Re: So the already exorbitant price of pampers go up...
The usual argument against traditional nappies is the energy and water embodied in the cotton that's used to make and launder the things, and the detergent*, but it's just about possible to get away with a dozen nappies for one child**, so long as you keep on top of the washing.
We found a report (I think it might have been this one (pdf) - though the date is later than I remember) which claimed that for one child the environmental impact was similar between disposable and reusable nappies, but some of the assumptions made - for example that 10% of people iron their nappies - were a bit silly. Since then the UK's electricity mix has changed, so the CO2 output for washing and drying would be different, and of course the embodied energy from manufacture is halved if the nappies are re-used for a second child.
What the report completely ignores is the environmental impact of the disposal of plastics. Again, reusables probably win here as if you choose the right nappy liner the only plastic involved is the waterproof "plastic pants".
Yes, it's a faff and yes, you will need a stock of disposables for certain occasions, but it's not impossible.
M.
*There's an interesting trade off here between nasty washing powders and simply washing the things at a higher temperature. We used basic "Fairy" powder, not too much, pre-soaking the worst nappies in Napisan, and washed at 90C. Measurements at the plug found that 90C only used something like half a kWh more than washing at 60C (60C kills bugs that survive 40C washing)
**I think we ended up with two dozen in total over four children, but one half was a lot thinner than the other half and we tended to use just the thicker, fluffier ones. I think we passed those on to someone else once ours were finished with them, while the thinner ones have found second lives as cleaning cloths, dusters etc.