco-efficiency is a tree in a pot that is brought in every year, says Samm Coombs of San Francisco, whose Halo Books publishes the handbook “The New Green Christmas.”

“You can keep it outdoors in a pot, or bury the pot in the garden, or knock out the bottom, until the tree gets unwieldy,” he says. “You’ll need to trim the roots, but anyone who would take this much trouble knows how to do that.”