- Emily Pilloton Discusses the Hippo Roller and other Designs for Humanity (Part One)
- Janine Benyus on Biomimicry in Design (Part Two)
- Janine Benyus on Biomimicry in Design (Part One)
- Andy Revkin - Climate in the Obama Age
- Fred Pearce - Confessions of An Eco-Sinner (Part Two)
- Fred Pearce - Confessions of An Eco-Sinner (Part One)
- Chris Goodall - Ten Techs to Save Our Butts (Part Two)
- Chris Goodall - Ten Techs to Save Our Butts (Part One)
Entries for April 1, 2007 - April 7, 2007
Total this week: 138
art4aid: Use Your Art to Make a Difference
by Kathreen Ricketson, Canberra, Australia on 04. 7.07
Stir is a youth initiative of World Vision Australia, they run various design, art, music and youth culture projects to involve a younger generation into taking an interest in world events. Art4Aid, just one of their initiatives, is an art/design competition, with an aim to help spread the message across Australia that we can and want to Make Poverty History!
Art4Aid theme for 2007 is global poverty and how we can make it history. Closing date for entries is 1 June 2007.
Make the jump to see winners from last year and to learn more about Stir....
Challenging "Toyota's Eco-hypocrisy" at the New York Auto Show
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 7.07
When we last wrote about the Toyota Tundra in these pages, readers said that there was a role for big pickups on farms and in industry, and that Toyota wasn't going to leave that market to GM and Ford. Thus they developed the Tundra, which is bigger and gets worse mileage than either of its competitors. Others aren't so sure that is a good idea; activists from the Freedom from Oil Campaign hacked the New York Auto Show with this banner. “Building Priuses does not give Toyota license to mass-produce the Tundra,” said Sarah Connolly, the co-director of the Freedom from Oil campaign for Rainforest Action Network. “If Toyota really believed in curbing global warming, why did they argue with the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers in the Supreme Court that CO2 is not a pollutant and that the EPA should not have the right to help regulate greenhouse gas emissions?” ::Freedom from Oil...
The LED Era is Upon Us: Philips Luxeon Rebel
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 7.07
Philips has just introduced a teensy little LED that could have a big impact. At just 3mm by 4.5mm, it delivers 80 lumens per watt, which makes it just about the most efficient light source around. The small size reduces the manufacturing costs, the size of the circuit board and can fit in fixtures that are 50% slimmer. It is also rated for 50,000 hours.
It is also colour balanced in warm, neutral or cool white so it will look good in the home. “LUXEON Rebel will cause a rapid change in solid-state lighting design,” said David Eastley, Product Manager. “LUXEON Rebel takes advantage of our latest chip, phosphor and packaging technologies to accelerate the use of LEDs in a wide range of lighting applications, particularly residential and other ‘white lighting’ applications for which LED options have been limited.” Available now from ::Philips via ::Ubergizmo...
Solving the Installation Puzzle: Puzzle Floor
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 7.07
Hardwood floor installation is a skilled job and repairs are difficult; engineered floors are easier, but still require some skill with a saw and are just thin veneers of wood or plastic. We have often said that the greenest flooring around is probably sustainably harvested hardwood but that is not for the do-it-yourselfer, and people often need floating floors when installing over concrete in apartments.
Then there is Puzzlefloor, which takes sustainably harvested hardwoods and makes 5/8" puzzle pieces out of it and finishes it with a 10 layer urethane/ aluminum oxide coating for durability. However what we really like is the process....
Battery Electric Vehicles of Bristol
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 04. 7.07
Bristol, UK, just keeps on popping up on Treehugger. Most recently we talked about the potentially ground breaking Transition City Bristol initiative, a community lead process to plan for peak oil, but as we noted then, it doesn’t end there. It’s also home to not one, but three local, organic eateries (here, here and here), and innovative wind energy projects here and here. Now we have another project to add to the list – Battery Electric Vehicles of Bristol. BEVOB is a community led group based in and around Bristol and the southwest of England to promote the use of Electric Vehicles (or EVs) as safe, reliable and environmentally responsible alternatives to the internal combustion engine. The group’s website includes examples of a few members’ vehicles, competitions and information on vehicles for sale. The organization recently celebrated the grand opening of the first public EV charging points in the South West (an event which included test-rides on a Vectrix) and apparently interest is building in the town for viable alternatives to the combustion engine. ...
Another Green Show for HGTV and a Green House up for Grabs
by Mairi Beautyman, Berlin, Germany on 04. 7.07
Basking in the success of "Living with Ed" (check out TreeHugger’s exclusive interview with star Ed Begley), HGTV is flush with new environmentally-focused programming for 2007. The home and lifestyle channel is geared to premier another green show and launch the first annual HGTV Green Home Giveaway. "Red, Hot and Green," a new green design series, will premiere Sunday, June 10 at 9 pm ET/PT. Starring craftsman and green enthusiast Carter Oosterhouse and Eco-stylist Danny Seo, and hosted by Steven Lee, the show will “demonstrate that today's environmentally-focused designs can be fresh, stylish, and accessible,” according to HGTV promotion material. Based on the popular HGTV Dream Home program, the 2008 HGTV Green Home Giveaway will award one lucky viewer a custom-built, fully-furnished, home—constructed using eco-friendly materials, energy-saving appliances, and natural textiles. This Fall, Oosterhouse will also star in the new series "Carter Can," premiering Saturday, October 6 at 10:30 am ET/PT. Although not billed as a green show, Carter will offer eco design alternatives during each episode. Also check out "Green Force", which recently premiered on HGTV Canada. ::HGTV...
BottleCycler: Better than it Looks at First Glance
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 7.07
I was all set to get myself in trouble again like I did with the Solar Powered Trash Masher. Australia's BottleCycler "reduces the disposable volume of your empty bottles by 80% The machine, inside your bar area, reduces the volume by crushing the glass into recyclable pieces, fast, quiet, safe and easy." I was going to say that crushed glass is good for nothing but paving, blasting and fibreglass production and that this was downcycling at its worst, and that this did not compare to deposit and return systems where the glass can be separated by colour.
Then I read further and learned the important stuff- it is part of a well thought out system. The BottleCycler does mix up different colours of glass, but the company picks up the glass in special trucks to avoid cross-contamination, and delivers it to VISY glass recycling, which has laser driven equipment that can ""see" up to 16 million different colours at high speed. Highly accurate air jets then sort the glass into its different colours and removes any nonrecyclables such as caps and corks and the like. The facility can automatically sort glass pieces as small as 6mm." More than 80% of the glass is turned back into bottles. ...
Baseball Stadium Goes Nuclear
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 7.07
In Ontario, one cannot go to an event that calls itself any shade of green without seeing the signs "Powered by Bullfrog", the fabulously popular wind and hydro power service. Bullfrog invented sexy branded electricity and other suppliers must be green with envy. Now Bruce Power, the recently privatized nuclear plant, has inked a deal with Ted Rogers, owner of the Toronto Blue Jays and the Rogers Centre, to plaster the joint with "Power supplied by Bruce Power". This is appropriate because when the roof is closed, it rather looks like a containment vessel. Some environmentalists are appalled- "Bruce wants to portray itself as a big cuddly bear" said one, and it is unfortunate that this was announced on the same day that the Auditor General denounced the sale of the Bruce as too expensive and that the rates were too high.
A recent study looking for nuclear waste storage sites suggested that the sedimentary soil beneath Toronto and surrounds was very stable and suitable for long term storage. We understand that Ted has also made a deal to store the waste from the Bruce plant under the pitchers mound. ::Tyler Hamilton in the Star...
Congress Critters Practicing Green Flight Patterns
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 7.07
Perhaps its the idea of Roasted World sinking in. Or, a desire to save money. In either case, US Senator James Inhofe deserves an honorary Tree Hugger award for co-sponsoring this bill. Via Federal Times - "Thousands of federal buildings would get more efficient lights and other equipment to reduce energy use under a Senate bill with bipartisan and White House support. Introduced March 27 by the unlikely duo of Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and James Inhofe, R-Okla., the legislation would require the General Services Administration to create a program to hasten installation of energy-efficient technology in more than 8,000 federal facilities it owns or leases. The bill would require GSA’s Public Buildings Service to improve insulation, update heating and cooling systems and add energy efficient lights at the buildings, with the goal of reducing their energy costs by 20 percent in five years."...
Pizza Fusion: Organic, Hybrid, Wind Powered Franchise
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 7.07
Pizza Fusion, a Florida USA-based restaurant chain was "born out of a desire to serve delicious natural & organic food in a clean, unique and comfortable atmosphere." Pizza Fusion advertises that they are the only such restaurant company which owns a fleet of hybrid delivery cars. Their stores are also 100% wind-powered. And, Kenny Luna, check this out: On the 3rd Saturday of every month they offer kids an Organics 101 course, where they learn to make organic pizza. The Pizza Fushion leftovers, if there are any, might even be good for the pet dog, as they offer gluten-free pizza as a health conscious alternative. With franchise offerings, they are positioned to grow (and of course to be emulated)....
Video: Sexy Green Car Show
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 6.07
The Final Report Is Out - And It's Not Pretty
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 6.07
Under the header "Roasted World," We summarized prepublication coverage of the much anticipated second IPCC climate report, which would be detailing regional impacts of climate change . With that summary report out today, it turns out that some of the contributors got heated up from the all night editing process. Via the Washington Post:- "Agreement came after an all-night session during which key sections were deleted from the draft and scientists angrily confronted government negotiators who they feared were watering down their findings." And to now one's surprise, "The United States, China and Saudi Arabia raised many of the objections to the phrasing, often seeking to tone down the certainty of some of the more dire projections." (Those of you who were around for the drafting of the Kyoto Treaty will recall OPEC nations objecting then as well.) Bringing all this home for US readers (where the lesson most needs to sink in), we recommend this article from the LA Times, where they lay out the regional implications, drawing on a corroborating study that was just published:- "The driest periods of the last century — the Dust Bowl of the 1930s and the droughts of the 1950s — may become the norm in the Southwest United States within decades because of global warming, according to a study released Thursday. The research suggests that the transformation may already be underway. Much of the region has been in a severe drought since 2000, which the study's analysis of computer climate models shows as the beginning of a long dry period." Peak Oil and Peak Objections are about to correlate with Peak Drought, leading to Peak Reality Facing. We are about to enter the "what should we do now" phase.
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World's Largest Thin-Film Solar Power Plant Opens
by Justin Thomas, Virginia on 04. 6.07
The largest thin-film solar power plant in the world has opened in Germany, dubbed the “Rote Jahne”. It was built by the contractor Juwi Solar, and it will have a total output capacity of six megawatts. It uses 90,000 solar modules to capture quite a bit of sunlight. Thin-film solar modules are cheaper than crystalline modules and produce more energy per unit of installed capacity. The thin-film cells were made by First Solar. The solar plant is built on a former military airfield, and its module surface area comprises approximately 16.5 acres.
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Discovery Communications Announces New Network: PlanetGreen
by Kara DiCamillo, Newport, Rhode Island on 04. 6.07
We reported in February that the Discovery Health Channel was adding a new natural living show to their lineup. Now Discovery Communications is announcing something even bigger: they’re adding a whole new network. Called Discovery PlanetGreen, the network will be one-of-a-kind with 24-hour programming dedicated solely to living a green lifestyle. Discovery Channel’s Planet Earth, the 11-part mini-series event which started on March 25th, had an overwhelming response (if you’ve seen it you definitely know why) and clearly demonstrated the interest and passion that viewers have for our planet. “The Earth has been central to Discovery since John Hendricks first chose the planet to represent our brand,” said Chief Executive David Zaslav. “The goal of Discovery PlanetGreen is to use Discovery's worldwide credibility to be the most comprehensive and trusted global resource for celebrating, preserving and protecting the planet.” ...
How Much Land to Power The Whole World with Solar?
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 6.07
"Solar power systems installed in the areas defined by the dark disks could provide a little more than the world's current total primary energy demand (assuming a conversion efficiency of 8%). That is, all energy currently consumed, including heat, electricity, fossil fuels, etc., would be produced in the form of electricity by solar cells. The colors in the map show the local solar irradiance averaged over three years from 1991 to 1993 (24 hours a day) taking into account the cloud coverage available from weather satellites." Note that current solar panels have an efficiency higher than 8% (more than double that, in many cases). For more info and details on the sources, see this page. Via Reddit. Thanks to Matthias Loster!
See also: ::Incredible Growth for Solar Power Industry, ::Video: Past, Present and Future of the Solar Industry, ::TreeHugger: Solar Archives...
Most Huggable: Malaysia Holds the Rain, MoMa’s New Skin, Flexible Solar Batteries
by Jacob Gordon, Nashville, TN on 04. 6.07
Malaysia is developing plans to require rainwater collection on more expansive roofs… The stylish MoMA stores have switched their packaging skin to a high-tech and greener TerraSkin… Researchers claim they’ve combined the best of both worlds: thin film solar cells and flexible battery storage… After last month’s big news at TXU, new windpower comes online for the Texas power company… Tired of TreeHugger? Impossible. But if you’re looking for some fresh green, take a GreenOptions tip and StumbleUpon something new… Most Huggable is a daily roundup of some of the most tantalizing stories from Hugg.com, TreeHugger’s user-generated green news site. Why not submit your own green news? ...
Food Climate Research Network - Looking at the LCA of Food
by Jenna Watson, Barcelona on 04. 6.07
The Food Climate Research Network (FCRN) joins the food industry, Government, universities and NGOs to find ways of reducing greenhouse gas emissions coming from the food chain. This UK based research organization has a simple but informative website that explains its goals and tempts us with future publications, as yet not available. They are researching ways of reducing emissions all along the food chain (from agricultural to food processing, distribution, home storage, preparation and final waste management) all while taking a life cycle approach. Their ultimate goal is to reduce the food chain’s burden on our fragile climate. Their research areas include meat and dairy, fruit and veggies, cereals and oilseeks, sugars and alcoholic beverages (which currently are lacking in the LCA department). Based on these findings they plan to, “develop a series of visions as to how a less greenhouse gas intensive food system might be achieved.” We will be anxiously awaiting those visions. ...
Prisoners Smash Computers
by Mark Ontkush, Boston, Massachusetts, USA on 04. 6.07
Did you know that inmates in the US are being afforded the opportunity to recycle eWaste? The program has been running since 1994, through an arm of the government-run corporation UNICOR which opened its first eWaste 'business' in Florida. Since then, the company’s electronics recycling program has spread to other federal prisons across the country. In 2005 the company recorded $64.5 million in profits; inmates get paid between 23 cents and 1.15 per hour for their services. Dell got nipped a while ago for supporting the practice; they have since discontinued it.
What do they do? Well, when the program began, the job consisted of raising CRTs over their heads and smashing them down on metal tables to separate the glass from the recyclables. Ultimately inmates might want to reevaluate the risks, which are outlined in a excellent joint report entitled Toxic Sweatshops. In addition, the March 2007 issue of Prison Legal News has picked up on the practice, which suggests, amongst other things, that the program to just there to provide a labor intensive activity to keep inmates quiet. And, as the article reports, inmates are dying from the exposure to the toxic chemicals in the eWaste....
Wallpaper* Magazine: April 2007
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 6.07
As usual, the design-hungry folks at Wallpaper* magazine from around the globe have searched high and low for the next big thing (and currently hot things) in design, interiors and lifestyle, and, as usual, have found a good deal of very pretty, sleek accoutrements for the modern lifestyle. With a focus on design first, you know that anything that makes the cut has been designed to be thoughtful and sexy, so it's great to see more and more examples of sustainable and green design in the glossy pages. They were taken by David Trubridge's work (above, center -- we've featured his furniture before), which they found in Shanghai (page 076), and determined that rattan, once maligned in the design world for its "1970s hippy look", has entered something of a renaissance and has been discovered as a useful material suitable for modern furniture and interiors (above, right, and page 092). In Los Angeles (page 126), they peeked at the restaurant owned by Michael Wilson (son of Beach Boy Dennis Wilson), which is part of MODAA, the Museum of Design Art and Architecture, a LEED-certified, mixed-use development leading the way in Culver City's emergence as a new center for architecture worth paying attention to. Lastly, they make a trip to The Omnia in Zermatt, Switzerland (page 172), a car-free town that presents some interesting design challenges, met with solutions like an electric buggy customized with an Eames-like veneered wooden interior. As always, lots more inspiring eye-candy and forward-looking design in the print mag, and improved month-to-month coverage at wallpaper.com. ::Wallpaper*...
Kids Closets May Be Goldmine
by Kenny Luna, North Babylon, NY on 04. 6.07
When I recently took a glance at my school's weekly calendar it intrigued me to see that the Leaders Club had been able to collect 75 pairs of old sneakers for a recycling effort. Then when I saw that they'd been able to combine their efforts with those of schools around us to compile an impressive 1,374 pairs headed to the recycling bin I was determined to dig deeper. It turns out they were taking part in Nike's Reuse-A-Shoe program that works to keep old, worn-out sneakers out of landfills and instead turns them into basketball courts, tennis courts, athletic fields and even running tracks. It's reducing waste, reducing the use of raw materials, and teaching kids about environmental responsibility at the same time. And with roughly 53,000,000 kids in grades K-12 in the US alone, it appears to me that there are certainly an awful lot of potential recycled sneakers hiding in kids closets across the country if someone in every school just takes the initiative to get with the program......
The Genes and Politics of Kenaf: Making Paper’s Best Alternative Better
by Karin Kloosterman, Jerusalem, Israel on 04. 6.07
New Zealand Researchers Experiment with Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells
by Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, St. Louis, MO on 04. 6.07
In '05, Tim took note of Australian company Dyesol, which has been working on the development of titanium dioxide solar cells for over a decade. It appears that something of a race towards this technology is developing "Down Under," as Massey University's Nanomaterials Research Centre (New Zealand) has released news about its own research to "enable New Zealanders to generate electricity from sunlight at a 10th of the cost of current silicon-based photo-electric solar cells." The Centre's Dr. Wayne Campbell and colleagues have developed a range of colored dyes that can be used in "dye-sensitized solar cells." According to Science Daily,The synthetic dyes are made from simple organic compounds closely related to those found in nature. The green dye Dr Campbell (pictured) is synthetic chlorophyll derived from the light-harvesting pigment plants use for photosynthesis. Other dyes being tested in the cells are based on haemoglobin, the compound that give blood its colour. Dr Campbell says that unlike the silicon-based solar cells currently on the market, the 10x10cm green demonstration cells generate enough electricity to run a small fan in low-light conditions – making them ideal for cloudy climates. The dyes can also be incorporated into tinted windows that trap to generate electricity....
Varian Designs Launches The Timber Collection
by Leonora Oppenheim, London, UK on 04. 6.07
This Saturday 7th April (that's tomorrow folks!) Varian Designs will be exhibiting their debut collection at San Diego State University. The Timber Collection is made up of five hand crafted pieces of furniture created by graduate design student Forest Dickey. The five pieces are made from recycled 19th century wooden beams, combined with machine sawed materials and laser cut steel. The effect is one of traditional rustic furniture with a distinct contemporary twist. Dickey says, "Varian Designs is devoted to making intelligent, referential, and environmentally conscious furniture that enriches the lives of those involved in its creation and use." The Timber Collection will be exhibited at the Everett-Gee Jackson Gallery on the San Diego State University campus, April 7th, 6-9 pm. Via: LiveGreen Blog ::Varian Designs...
Loblolly House in Architectural Record
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 6.07
Every year Architectural Record does its Record Houses issue, their pick of the most interesting houses of the year. The most Treehugger friendly is of course the Loblolly house, which I cannot be effusive enough about, with its offsite construction, piers instead of basements, and use of off-the-shelf components. There is also a stunner in Hawaii by James Cutler, an concrete cube in Chile and some other overly large but interesting dwellings out in the country. More when they become available online.
Previous posts on Loblolly House here and here...
Carbon Footprint of Brazilian Soybeans
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 6.07
Driver preparing dinner: Lalo de Almeida for The New York Times
When I read a story like this I wonder why we even bother. It seems that China can't grow enough soybeans to feed itself as internal demand for pork, poultry and beef increases, and the main source of soybean imports, the US, is getting priced out of the market as the farmers all switch to corn, so it has turned to Brazil where land is cheap and soybeans still plentiful....
Turkish Delights
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 6.07
From the depths of the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul comes this fragrant and exotic gift. A bar of jasmine and a bar of lavender soap, wrapped in brown paper with twine and an amulet to ward off evil spirits and a card with the name " abdullah" on it... A trawl through the net reveals a treasure of a stall in the souk selling natural olive oil soaps with a completely natural olive oil base and all natural ingredients. The fragrances reflect their composition: lavender, chamomile, rose, orange, sesame, tea, and cinnamon. Should you decide to visit the hamam, the communal steam bath, they have loofahs made of pure goats' hair, to scrub your skin and the tiny shop has pure, natural cotton and silk pestemals, which are like sarongs, to wear in the hamam. For the house are mohair rugs, made of hand-spun goats' hair in natural colors, hand loomed and hand brushed in local villages. They are the traditional handiwork of east Turkey and were originally used by nomads to keep warm. All of the products are from natural handmade materials from small workshops, without a trace of factory-manufactured materials. Is this the Grand Bazaar's only natural, almost organic, shop? Worth checking out... :: abdulla...
“I’ll Compost Your Corpse” – The (Organic) Demise of Ethical Man
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 04. 6.07
We have previously reported on the BBC’s Ethical Man, AKA Justin Rowlatt, here and here. While Justin is still very much alive and well, the time has come for him to bury his more altruistic alter-ego. In a fitting end to this educational series of reports, he explores an intriguing offer from a viewer – to compost his corpse. As it turns out, this isn’t that easy to do. The environmental problems of cremation and burial are duly discussed, in some detail:
“Apparently, the problem with the way a corpse decomposes at the bottom of a grave is that there isn’t enough oxygen to get a good aerobic compost going. The main by-products of aerobic decomposition include carbon dioxide and water meanwhile anaerobic decomposition produces methane - 23 times as powerful a greenhouse-gas as CO2.”...
The TH Interview: Lawrence Bender on 18Seconds.org
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 04. 6.07
Not content with co-producing An Inconvenient Truth, Lawrence Bender (who also happens to have produced Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Vol. 2, Good Will Hunting, Pulp Fiction, Anna and the King, Jackie Brown, and Reservoir Dogs) really does want to change the world. He is the founder of 18Seconds, a campaign we featured here, which is focused on empowering the individual to take an easy step toward energy efficiency - switch just one incandescent bulb for an energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulb. The campaign has brought together major retailers, celebrities, internet providers and environmental groups, and is aiming to harness the power of friendly competition and civic pride to bring about real, lasting environmental change in America. In this interview he tells Treehugger how 18Seconds came about, how the campaign works, and why he believes it can lead to a significant shift in environmental consciousness.
TH: How did the 18seconds project come about, and what are its goals?
Lawrence Bender: I was having lunch with Amy Iorio, general manager of Yahoo! News to discuss how we could work together. She told me about Yahoo’s new interactive map. She had been thinking of ways to “green” America by getting individuals to connect through Yahoo’s new technology. So I pitched her this idea....to create a feedback mechanism. Every time somebody bought a CFL, they would be able to go to this site and see how many CFLs were bought, plus how much money, energy, and CO2 gasses were saved in their area. I brought the idea to Wal-Mart, which quickly embraced it as part of its own CFL awareness campaign. The campaign later expanded to include government agencies (DOE, EPA), AC Nielsen and Environmental Defense. Many others have joined the 18Seconds network and will continue to join.
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Longpen Bookfest at Green Living Show
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 6.07
Who knows what people are remembered for. Hedy Lamarr became famous for acting in a lot of second rate movies, but now is remembered for US patent 2292387: the invention of frequency-hopping spread spectrum communication, that has "served as the basis for modern spread-spectrum communication technology used in devices ranging from cordless telephones to WiFi Internet connections." (wikipedia) Margaret Atwood is one of the world's most successful authors, winning Bookers and G-G's galore, but is also the inventor of the Longpen, where a pantograph meets the internet and videoconferencing. We thought it interesting when we covered it but now we are beginning to see the impact it might have. Her books are better than Hedy's movies, but this Longpen has legs.
The Green Living show in Toronto at the end of April is running string of book signings that anyone would kill for- Robert Kennedy Jr., David Suzuki, Tim Flannery (introduced by Graeme Gibson) and George Monbiot (introduced by Margaret Atwood). Instead of flying them in at great carbon cost, they are all appearing by longpen, powered by the wind through Bullfrog. One can talk to them all and get them to autograph that book, they are spread out from Australia to the UK, yet it is carbon free.
Normally, a show might be able to nail one or two authors of this calibre. Now, through the Longpen, they can have an entire slate of them. What book lover could miss such an opportunity. ::Green Living Show...
Molo Rocks!
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 6.07
We have always loved Vancouver designers Stephanie Forsythe and Todd MacAllen, who hit the scene a few years ago with the softwall and followed up with the softseating. They are at it again with the completely silly but wonderful felt rocks:
"sculptural pieces, made from 100% pure wool felt - solid all the way through, and are individually hand dyed in a painstaking process. felt rocks come in sets of 5 hand selected rocks, contained within a natural grey wool felt bag. The rocks vary in shape in size, but average about 4-6 inches across."
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Sun Cube By Green and Gold Energy Of Australia
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 6.07
Back in 2005 Warren reported on the "Sun Ball", which is now become apparently the Sun Cube". Via Energy Blog, we just noticed that Green and Gold, after some more R&D, has announced that they are ready to go commercial with the roof mounted Sun Cube, priced at approximately US$ 1,000. Per Energy Blog, the "600 kWh/year SunCube Mark 5 Solar Appliance™ is with toughened glass lenses, internal 2 axis tracking motors / grid connect inverter." A 1,000 unit per month manual assembly line is in use, with plans for expansion commensurate with market response....
Sublime Magazine Issue 2: The Silent Road
by Petz Scholtus, Barcelona, Spain on 04. 6.07
The second issue of this first international ethical lifestyle magazine Sublime, is just an as ‘essential read for creative thinkers and inquiring minds’ as the first one. It’s themed The Silent Road along which Laura & Damian Santamaria, as independent publishers, are taking the risk of starting a quite journey. ‘Words are powerful, but words without actions are just hot air’ and that’s why the two editorial directors are tackling today’s issue of monopolies where the people end up paying a high price.
The 130 glossy pages of Revive 50:50 paper (50% recovered waste & 50% FSC certified fibre) take you past breathtaking images such as geologist Bernhard Edmaier’s photographic journey of unspoiled areas of the earth Global Pattern, the stunning fashion photographs of Swedish designer Sandra Backlund and Hannah Engelkamp’s Lifelong Journey which enquires the value of pilgrimage. Lots more loud silence in an interview with Kiefer Sutherland, in Clean Start which investigates alternatives in the car industry, in the interview with Erik Schlosser and Richard Linklater about Fast Food Nation and in self-sustaining solutions to poverty Made In Sudan. That and more fashion, design, architecture (the most beautiful energy-efficient homes), soul, beauty products and the coolest bikes on the market in the second issue of this bi-monthly magazine.
A magazine preview is available on the Sublime web site, as well as the link to join their independent Think-Tank. Subscribe online or grab a copy at Barnes & Novel in the US or WHSmith in the UK. Price per copy: US$6.99, UK£4.95, €7.99 ::Sublime Magazine
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Free San Francisco Classes: Sustainable Landscaping & Composting
by Team Treehugger, Worldwide on 04. 5.07
Full disclosure: PG&E is a TreeHugger sponsor (or "was", if you are reading this post a long time after it was published). If you are outside of the San Francisco Bay Area, you probably don't see their ads on the site, but we want to be transparent about it anyway.
Via Lets Green This City (a site sponsored by PG&E), we found two interesting free classes for you San Francisco residents: On April 7th (from 10 AM to 1 PM) there's a Sustainable Landscape Installation class at the Alemany Farm (maps here). It's the last class in their Resource Efficient Gardening and Landscaping (RELE) program, but prior attendance in RELE classes is not required.
The second free class on April 15th (from 11 AM to 1 PM) is Spring Composting at the Double Rock Community Garden (Griffith & Fitzgerald, located in the back of the Alice Griffith Housing Development). "This fun, hands-on class teaches methods for backyard and worm composting for home and community gardens. Come learn what you can do to improve your garden and prevent organic waste from ending up in the landfill!"...
Videos: Baby Duck Feeding Carps, Cute Otters Holding Hands
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 5.07
The Three Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 5.07
A clever example of the second "R", via Reddit and Flickr.
There's a big debate in the comments on Reddit on whether the plastic used for CD spindles is safe or not... Any plastic experts around here? Please enlighten us in the comments....
Recycled Cashmere Quilts
by Kara DiCamillo, Newport, Rhode Island on 04. 5.07
‘Tis the season for baby showers, weddings and springtime gatherings so next time you’re looking for a gift, think practical. Everyone could use one of these recycled cashmere blankets, whether as a throw while reading a good book or to wrap their new bundle of joy. Designer Wu Moonching uses recycled bits of cashmere that come donated or from moth-bitten sweaters found at local thrift shops. She cuts them into strips and then sews each together with contrasting thread and then backs it with cotton gauze. The results are beautiful blankets made of one-of-kind varying shades. And they are so lightweight that they can be used all year round. Moonching also offers scarves made from recycled materials as well as recycled iPod cases. Thanks for the tip, Heidi B.! Via ::Daily Candy ::Sun Moon Lake Quilts...
Energy Star: Earth Day 2007 Giving Tree
by Team Treehugger, Worldwide on 04. 5.07
We treehuggers are very familiar with Energy Star, the joint program between the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the US Department of Energy (DOE). Their logo can be found on all kinds of goodies (even outside of the US). This year, they have decided to celebrate Earth Day with a special online event called Giving Tree.
The way it works is that you have the option of picking "one of 10 Easy Ways to Give to the Earth" and you can "[dedicate] your Earth Day gift to someone you love and add a leaf to our Earth Day Giving Tree." Among the gifts suggested to the Earth for her birthday are things like sealing up drafts in your house, programming your thermostats, talking to your employer about energy management and signing up for renewable energy. To find out about the others options (we encourage you to do them all and explore Energy's Star website for more resources), check out the Giving Tree website. They even mention TreeHugger.com the Tree's page! Thank you, Energy Star!...
Ask TreeHugger: Do Scented Candles Stink?
by Helen Suh MacIntosh, Cambridge, MA, USA on 04. 5.07
Question: I have scented candles in my bedroom and living room, which I like to burn when I come home from work and want to relax. Lately, I have noticed that my walls look a little dingy. Is this from the candles? Why?
Response: In addition to leaving a nice smell, scented candles can also leave black soot and other pollutants (such as formaldehyde and acrolein) inside your home. The soot (especially) can deposit onto your walls, ceilings, and other indoor surfaces, leaving these surfaces looking dirty and dingy.
Not all candles are equally polluting. Several scientific studies have shown scented candles to be more polluting than non-scented varieties, producing more soot as the result of more incomplete combustion that may occur from the presence of additional chemicals in the candle. The amount of soot produced can vary depending not only on the type of candle, but also the type and length of the wick and how drafty your house is. This variation can cause one type of candle to emit 100 times more soot than another type of candle. As you are probably seeing, emitted soot can mean more cleaning and interior home maintenance for you. In addition, it is also possible that soot and other chemicals emitted from the candles may harm your health, since soot from outdoor combustion sources has been linked to bad health outcomes. However, the health impacts from candle-produced soot are not known....
Filthy Farmgirl Cleans Up Dirty Hippies
by Jasmin Malik Chua, Jersey City, USA on 04. 5.07
We received some exquisitely aromatic soap samples from Filthy Farmgirl recently and can personally attest to their all-natural sudsing goodness. With flavors like Cheeky Ginger Citrus, Sassy Honey Oatmeal, and Coffee Vanilla Vixen, it's hard to misfire, but the California- and Hawaii-based company ups the green ante further with its earth-loving operations.
The herbs and spices found in the vegan-friendly soaps are mostly sourced from local organic farmers—that is, when they're not grown and harvested on site. Filthy Farmgirl's headquarters and farm are completely solar-powered and off the grid, with a similar setup in the works for its California office. ...
Interview: Verdiem, Making Computers Use Less Energy
by Mark Ontkush, Boston, Massachusetts, USA on 04. 5.07
Wouldn't it be great if your PC took energy consumption into its own hands? By this I mean it would turn itself on and off, shut down the monitor, and go to sleep automatically. Sure, there are a lot of products out that manage power consumption for computers (including OSes), but I'm talking about going one step further- the computer actually learns something about you. It knows you write in spurts, knows that you leave for lunch between 11:30 and 12 every day, knows you never show up on the weekend. It learns your habits so that it can reduce its own power consumption accordingly, without inconveniencing you.
Doesn't that sound, say, farfetched. In actuality, the technology exists and is being deployed to thousands of PC worldwide. VerdiemTM, the inventor, was at hand to explain it to Treehugger in this exclusive interview. Kevin Klustner, CEO of Verdiem, explains the marvel.
So, tell us a little about Verdiem Kevin, the product, the business.
Hi Mark, thanks for inviting me to this interview. The company was founded in 2001 by an entrepreneur whose wife was a school teacher. In light of the consistently tight budgets facing the district, the founder's wife was upset by the amount of energy, and therefore money, wasted by school and district computers that were left on all night. The founder wrote a program to turn them off, and that's where it all began. ...
HauteGREEN 2007: Accepting Submissions for the Best in Sustainable Design
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 5.07
HauteGREEN, a design exhibition of the best in sustainable home furnishings, is now accepting applications for the 2007 show. Held during the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) at New York's design week (May 19 -22), HauteGREEN will feature a curated collection (with Graham Hill, on board as one of the curators) from both emerging and established designers, in New York and around the world. Spotlighting design that is beautiful, functional, and sustainable, the event showcases furniture, lighting, and accessories that are both aesthetically pleasing and eco-friendly -- something that TreeHugger keeps an eye peeled for ever day. We got a good look at some of the designs from last year's show in our HauteGREEN sneak peek series, and buddied up with Alex and Sarah from WorldChanging for a three-part HauteGREEN Salon (here's part one, part two & part three) on TreeHugger TV. Last year's show featured some of TreeHugger's favorite sustainable designers, like Q Collection, Rhubarb Decor, MIO Culture and Bambu, and this year's promises to be bigger and better -- we can't wait! The deadline for submissions is next Friday, April 13, and selections for the show will be announced on or before April 23. There is no fee to submit, and guidelines and forms for submission are available from the HauteGREEN website. Good luck to all interested designers; we'll look forward to seeing more of the best in sustainable design at the show. ::HauteGREEN...
Green Suggestions for Coffee Shops
by Ron Dembo, Zerofootprint on 04. 5.07
This week, Ron Dembo’s daughter, Justine, is writing in his place. Justine is a medical student at the University of Toronto.
I recently realized that the coffee companies of Toronto (and, no doubt, of the Western hemisphere) waste a tremendous amount. I noticed that my fellow medical students buy at least two coffees per day from the hospital Tim Hortons, and each time, they use a new cup, new lid, new straw, and so on. Plus, wherever I see a coffee shop in a mall, there’s no recycling bin to be seen anywhere nearby – and I doubt many people carry the used cup around until they find a bin.
Imagine the waste that could be prevented if people were to use refillable mugs….and better yet, if the coffee companies were to encourage that. And wouldn’t it be wonderful if the coffee cups could be recycled? Wonderful, but hardly a fantasy. Surely we’re at a stage in our civilization where recycling is not a great deal to ask for from people and companies claiming to be even the least bit green. The materials involved in the coffee business are actually recyclable in some places but, regrettably, not Toronto.
Fifteen billion cups of coffee are consumed each year in Canada. That’s 45 million cups a day. Leaving aside for a moment questions of procurement and fair trade, and questions of greenhouse gas emissions associated with food miles, there has to be a real opportunity here to make a difference just by giving a damn....
The Real Dirt on Farmer John
by Siel, Los Angeles on 04. 5.07
What do orange feather boas have to do with farming? For Midwestern farmer John Peterson, bright, glammy outfits work just fine for his 80-90 hour weeks on the Angelic Organics farm. “I love glitz, I love glitter, I love glamour,” says Farmer John while driving a tractor through his farm in rural Illinois, in The Real Dirt on Farmer John, a documentary about his tempestuous relationship with the farming life.
In The Real Dirt, Farmer John often goes about his work dressed to the campy nines, despite the fact that his neighbors have called him everything from a murderer to a devil-worshipper to a drug dealer for his unconventional, un-typically-Midwestern lifestyle. The story begins with Farmer John's childhood, which ends prematurely with the early death of his father. John turns his family farm into an artistic commune of sorts while a college student in the 70s, then faces major financial problems in the 80s when – 30 years old and a half million dollars in debt – he's forced to sell the bulk of his family land, bringing the 350-acre farm down to a 22-acre one. Depressed, Farmer John goes to Mexico for a few years, and discovers writing, penning a play and a number of short stories....
A Manifesto: 1000 Words for Sustainability in Design from Core77
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 5.07
Allan over at Core77 has written a 1000-word manifesto (that's right, exactly), of sorts, for sustainability in design, and it's absolutely worth reading for anyone who actively practices, is thinking about starting, or dabbles in design. Designers, especially those interested in sustainability, have to walk a fine line: design more products (that ideally solve problems while incorporating and further perpetuating sustainability in design) while not creating too much waste, crap or harm; Allan has some solid ideas about how to avoid the latter while embracing the former. Points that hold his manifesto together include: Stop Making Crap; Systems Before Artifacts; Hippocratic Before Socratic; and Screws Better than Glues. Though they all make good arguments as individual ideas, his ideas follow a fairly basic concept that TreeHugger is a big fan of: you have to think about where your stuff comes from (whether materials for design or food on your table) and you can't forget about where it's going to go when you're done with it. We like the way he finished the piece, so we'll borrow it for the same purpose: "The power of design is an amazing thing. Let's wield it wisely." ::1000 Words: A Manifesto for Sustainability in Design...
ASU Announces New Renewable Energy Technology Program
by Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, St. Louis, MO on 04. 5.07
Many North American colleges and universities are making significant strides towards creating a more sustainable educational experience; few, however, are moving forward as aggressively and creatively as Arizona State University. A two-part series in the Christian Science Monitor late last year profiled the university's plans, and the vision of its president, Michael Crow. On Wednesday, ASU announced the next step in becoming a "a new kind of university": the launch of a program in Alternative Energy Technologies at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
The program will be offered at ASU's polytechnic campus in Mesa. According to the university's announcement,The new alternative energy program will educate students about alternative energy sources, such as solar, wind, ocean, geothermal and biomass, promoting a dual energy crisis strategy of conservation or maximizing efficiency as well as vigorous development of alternative energy sources. The new courses that make up the program will prepare students in how to engineer concepts, components and materials. This unique program also compliments other activities at ASU that have similar goals, but different approaches....
Sundance Channel Asks: What's the Big Idea?
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 5.07
If the Convenient Truths video contest only whetted your appetite for producing short, powerful videos with compelling ideas for helping to save the planet, then the Sundance Channel has a question for you: What's the Big Idea? That's the name of their new contest, and they're looking for one minute films about one big idea that will help change the world and make it better, greener place. If they like your video, a lease of a Lexus hybrid and $10,000 to help turn your idea into reality is yours. The contest was launched earlier this week, on April 1, and they'll be accepting entries through April 30. There are a handful of Big Idea examples up to use for inspiration (including one by TreeHugger's own Kenny Luna -- way to go Kenny!); when your video is complete, upload it directly to the site. There, you can also learn lots more about all the good green things that Sundance is up to in preparation for The GREEN block of programming, coming to a television near you on April 17. What your big idea? ::Sundance Channel's 'What's the Big Idea?' Video Contest
Update: Props to TreeHugger's George Spyros, for producing all of the sample videos (they look great, George!), and, for full disclosure, Sundance Channel is a TreeHugger sponsor, and it's important for TreeHugger to maintain transparency, so we want to be clear about that as well....
Roasted World: The IPCC Second Course Is Served
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 5.07
We humans have spent millions of years learning to hang with the 100+ people we know best, and to find our life sustaining resources from a 100-mile circumference of the earth's surface. So, it should seem natural for people to express even more "shock and denial" when the second, and impact-focused IPCC report gets released tomorrow. Global economy not withstanding, imagine how much more closely we'd be roped into 100-mile circumference - and how shocked we'd be - were it not for a near constant flow of updated, online news. Much of what we discuss on TreeHugger comes via the old fashioned investigative reporting of the world's print media. Without the print reporter's probing, flawed as it can be at times, we'd all be in climate knowledge purgatory. How ironic, then, that the internet - blogging in particular - is lately portrayed as print media competitor #1. (Mysteriously, the news paper business has not figured out that some of us might wish to forgo the tree cutting.) A symbiosis between print news and blogging is possible, if news outlets would offer an "opt in" subscription where one is not forced to accept the newspaper in a plastic bag...or even in a double plastic bag!...on the porch or at the head of the driveway. Until that day, and in tribute to the print media's coverage of Roasted World this very week, there follows some excerpts from the print media's anticipatory coverage of the latest IPCC report. A link to the full, original article is at the head of every paragraph grouping.
Title credit: "Roasted World", Dr. John Holdren, incoming President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, via:- John K. Bullard Image credit:- Deviant Art, by yediburun...
TreeHugger Radio: The Supreme Court Rules on CO2, MIT Takes on Biodiesel, and a Little Canary Goes Green
by Team Treehugger, Worldwide on 04. 5.07
This week on TreeHugger Radio, the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA must now take responsibility for carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act. We spoke with Joseph Romm, author of Hell and High Water and the editor of ClimateProgress.org, about this landmark ruling. The Ecomagination/MTVu contest has come to a close with MIT as the winner. Team member Matt Zedler explains how the group plans to turn cafeteria grease into clean fuel for campus vehicles. Also, we talk to the World Wildlife Fund about a new report on the world’s most imperiled rivers, and one of Spain’s Canary Islands decides to go energy independent. Listen to TreeHugger Radio each week on Air America’s EcoTalk, here on TreeHugger.com, or pick up the podcast on iTunes. (listen/right click to download) ::TreeHugger Radio ...
The Postman Always Pings Twice: A Bus Brings lnternet to the Developing World
by Alex Pasternack, New York, NY on 04. 5.07
For those of us who thought this page took a little too long to load, a bus may not seem like the best way to transport data between your home computer and the internet. But if you live in a far-flung village off the grid, that option sure beats walking dozens or perhaps hundreds of kilometers to the nearest hot spot. That's the thinking behind United Villages, a US company that helps villagers in India, Cambodia, Rwanda, Costa Rica and Paraguay send email, search the internet, check voicemail and shop on eBay—all without the need for expensive infrastructure, even electricity. They rely instead on what is essentially a digital pony express, a hot spot on wheels: users do their internet tasks offline on a donated neighborhood computer until a local bus or motorcycle rolls by, its on-board mobile access point wirelessly collecting data from the computer. Upon return to the nearest large town or city, the vehicle sends and receives data to the internet via wired network or satellite. And then the loop continues, back to the village to transmit and receive more data. Computer and antenna are solar-powered; the vehicle is on a route it would already be traveling. It's an elegant, efficient and sustainable idea, and it's one that sees the developing world as the "first mile" on the road to the internet, not the last. ...
Beam Me Up: 3D Scanning is Getting Affordable
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
Scanning or faxing paper is so 1970. Now you can get an affordable Nextengine 3D scanner ($2,495, just a little more than I paid for my first fax machine). It is another step on the road to dematerialized production, where designs are transported over the internet and printed out where needed. 3D Kinko's are opening where you can go to get your object printed out; 3D printers are still industrial strength at about $ 40,000. According to the New York Times:
"The world is just beginning to grapple with the implications of this relatively low-cost duplicating method, often called rapid prototyping. Hearing aid companies, for instance, are producing some custom-fitted ear pieces from scanned molds of patients. Custom car companies produce new parts for classic cars or modified parts for hot rods. Consumer product makers create fully functional designs before committing themselves to big production runs.
Tom Clay, chief executive of the Z Corporation, says he is constantly amazed by the uses people find for his products. Doctors use them to build practice models, and museums build replicas so people can feel the object without damaging the real artifact. He thinks one big potential market will be three-dimensional portraiture, so people can create busts for immortality." ::New York Times
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Superuse: Where Recycling Meets Design
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
I am so in love with Superuse, "where recycling meets design". It is yet another social networking site where you comment and vote on your choices, set up by "2012 Architects and Suite75" and so new that their about page has no content. This is a Digg or Hugg type site that I can get into: great ideas for recycling billboards into birdhouses, subway cars into architects offices, pallets into houses, and my favourite, DC3 wings into desks. (shown below the fold)
2012 Architects are a dutch group of architects who use a lot of recycled materials. From Archis we learn that the firm "views reuse as an integrated design strategy, and is busy creating a network organization for more widespread and efficient reuse in the construction industry. However, ecological considerations were not their prime motivation. More important, in their view, is the creative inspiration they draw from the potentialities of recovered objects. The 'history' that is inherent in used products and materials – and which is absent in unused new materials – offers potential added-value when incorporated in new products and compositions: the ready-made principle of art applied to architecture." Much, much more at ::Superuse via ::core77...
TH Blog Love – Our Favourite Greens Of The Week
by Leonora Oppenheim, London, UK on 04. 5.07
Groovy Green: How To Start A Compost Pile by Aaron Newton
"Here we are cruising into April which means many parts of the country are experiencing the first warm days of spring. Also arriving is the annual spring cleaning of yards across America as people deal with the remaining fallen leaves of last autumn and mow down their lawns for the first time this year."
Inhabitat: T-Shirt Design Competition! by Jill Fehrenbacher
"In honor of Inhabitat’s recent two-year-birthday we are launching our first ever design competition - a green T-shirt design contest! We have always wanted our very own eco-friendly Inhabitat T-shirt, incorporating organic cotton, water-based inks and a super cute design, to illustrate our mission of green design = good design."...
Record Houses: A Modest Little Reno
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
So many houses in Architectural Record's Record House issue are new construction, second homes, off in the country, and bait for criticism about the extravagance and waste of the rich owning second homes. Thus we were thrilled to see a home that is urban, a renovation and restoration, and at two million bucks, wildly extravagant. Christopher Wren's Christ Church was bombed out in WW2 and is now a roofless rose garden; its tower survived and got into private hands. Architect Nicholas Boyarsky has designed an apartment in it: eleven stories high. Owner Kate Renwick must have great legs, going up and down those stairs all day.
Planning approvals took a long time, no new window openings were allowed, and "the utmost in architectural discretion" was required. The biggest floor plate is 231 square feet, which doesn't leave much room after the stairs and a tiny elevator that starts at the third floor. The kitchen and dining room are near the bottom (no need to lug those groceries too far) bedrooms in the middle and the living room is at the top, with a 49 foot high ceiling. If you have the nerve, there is a ladder up to a belvedere. ::Architectural Record not yet on line....
Wheels on Fire
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 5.07
Holland is a small and flat country, so bike riding is an easy, popular solution for travelling short distances. With 16 million people in the country, nearly everyone owns a bike. Many of the older bikes are abandoned at the repair shop or worse... Others finish their lives in accidents, canals or ditches. Wheels-on-Fire, a Rotterdam-based industrial designer, collects old bicycles and turns them into stylish and good-looking lighting, furniture and handbags. The bags for men and women are made out of woven rubber. The women's have long shoulder straps and the men's have a good flap and an air valve as a lock. For the long-distance bicyclist, there is an ingenious and complicated saddle bag. Hanging light fixtures with 7 or 9 lights are made out of the rim of the bicycle wheel, with red or black cord to suspend it. The tables, and deck chairs are made out of woven rubber that could withstand any outdoor weather conditions. :: Wheels-on-Fire...
Book Review: True Green - 100 Everyday Ways
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 5.07
The full title is True Green - 100 Everyday Ways You Can Contribute to a Healthier Planet. And the full impact of such a book is hard to judge. If the question of our time is: our planet is sick, but what can little old me do to help? Then books such as this are the answer. A simple format, clean engaging design, heaps of images, minimal text and maximum information (in keeping with our new sound-bite induced short attention spans). True Green is a modern reworking of earlier classics, like 50 Simple Things You Can Do to Save the Earth, from back in 1989. And the format is much the same. Present an issue, with accompanying scary statistics, and follow through with actions that the reader can take to limit their contribution to said impact. Oh, yeh, and provide a bunch of resources for further information. True Green manages to pull this off with aplomb by being as succinct as possible, and being clear about the solutions one can take. The authors Kim McKay and Jenny Bonnin, with experience in managing the Clean Up the World campaigns, don’t gloss over the tricky points. “while synthetic textiles such as nylon polyester and Lycra are produced from fossil fuels, opting for natural fibers is not the clear-cut environmental choice you might think.” Whence they note that cotton uses a quarter of world’s pesticide and one pound of wool requires 22,400 gallons of water (they suggest going for organic cotton. linen and wool, plus hemp.)...
Spring Bed from Up To You
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
Have we said how much we love the Toronto store /studio/ apartment/ theatre called Up to You? Yes. Now we find new products that we want to spring for, like this bed, "Made from recycled materials including car suspension springs, this bed is such a pleasure to sleep on, you will never be able to get off. This is a truly contemporary, comfortable bed for the environmentally conscious consumer. Mattress not included. Hand signed and numbered by the maker. "
The springs are from Vauxhall Astras, and the frame is reclaimed British pine. We are relieved to learn that there are rubber feet to protect the floor. Made to order, it takes about a month and the price is not yet finally determined. ::Up to You
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Transit Plan in Buenos Aires Favors Public Transport and Overcharges People Driving Alone
by Paula Alvarado, Buenos Aires on 04. 5.07
The Buenos Aires Government has launched a Transit and Transportation Plan to organize the traffic in the city, in which establishes some cool measures that will for sure reduce carbon emissions from cars if implemented right. The plan implies initiatives to favor automobiles rational use, investments in road infrastructure, development of new rail-guided transport alternatives (subways and trains), and a computer data base to inform the exact state of transit considering several elements, in order for people to choose the best way to travel. Though some of the works will take a long time -such as the subway lines extensions and parking places-, some others like the rise of motorways’ tolls will begin next May. Read the full text of the plan and how it can reduce emissions in the extended....
Waves of News About Water
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
TreeHugger is not a fan of bottled water, and we note that the movement to promote tap water has been growing by leaps and bounds. In Ontario, Canada, the government is about to start taxing it, having previously promised "Companies that want to take oil from the ground or trees from the forest have to pay for that privilege. ... But when companies want to bottle our water or export it as part of other products, the [previous] government gives it to them free and without any consideration of the impact on local aquifers,We will end this reckless giveaway." ::Star
In San Francisco, Chez Panisse has banned the bottle and has installed a carbonator so that it can serve San Francisco's finest flat or bubbly. "Our whole goal of sustainability means using as little energy as we have to. Shipping bottles of water from Italy doesn't make sense," says Mike Kossa-Rienzi, general manager of Chez Panisse.::SF Gate
Our favourite source of the latest news on bottled water, Fine Waters: The Water Connoisseur doesn't think much of this, complaining about "imposing a “no choice policy” when it comes to water." which we expected, but as a last ditch measure they have a suggestion worth noting: "Instead of embracing tap water Chez Panisse and other restaurants could have developed a relationship with a number of local bottlers of a natural spring water in the same way as Alice Waters has pioneered it with sourcing local food products." Right. What is more local than tap water? ::Fine Waters...
The 2007 Earth Day Climate: Something Has Changed
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 5.07
With only weeks to go before Earth Day April 22, 2007, the profile of the now 37 year-old event seems subdued compared to the Earth Days of decades ago. As the years passed, imagery associated with it increasingly included 'cute concoctions of kids holding hands or hugging the earth': nothing political or revolutionary. The years of corporate PR alignment made it seem archaic, an easily spun hippie-like custom that few took seriously in a political context. TIme for Earth Day to be re-branded as an event that helps citizens improve things at home, as something that's sexy and lifestyle oriented, something that politicians will want to be associated with. It will be most interesting to see if US presidential candidates of either party will include Earth Day 2007 in their public relations statements. What are your thoughts? See more Earth Day 2007 posts here, and here, and here.
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Building Houses out of Garbage, Not Concrete
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 5.07
Readers have noted that I am not fond of concrete; Dr. Jim Forth of Leeds University isn't either. He has developed the Bitublock, a sustainable low energy replacement for concrete blocks. "Our aim is to completely replace concrete as a structural material," he explained. "Bitublocks use up to 100% waste materials and avoid sending them to landfill, which is quite unheard of in the building industry. What's more, less energy is required to manufacture the Bitublock than a traditional concrete block, and it's about six times as strong, so it's quite a high-performance product."
Crushed glass, incinerator ash and slag are pressed together with bitumen, the goo used to make asphalt and currently being expensively cooked into gasoline at the tar sands, or produced as a biproduct of refining crude oil. The ingredients are heated a bit to oxidise the bitumen and harden into a useful block.
Dr. Forth is also developing a version made from vegetable oil called the Vegeblock. ::University of LEEDS via ::Science Daily, ::PDF of Study Here...
Toyota Prius and Camry Hybrid Selling like Hotcakes
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 4.07
March 2007 was the best month ever for Toyota's hybrid cars (the Prius and Camry hybrid - they also sells a hybrid SUV) with 28,453 units sold (19,156 for the Prius, 5,144 for the Camry hybrid). It's also another important milestone for Toyota: The aggregate of hybrids sold in the US by the company has now reached the half-million mark. "Toyota’s calendar-year-to-date hybrid sales in the US totaled 61,635 units, an increase of 68% over the same period last year." ::Toyota’s US Sales of Prius and Camry Hybrids Soared in March. Image credit: Green Car Congress
Standard car article advice: Walk, cycle, carpool, take public transit, car-share, telecommute. Try to live close to the things you need and to where you work. But if you have to own a car, get the most efficient model that fills your needs, drive sanely, combine trips, keep it in good mechanical condition and keep your tires properly inflated....
TreeHugger Star Search: Harrison Ford (on eBay!)
by Summer Bowen, Santa Monica, California on 04. 4.07
Conservationist and box-office star Harrison Ford will be offering up his ruggedly handsome self for the environment this month. If you’ve got extra green burning a whole in your organic cotton pockets, you can bid on lunch for two with Ford on ebay starting at $2,500 (if Ford doesn’t float your boat, you can also name a microbial species starting at $2,000). The lunch money benefits the E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation.
Among Ford’s green carpet honors for conservation are the 2002 Environmental Citizen Awards, ICCF Good Steward Award, and The World Ecology Award. The actor has also served on the board for Conservation International for over a decade. Back at home in Jackson, Wyoming, he donated 400 acres of his own property for conservation easement to the Jackson Hole Land Trust.
Don’t think the third richest movie star in Hollywood is just writing checks and shaking hands… Ford's been known to police over the Hudson River in his helicopter, in an effort to crack down on polluters.
Says Ford of the importance of biodiversity, “When we protect the places where the processes of life can flourish, we strengthen not only the future of medicine, agriculture and industry, but also the essential condition for peace and prosperity.”...
Incredible Growth for Solar Power Industry
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 4.07
The salmon-pink Financial Times reports today that the solar equipment industry is on a path to grow amazingly fast: From 20 billion dollars last year to 90 billion dollars in 2010. "Profit growth is expected to accelerate even faster, as costs are contained, pushing margins up to nearly 60 per cent." These high profits hopefully will mean more capital investments into production facilities and R&D (which will help further decrease costs), and more companies entering that sector.
A 10-fold increase in production of high-purity silicon, the main material used to make solar panels, is also forecasted for 2015 by Photon Consulting, a German research group. In recent years, because the supply couldn't keep up with demand, silicon has reached prices as high as $300,000 (!) per tonne. ::Solar energy demand soars. See also (we recommend it strongly if you want to learn more about the solar industry): ::Video: Past, Present and Future of the Solar Industry...
Help Pick the New Chevy MiniCar
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 4.07
You don't need a hybrid to use less gas, you just need a smaller car. General Motors is getting this message (as John pointed out earlier) and today Chevrolet unveiled three new small designs from GM' s Design Studio in Incheon, South Korea, where they know something about small cars.
According to the press release, “The original mission was to develop the perfect Chevrolet small car for urban commuters, but after the architecture was developed, the young designers brought so much energy to the project that they came back with not one but three interpretations of how this car could be built and adapted to Chevrolet customers around the world.”
So in a very web 2.0 fashion we all get to vote which of the three designs we like best, not that they give much information on them. Too bad they won't let us make ads for them. All three are fuel-sipping little things. Take your pick at ::Vote4chevrolet via ::Groovy Green
UPDATE: Coverage of the Auto Show on PSFK with pictures of the minicars. ...
Rainforest Alliance Certified Coffee at Holiday Inn Hotels
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 4.07
The Rainforest Alliance has dropped us a note to announce that Holiday Inn will start serving Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee in the nearly 1,000 hotels that the company has in the USA. It's not a perfect deal: Holiday Inn has commited that "at least 30 percent of the beans used to brew the more than 55,000 cups of coffee served at the hotels every day [will] come from farms that have met rigorous environmental and social standards including biodiversity conservation, worker protection, healthcare and education for children of farm workers." But it's still a significant step in the right direction and it will strengthen the Rainforest Alliance's certification and encourage other companies to follow suit. The amount of coffee purchased from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms has, on average, doubled each year, from an estimated 7 million pounds purchased in 2003 to an estimated 60 million pounds purchased in 2006.
See also: ::How to Green Your Coffee & Tea, ::Black Gold: A Coffee Film That Has Starbucks Scared, ::Starbucks Challenge: Fair Trade Coffee, ::Larry's Beans - Just How Good Can Coffee Be?, ::Cafédirect: Fairtrade Coffee Company, ::McDonald's to Start Selling Organic Coffee, ::Green Mountain Coffee Roasters' Organic, Fair Trade Frappuccino™ Alternative, ::Coffee and Global Warming, ::6-Step Program for the Caffeine Addicted...
Convenient Truths: Global Cool Announces Climate Change Film Competition
by Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, St. Louis, MO on 04. 4.07
The star-studded climate change campaign Global Cool announced a new effort last week that sounds vaguely familiar: a film competition on the topic of climate change. The similarities between GC's and Scene Won's contest, and Treehugger and Seventh Generation's Convenient Truths competition are only skin deep, though: while we focused on encouraging videos from anyone with access to a video camera, the London-based organization's competition targets "aspiring young filmmakers," and tempts them with cash prizes of up to £5,000. According to Global Cool's press release:...
Got Hormones? - Hormone Free Milk Not Healthier After All
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 4.07
This whole synthetic hormone in milk argument is just boring for the 50+ million Americans who are lactose intolerant. But we love posting on poo, anyway, like here and here for example; and, we'll take more wherever we find it. Via Minneapolis Star Tribune:- "The company that created an artificial growth hormone widely used to increase milk production called on the U.S. government Tuesday to clamp down on dairy companies that advertise "hormone-free" milk as healthier, saying there's no difference between milk from cows treated with the hormone and those that aren't. St. Louis-based Monsanto Co. urged the Federal Trade Commission to crack down on what it called deceptive advertising and for the Food and Drug Administration to issue warnings to companies that continue to run such ads." Image credit: University of Texas Health Science Center, regarding lactose intolerance. ...
Solar Powered Nintendo
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 4.07
The crazy kids at Toms Hardware who built the solar powered wii took a little flak from their readers for building a device that could not quite get by on solar power (which they could have fixed easily just by adding more panels) so they went back to the drawing board to develop a fully solar powered gaming device, just what everyone needs when the great outdoors gets boring.
In this case, they took a Nintendo DS, and added folding panels that produced enough juice to run the nintendo without its internal battery. When the battery is installed it can charge from the panels for use under the covers at night. Given that the panels are about the same size as the unit, it folds up nicely. Proof that there is nothing under the sun that can't benefit from a little free juice. ::Toms Hardware via ::the sietch
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Plug-In Hybrid School Buses Introduced
by Justin Thomas, Virginia on 04. 4.07
Students in Florida are riding on the first two hybrid plug-in school buses in the U.S. The buses use both a diesel engine and electric motor, and they plug into a power socket at night to charge the batteries. The Manatee School District bought the buses from Navistar, a diesel truck company. This week, another bus will be delivered to a school in Pennsylvania. The first 19 buses cost over $200,000, which is more than double the cost of a regular school bus. At that price, the buses won't pay for themselves over their lives, based on fuel savings. However, analysts say that the plug-in hybrid buses may drop in price, so that they cost only $40,000 more than regular buses. At that price, they will pay for themselves in just a few years with lower maintenance and fuel costs....
Forests Destroyed in China's Race to Sell Floors and Furniture
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 4.07
We have discussed the evils of teak, the provenance of bamboo, the question of merbau. The Washington Post has completed a year long investigation following lumber from the Asian forests to IKEA that is a must read for any TreeHugger. Complete with photo essays and great graphics, it describes how "Every day huge volumes of logs, many of them harvested illegally, stream toward Chinese factories where workers churn out products such as furniture and floorboards. These wares are shipped to major retailers like Ikea and Home Depot, and are bought by shoppers with little inkling of the wood's origins."
Time to think about :: local sustainable furniture and read ::Washington Post...
Beijing Olympians Urged to "Go For Energy Gold": WWF Endorses Carbon Offsets
by Rachel Wasser, Beijing, China on 04. 4.07
The WWF has stepped in the middle of the ongoing controversy about carbon offsets, providing new fodder for TreeHugger’s healthy, keeping-it-huggy debate on the subject. (See Wikipedia for a primer, and check out Mike’s recent cautiously optimistic comments, Mark’s concerns, and your responses in the comments.) Last week, with just 500 days to go until the 2008 Beijing Olympics – which is gearing up to be green and hopefully carbon neutral – WWF urged all would-be Olympians to follow in the clean-as-can-be-(while still flying)-contrails of our own Sami Grover. WWF called on athletes “to be climate winners,” asking that they offset the carbon costs of their travels by donating to Gold Standard climate-change offset projects, and pointing out that 2% of the world’s yearly carbon emissions come from long-distance flights. According to WWF China Country Representative Dermot O’Gorman:...
Man to Live Underwater for 2 Weeks
by Matthew Sparkes, London, UK on 04. 4.07
Marine biologist Lloyd Godson is attempting a brave experiment to investigate sustainable living. He's going to live in a sealed box for two weeks, which will be placed underwater. The experiment is taking place near Albury-Wodonga, in Australia.
Godson will be cultivating algae both as a food source, and to produce oxygen. He will also have electricity via a stationary bike that he's using as a generator.
The air supply is the most important part of the experiment, "We've got some gas monitors and back-up air supplies to make sure that the air quality stays at a high standard. If it doesn't then that's when I'll implement my back-up strategy." This strategy is, presumably, to get out of the box.
By sealing the box he is making a powerful statement, that much of what a human needs comes from a reciprocal cycle with nature. In the modern world we need to remember that the availability of air is reliant on plants, and isn't some commodity that can be bought in a supermarket....
Curl up with a Good Book: Paper Back Swap
by Kathreen Ricketson, Canberra, Australia on 04. 4.07
We at TreeHugger love a freebie, especially one that means something is recycled and re-used rather than thrown away. Bookcrossing and read it swap it are a couple of book swapping sites that have been mentioned on TreeHugger before. Now check out Paper Back Swap.
Its a book swapping club run by real folk, who wanted to find a way of trading paperbacks with each other through the US mail. This is how it works, you receive a credit for every book you mail out. You can list as many books as you like, and the more books you mail to other members, the more credits you get.
With over a million books listed by members on the site it looks like an excellent readers resource! Only for inside the US though - let us know if you have something similar near you. ::paper back swap Image: Flickr [The books from Paper Back Swap don't necessarily look like the books on that picture. Most are probably in good condition, but in this case, it's the content that matters. -Ed.]...
Firefighters Find Environmentalism Helps Common Cause
by Kenny Luna, North Babylon, NY on 04. 4.07
That's right, fire departments and hospitals in places like Pennsylvania and Ohio are engaging in a program called Aluminum Cans for Burned Children, collecting and donating millions of aluminum cans for recycling, and utilizing the redemption funds first to help prevent burns through education, and then to help child burn victims recover both physically and emotionally from their wounds by providing funding for research, annual therapeutic residential burn camps, and other year round activities that support their physical, psychological, and social needs. One such program is to help send kids to an annual five-day Summer Camp for children who have been patients at The Western Pennsylvania Hospital Burn Trauma Center. The Camp for Burned Children provides them with the opportunity to interact with other kids who have also had the difficult experience of being burned and who know the resulting physical and emotional trauma, thereby creating a sense of friendship and inclusion that helps all of them cope with their everyday realities....
The Computer as Art, Friend
by Mark Ontkush, Boston, Massachusetts, USA on 04. 4.07
Do you throw beautiful things away? Probably not, because if you are like most you enjoy things that have taken some skill and time to create. Take, for instance, this Russian computer case pictured at top. Now, wouldn't you do as much as possible to fix that thing to keep it running? Or would you trash it after three years, the average life of a computer. Take a look at it again; unlike most, doesn't smashing that computer seem like a crime?
It's not a new idea, and we have covered these items of wonder before - bamboo mice and notebooks and monitors, for example, all wonderfully crafted. Fact is, no one likes ugly. Ugly gets destroyed, but treating your machine with respect will extend it's life. And the first step out of ugly is to establish a relationship - maybe start by giving your computer a name. Just try it, right now - take a piece of tape, write a name on it, and affix it to your machine. See if it changes your behavior, or your coworkers. If you want, you might try a laser etching to beautify your pal. We're waiting for the comments to roll in....
Yvon Chouinard Gets Fortune Magazine Cover Story
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 4.07
Not for the first time, Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia graces the cover of business magazine. It’s hard to ignore a company that’s been around for 30 something years, gives away pots of money to rowdy environment activists, drops best selling lines for greener ones, yet still makes $270 million USD a year. We glean from the article that Patagonia are working on a new wetsuit design. A non-petroleum neoprene made from crushed limestone with “a lining of recycled polyester and, of all things, organic wool.” And according to the Fortune piece, ”90 percent warmer than other wetsuits, as well as stretchier, stronger and naturally odor resistant.” Chouinard is quoted "We're getting [back] into the surf market, because it's never going to snow again, and the waves are going to get bigger and bigger." On the greener of business he remarks, "I'm blown away by Wal-Mart. If Wal-Mart does one-tenth of what they say they're going to do, it will be incredible. And hopefully America will get a government that we need rather than one we deserve, that will put pressure on business to clean up its act. But the most powerful pressure will come from the consumer. Oh, my God, it's going to be really powerful."...
Hand Cranked Cell Phone Charger
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 4.07
We have shown many solar phone chargers, but the sun isn't always shining when you need to make a call. We have seen crank-up chargers as well, but we like this combination flashlight and crankup charger for cell phones for a lot of reasons: 1) it is good emergency backup (designed in Japan for earthquakes and other disasters) 2) it has built in red and white LEDs for additional emergency use, which can be set to white to act as a flashlight or flashing red as an emergency beacon; 3) with cellphone bills as high as they are, one should have to work a bit to make a call. 4) Imagine how many fewer people would be driving with cell phones to their ears if they had to stop and crank it up every eight minutes. (although many would figure out a way to drive, crank and talk at the same time) 5) only 2,000 yen or 20 bucks. ::Nodaya via ::Trendhunter...
New Green Outdoor Fabrics from Toray
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 4.07
Industrial giant, Toray [1 and 2 ], of Japan, announced last month that they were launching a couple of new fabrics onto the outdoor apparel market. One was an eco version of their Entrant waterproof-breathable outerwear material. According to the press release, which is a bit hazy, Entrant E is “free of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) and other solvents” considered nasty to us and the environment we inhabit. (In another news snippet we read that 98% of solvents were eliminated.) And in achieving this they did not compromise the wet weather performance of the product. Apparently it is such a breakthrough that 20 patents have been filed to protect the development. In a bit of a first, another thread out of the lab is a recycled nylon 6 fibre, known as Recyclon. One reports says it will be used in a fabric with 50% recycled content, while another had it down as 36%, and as best we could make out this was post-industrial content. But either way it is very significant, because nylon has been notoriously difficult to recycle, and virtually no commercial facilities, outside of some carpet firms, exist to process the stuff. Outdoor clothing company, Patagonia, is a long time client of Toray, so expect to see these materials turning up in their line this year. Via ::Apparel Mag. ...
Getting Ready for Earth Day: Eat Local Food
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 4.07
When it comes to learning more & doing more to make your life greener and getting ready for Earth Day, the choices you make in the food you eat every day can make a tremendous impact. There are lots of food choices that you can make that are better than pesticide-laden conventional, hormone-injected factory-farmed food; today we'll concentrate on a few of the benefits and strategies for eating local.
1) Why eat local? We partnered up with EarthTalk to explain the ins and outs of the environmental benefits of eating local.
2) Here are 10 more reasons to eat local along with a handy PDF for easy printing and distribution.
3) Local Harvest is one of the most comprehensive, complete resources for find local food near you.
4) One of the difficulties of eating local is dealing with the changing seasons (and generally smaller harvests in winter) but it's possible to eat local all year 'round.
5) Among its many benefits, local food is more nutritious, even in the winter.
6) Local food is becoming big enough that it was even featured on the cover of Time magazine.
7) If finding time to get to the farmer's market each week proves difficult, joining a community supported agriculture (CSA) co-op like this one is a good alternative.
8) Eating local food can seem restrictive in terms of ingredients, but there are good examples of local food menus that can make a seemingly small amount of choices go further.
To learn more about making Earth Day-friendly food choices, check out our How to Green Your Meals guide and stay tuned for more tips as the big day approaches....
Finally: a Modern North American Pellet Stove From Snoqualmie
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 4.07
North American designs for pellet stoves are usually ugly, traditional knockoffs of grandma's wood stove, and we complain often that one has to go to Austria or Japan to get a decent looking unit, and then find it is not UL approved for North America or costs a fortune to import. When will we get a decently designed modern North American stove?
Apparently, in June. Snoqualmie Stove works appear to have channelled Raymond Loewy and designed this stunning number. What is even better, those fins serve a purpose- they radiate heat and keep the unit safe for kids and pets.
The technology is patent-pending new too: "This stove represents a remarkable new design in pellet burning appliances, boasting state-of-the-art pellet stove technology and offering for the first time, a truly radiant heat pellet stove. The SNQ-1 uses 100% of its surface area as a heat exchanger; from the point of ignition, to the exhaust exit point, the SNQ-1 radiates heat. The stove is based on our patent-pending "Combustion Capsule” technology, a more efficient and cleaner burning alternative to traditional fire-pot technology. Combustion capsule technology eliminates the formation of fused ash, creating nearly complete combustion and extremely clean operation."
It is going through final approvals now, with production starting in June. Line up at ::Snoqualmie Stove Works
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In Praise of Olive Oil
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 4.07
There is something about olive oil--it tastes so good and is so healthy. You can just feel that hot Mediterranean sun baking those ancient trees all summer long. From northern Israel comes Peace Oil, produced by a collaboration of Arabs, Jews, Bedouins and Druze working together. In a small town south of Rome Italy, prisoners are taught to cultivate organic fruit and vegetables, fresh juices, jams and tomatoes as well as olive oil. The idea was to give them a useful skill to take with them when they get out of prison. It's called Fuggiasco Novello ( the running man),if you see it in a local deli. Or you can adopt your own Italian tree and receive a year of produce from it. Nudo has 881 trees and eight groves. With names like Gruffina, Immacolata, and Piano Piano, you can pick your grove, see pictures of it and read about the kinds of trees and the taste of the oils grown in it. Then there is Peligoni Organic Olive Oil from the island of Zakynthos, in Greece, where the farmers still hand-pick the Koroneiki olives from trees that are up to a thousand years old. They’re then hydraulically stone-milled and pressed within 3-5 days. Set up by British visitors to the island, now they export it to England. And from Spain: Nunez de Prado is organic extra virgin olive oil from Andalusia, near Cordoba. This handcrafted organic olive oil is presented in individually numbered bottles, and made by the same family since 1795. Now that's history....
TreeHugger Picks: Dip Your Toe in the Car Pool
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 4.07
Though TreeHugger prefers bicycles and legs for transportation over automobiles, sometimes cars are the only way to go. When the time for four-wheeled, petroleum-powered transportation comes, we definitely recommend that you find a friend who's going the same way. Whether you're heading across town or across the country, there is a way to use more seat belts and cut back on emissions: dip your toe into the car pool.
1) eRideShare is a free service for connecting commuters, or travelers going the same way in the US or Canada, even incorporating Craigslist's rideshare listings.
2) Ridester features a way to both offer and find rides; drivers get paid for gas and riders pay for the lift.
3) NuRide, touted as a frequent-flyer program for cars, takes a proactive approach to cutting down on traffic, petroleum consumption and pollution by offering rewards for documenting your ride-sharing with them.
4) Casual Car Pool gives Bay Area commuters the option for a ride across the Bay Bridge, while avoiding the toll, and riding in the (theoretically faster) carpool lane without pre-registration or advance sign up.
5) If car pooling won't do the job, for whatever reason, a car sharing service is a great alternative to getting around without owning a car....
Dropping Knowledge: Still Asking the Questions
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 04. 4.07
Supreme Court Delivers Landmark Ruling On Greenhouse Gases
by Eric Kane, New York, NY on 04. 4.07
On Monday, the Supreme Court delivered one of the most important environmental decisions in the court’s history. The case in question, Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), challenged the agency’s failure to regulate vehicle emissions of carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act. In a 5-to-4 decision, the court ruled that the EPA has the authority to regulate greenhouse gases (GHGs) in automobile emissions. Although the ruling does not force the EPA to regulate auto emissions, continued inaction would almost certainly result in further legal action. ...
Eco Touch: Waterless Carwash
by EcoGeek.org on 04. 4.07
Eco Touch is providing an old product to a new market. While waterless car washing products have been available for over a decade, demand for them in America has been slight. While similar products have taken off in areas with strict water regulations like the UK and Australia, America has been slow on the uptake.
Eco Touch is hoping that waterless car washing systems will ride into America with the latest wave of environmental concern. The Eco Touch waterless car care system is cheap, easy and contains no petro-chemicals. Each bottle can wash dozens of cars to near-show-room shine and will thus save thousands of gallons of water while keeping the toxic grime from your car out of lakes and rivers.
For an extra five dollars, you can buy five re-usable micro-fiber towels, and if you're not sure if you trust the system, you can get a free sample bottle from ecotouch.net for just the cost of shipping.
See Also ::No Wet Waterless Car Wash and ::Car Wash Clarity...
Cincinnati Reds Host Carbon Neutral Baseball Opener
by Sean Fisher, Cincinnati, Ohio on 04. 3.07
The first professional baseball team in the US has taken the initial steps toward making America's pastime carbon neutral. For Monday's Cincinnati Reds game against the Chicago Cubs, the season opener for both teams, the team purchased carbon credits for the 96 tons of carbon emissions estimated to have been created by the stadium's electricity and natural gas usage (however nothing is mentioned about carbon produced by travel). According to Carbon Solutions Group, the firm handling the team's offsets, the credits will help fund wind and solar power including the financing of an 11 MW wind farm in India. In addition, the team plans to partner with Duke Energy, the local utility company, to provide several "green days" through out the season including an Earth Day meeting with the Philadelphia Phillies on April 22. ::Cincinnati Enquirer
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Summer Rayne Oakes Gets into Denim in 2nd Issue of S4
by Leonora Oppenheim, London, UK on 04. 3.07
Summer Rayne Oakes has just released the second issue of her new quarterly magazine S4. No, this girl doesn't just model, she is reaching deep into the fashion industry to make important social and environmental changes from within. This industry newsletter is designed for "decision makers, press, universities, designers, industry professionals and any one else who is looking to get a deeper understanding of sustainability trends in fashion." This second issue focuses on the denim industry and not only includes information about 50 eco-conscious denim lines, along with fashion editorials, but it also features "an in-depth interview with China Blue’s director, Micha X. Peled, who filmed clandestinely in a Chinese denim sweatshop for three years." Summer Rayne says “The blue jean is the one piece of apparel that everyone can relate to. It gives us an incredible opportunity to discuss the issues and solutions to the social injustices that are happening along the garment industry’s supply chain.” ...
70 Max – Are You In?
by Tamara Giltsoff, United Kingdom on 04. 3.07
70 Max is a grass roots ‘collective’ campaign in the UK that encourages driving under 70 mph* (112 km/h), suggesting if everyone in the UK did this it would save a ton of carbon. It’s kind of a new type of membership, inclusively to those who can drive under 70 mph maximum (not as easy as it sounds if you are like most of the population and enjoy driving fast or generally always in a hurry to get somewhere). Well it’s not quite, but you can see the potential of this collective statement and member behavior change. The campaign is based on the research that 70 mph uses on average 15% less fuel per mile than 80 mph and 60 mph uses 29% less. Calculations also suggest that a top speed of 60 mph would half the number of motorway deaths....
Mexico City has a Healthy Government
by Matthew Sparkes, London, UK on 04. 3.07
The mayor of Mexico City, Marcelo Ebrard, has ordered all government officials to find a greener way to work one day a month. He has banned workers from using their car to commute, and insisted that people either cycle or take public transport.
According to New Scientist, even those workers who are in poor health are not exempt, and must still use public transport. That's quite a bold move, but only one day a month seems like it won't make much of a difference.
Perhaps this kind of authoritarian approach will be more effective than schemes that try to make cycling seem more attractive, maybe the threat of punishment is a stronger influencer than marketing. What the article doesn't say is how the employees are going to be monitored to stop cheating, and what the repercussions will be.
Once people are forced to explore the alternatives to driving to work they may realize that cycling to work can even be more convenient. I would imagine that cycling to work in sunny Mexico City would be quite enjoyable......
CelebrateEarth Day With Green Apple Music & Arts Festival
by Celine Ruben-Salama, New York, NY on 04. 3.07
Last year, 2006, it was the biggest Earth Day celebration in America. This year the Green Apple Music & Arts Festival is going to be much bigger still. From Friday, April 20th to Sunday, April 22nd, 200 performances will take place in over 60 top music venues in New York City, Chicago and San Francisco. Raising consciousness of environmental issues through the unifying voice of music is the goal of the event which truly offers something for everyone. Acts span all genres and include Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds, American Idol winner Taylor Hicks, top children’s act Laurie Berkner, a reunion by jazz fusion band Fat Mama, live electronica band The Disco Biscuits, The Decemberists, Stephen Marley featuring Junior Gong, and many more. Find the full list here.
On Earth Day, April 22nd, the Green Apple Music & Arts Festival will host large-scale free, day-time events for all ages in the participating cities’ finest parks including Central Park, the Lincoln Park Zoo and Golden Gate Park. The Festival will kick off on the east coast with two days of music, entertainment and environmental activities at Earth Fair outside Grand Central Terminal in New York City beginning the morning of April 20. TreeHugger will be there, so if you are around come and say hi! ...
Dining Green
by Jasmin Malik Chua, Jersey City, USA on 04. 3.07
Let's face it, Americans love a good nosh—especially if we don't have to whip it up ourselves. We consume 70 million restaurant meals a day at almost one million restaurants across the country, with each establishment churning out 50,000 pounds of waste, and using around 300,000 gallons of water every year. In fact, it seems we'd do anything to avoid slaving over a steaming hot stove—we spend more than $500 billion on prepared foods every year.
But a growing number of restaurants want to green up their acts, with the help of the non-profit Green Restaurant Association, which is transforming food businesses into what it calls "certified green restaurants." And we're not just talking about screwing on a few fluorescent light bulbs and switching to recycled paper towels....
Thin Clients are the New Black...
by Mark Ontkush, Boston, Massachusetts, USA on 04. 3.07
... on the ledger sheet, that is. Because according to a new report, it turns out that using these "super slimmed down" alternatives to the PC could reduce your cost of ownership by up to 25 percent, as compared to an office equipped with traditional desktops.
Thin clients have been around for years; they are simply a computer that uses a central server for processing activities, where you send your keystrokes and mouse clicks to the server, and you see what is happening on a monitor at your desk. It's very much like having a desktop PC, except that thin clients typically have no almost no moving parts and little memory. This reduces their power consumption dramatically; according to the report, they can use up to 50 percent less energy than a typical PC.
No word on the global impact of switching to thin clients, but if just the 10 million or so PCs in operation in the UK would be switched out for thin clients, businesses could save £78m a year and cut CO2 emission by 485,000 tonnes....
The (Earth) Hour was Nigh
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 3.07
Someone at Australia’s Sydney Opera House must have bruised knuckles. We can only assume that the display lights on this city icon were supposed to go out at 7.30pm last Saturday like many of the others that went black for the inaugural Earth Hour. But they only went off at 8pm! Still it was an impressive sight seeing the Sydney’s nightscape dimmed for 60 minutes. And if the event was primarily designed to get Sydneysiders thinking about energy use and global warming, it seemed to be at least partial successful for folk poured down to the harbour foreshore in numbers similar to a New Years Eve fireworks. WWF who organised the event reckon over 2 million residents joined in and recorded a 10.2% decrease in energy usage. This has been compared to a greenhouse gas reduction in the order of 24.86 tonnes of carbon dioxide - the equivalent of taking 48,613 cars off the road for an hour. Or 200,000 TVs turned off. A Coca Cola sign that hasn’t been turned off since 1972 was shut down for the first time, as were 90 of Macca’s famed golden arches. Over 1,000 businesses listed as participants, including many restaurants who served candlelit meals. Think I even read of one who had a special menu that didn’t require the kitchen to be powered up for the hour. WWF are considering taking the idea to a national or international level, but in the meantime have developed screensaver to help people turn off unused computers. (Ta to Mark for the tip on that one.) Earth Hour Official Site....
Denver Does Green
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 3.07
For the Month of April the Denver Public Library will be promoting a whole raft of green activities for Denverites to participate in, under their Fresh Life program. There’ll be movies, presentation, workshops on the likes of global warming, renewable energy and sustainability. Big names like L. Hunter Lovins will be explaining how business can thrive, while still responding to the impact of global warming. They’ll be workshops on low-water xeriscaping methods, natural gardening pesticide solutions, composting, hiking without a trace, how to make your soap, as well as pillows from old T-shirts. On May 3 to round out the program Laurie David, (producer of An Inconvenient Truth) and author of The Solution is You: Stop Global Warming - An Activist's Guide will host an evening alongside Denver’s Mayor, John Hickenlooper, who promoted the month’s events resplendent in a green suit! Follow the link for a full list of events. ::Denver Greenprint...
TreeHugger Star Search: Rosario Dawson
by Summer Bowen, Santa Monica, California on 04. 3.07
Rosario Dawson’s success story is even sweeter knowing she uses her fame to raise awareness for good environmental and social causes. Dawson, who was 'discovered' on her apartment building porch at age 15, has starred in hits Men in Black II, Sin City, and Rent. When she isn’t on the silver screen, the actress is a spokesperson for the Lower Eastside Girls Club of New York – an organization that addresses literacy and leadership issues. Says Dawson, “You want to give these latchkey kids not just a place to hang out but get them engaged and involved and help them start thinking about college”
Back in ‘05 we reported that Dawson attended a UN conference in support of the Poverty-Environment Partnership – a network of organizations that promote preserving the environment as a means to end poverty.
Recently she's been paling around with eco-style guru Danny Seo. Says Dawson about Seo, "He's fun, he's smart, and he makes it seem so uncool not to think about the Earth." She’s also styling it up green when choosing pieces for her wardrobe - word on the street is that Dawson dons eco-fashionable clothing line Stewart + Brown.
In March, the eco-activist joined fellow celebs Josh Hartnet and Jason Flemyg for the Global Cool text messaging campaign. For just a few bucks a month, fans can get eco-tip text messages from Dawson, with the proceeds supporting the Global Cool Foundation. ...
Which Way To Run: Decision Time For Water Conservation In Las Vegas
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 3.07
Via The Next American City comes an insightful article on the coming culture clash in Las Vegas. Cited directly from the lengthy article, here's the factual context: - "...in 1990, although the farming sector only generated 2 percent of the state’s [Nevada, USA] income, it consumed 80 percent of the state’s water. Nor does agriculture have any ancillary benefit for tourism,... nobody comes to Nevada to see farms. In his 2002 book Neon Metropolis, [Professor Hal] Rothman writes that “Nevada would dearly miss the MGM if it couldn’t get enough water, but if all of Nevada’s agriculture and ranching dried up and blew away, urban Nevada might not notice for years....A 2006 report by the non-profit Western Resource Advocates found that Las Vegas uses 60 percent more water per capita than nearby Tucson, which has encouraged water conservation by, among other things, raising rates for customers. In 2006, the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada (PLAN) determined that Las Vegas could save 153,000 acre-feet (50 billion gallons) of water per year simply by encouraging conservation measures like installing efficient faucets, toilets, and washers in all new homes and not watering lawns." What it seems to boil down to is that Las Vegas is bound into a cultural acceptance of boom development, fed by a fast growing tourism and entertainment economy. Not that there isn't green movement, as we've indicated in our postings here, and here. It's just that water has been managed like poker chips. Unless water conservation is embraced, the Road Runner is building his own trap. Image credit: Road Runner,S. Pinker photos....
Insulated Concrete Forms: Another Opinion
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 3.07
Philip Proefrock over at Green Options discusses Insulated Concrete Forms (ICF's) and appears to like them, saying "they offer green benefits". I like Philip's posts but think there is room for another opinion.
ICFs are a way of building a well insulated concrete wall out of easy to use, lego-like forms made from expanded polystyrene. Neither concrete or styrofoam are particularly green materials, but with rare exceptions all foundation technologies are pretty gross, primitive and invasive and few systems tread lightly on the landscape.
Above grade, the use of ICFs is questionable. They are serious architectural overkill- the up-front carbon load is astounding, and at the end of their life they are good for nothing but landfill. An equivalent insulating value can be achieved without such massive use of carbon and hydrocarbon intense materials.
Yet they are marketed as a green product; one brand is even called eco-blocks. Before we started measuring building materials in terms of their carbon footprint, before we worried about trucking gravel and making cement, before we measured the hydrocarbon content of our insulations, it might have been. Now a green building is one where we tread lightly, build out of recycled and recyclable materials, use as little of them as we can, and think about preconstruction, deconstruction and lifecycle.
ICFs are energy efficient for the occupant, solid and strong, and useful for foundations. However I think we are past the point where anything that saves a little money on heating is called green, the issues are bigger than that now. In such a world, polystyrene and concrete sandwiches are not green.
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Getting Ready for Earth Day: Save Water When You Shower
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 3.07
[Ed. note:] This post continues our series of posts featuring easy, high-impact ideas and tips to help you get ready for Earth Day. Read the previous posts about saving water when you flush, greening your car and saving energy in your home and stay tuned for more!
The typical household in the developed world uses upwards of 260 gallons of water per day -- whoa! The good news is that by making a few quick changes, spending as little as $30 and replacing faucets and showers with low-flow fixtures can cut out about 45 of those gallons each day (that's about 18%); if you splurge on a low-flow toilet, you're down to almost half the water, saving lots of precious H2O but also saving you money on your water and electricity/gas bill (depending on how your water is heated). Here are a few specific ideas and products for saving some water (and some bucks) when you step into the shower....
Green Findings at Puro Diseno Fair in Buenos Aires
by Paula Alvarado, Buenos Aires on 04. 3.07
As we mentioned last Monday, this year one of the most important design events in Buenos Aires (Puro Diseño fair, which took place from March 28th until April 2nd) had some green presence, with the participation of some of our featured local designers and a presentation on the basic aspects about Green Design. But thorough the fair, we were pleased to find some new green designers too. The first one was Neumatica, a small company founded by Roby and Deby Piwnica, two Argentine siblings living part-time in Brazil and Argentina, who make products out of recovered tires along with people from favelas in Rio de Janeiro. Though the idea is not new, they had some cool designs and incorporated things like belts, purses and polished diary covers that could make good green company presents. Their products can be purchased in several stores around Buenos Aires and Rio (they don’t have a site yet, but to find out more e-mail them). Other happy findings were organic cotton clothes (not very common in Buenos Aires), and cool pieces of jewelry that incorporated recycled paper and threads. Read more to find out the brands and websites....
Hot Poop on Composting Toilets: Separett
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 3.07
As John Laumer noted earlier, there is a lot of useful stuff in pee, but we dilute it with gallons of water, send it down big pipes mixed with everything else, and suddenly we have monstrous networks of waste piping, sewage treatment plants and water shortages feeding it all. Yet as Carol Steinfeld wrote in Liquid Gold, urine can be used "to grow food and landscapes, while protecting the environment, saving its users the cost of fertilizer, and reconnecting people to the land and the nutrient cycles that sustain them."
That's why we were so intrigued by the Swedish Separett Composting toilet that we saw at the Cottage Life Show. It separates out the urine, which can be put to use in the garden or drained to a leaching pit, and the poop, which is kept within the toilet for composting. Because the urine is removed, the volume is much smaller, and the mixture does not ferment, creating that familiar smell of overused outhouses. ...
Art in Your Hands
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 3.07
Here's a cozy container for your subway pass--a hand knitted wallet. It’s part of the celebrations for Arts Council England’s 60th anniversary. First there were the artist-designed carrier bags and now ten artists including Tracey Emin, Jeanette Winterson, Jyll Bradley and Michael Clark have been commissioned to create artwork on travelcard wallets. The wallets bring art into every day life and are being distributed in train and bus stations across the country. One thousand of these lovely woolly ones (pictured) were created by a knitting group of 15 women. The artist uses wool from a working mill that formerly made yarns with dyes from local plants and herbs. Each wallet is individually created using a unique selection of them. As one knitter said “These knitted wallets, each one a little different, turn mass-production on its head and subvert the concept of the mass-produced goods. Each item reflects something of the individuality of the handful of women who created them. So it is that a simple everyday item is transformed with a dash of absurdity and colour and a pair of knitting needles.”
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Going Green on Palm Sunday with "Eco-Palms"
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 3.07
Jennifer Szymaszek/NY Times
TreeHugger has been pleased to see more and more stories about the connection between religion, the environment and conservation efforts, from Interfaith Power & Light screening climate change films to the Evangelical Climate Change Initiative and Bill Moyers asking "Is God Green?". With the celebration of Palm Sunday, the NY Times has a look at a growing group of churches in the US that are using "eco-palms" on the Sunday before Easter. They're slightly more expensive than conventional palms, but represent a fair trade-like wage benefit to those who gather them; more stringent quality standards also help insure that they're harvested more sustainably. These eco-palms have skyrocketed in popularity over the past three years: in 2005, 20 American churches bought about 5,000 palms; 281 congregations placed orders for 80,000 palms in 2006; this past Palm Sunday, 1,436 churches distributed 364,000 eco-palm stems. Why so popular? Many say that the religious significance of the plant compels them to buy the most wholesome palm possible. "We want to be a green congregation,” said the Rev. David C. Parsons, pastor of St. John-St. Matthew-Emanuel Lutheran Church in Brooklyn, which purchased eco-palms for the second straight year. “We are conscious of our footprint on the earth. There is a biblical mandate to do that.” Read the whole article for all the details. ::NY Times...
Ask TreeHugger: Do Hand Sanitizers Work?
by Helen Suh MacIntosh, Cambridge, MA, USA on 04. 3.07
Question: Will a Purell-type hand sanitizer help me avoid getting a cold?
Response: The common cold is caused by a viral infection of the respiratory tract that produces runny nose, sneezing, congestion, and other symptoms. In laboratory tests, alcohol-based hand sanitizers like Purell have been shown to inactivate viruses and make them non-infectious. To be effective, however, the sanitizer has to get to the virus before the virus reaches your nose and begins an infection that leads to a head or chest cold.
There are many types of viruses that can cause an infection that can result in a head or chest cold. You can come into contact with any of these viruses by two routes, by breathing them in through your nose or mouth or by touching the virus and then your nose or mouth with your hands. As you might expect, hand sanitizers work best against viruses that are transferred by your hands rather than through the air. ...
Metagenomics: Met-a-what?
by Tim McGee, Western Massachusetts on 04. 3.07
The smallest little critters on the planet do most of the heavy lifting. I sometimes hear that we have more microbial cells than human cells on our body (I haven't counted today). These little wonders of Nature use green chemistry and advanced materials to survive everywhere on earth. Some break down plants, and animals into their component parts to allow reuse, and recycle of the nutrients and minerals. Usually, these bacteria, fungi, and archaea go about their lives without much attention. This is partly because the little buggers are hard to work with. Not only are they small, but refuse to take part in typical laboratory experiments- often requiring unbelievably complex environmental conditions just to live. A new report from the National Research Council suggests that metagenomics could revolutionize our understanding of the microbial world, and I think in the process provide significant insight into creating a sustainable world....
Copy this Post: Museum Plagiarius
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 3.07
Architects: Reinhard Angelis, Planung Architektur Gestaltung Photographers: ©Tomas Riehle / artur
We so want to copy this wonderful idea: A museum in a converted railway building, devoted to plagiarism and knockoffs, that opened on April 1. (We first thought it an elaborate hoax) Since 1977 the Plagiarius gnome has been awarded the best plagiarized object of the year; this year to a coffee jug produced in Germany by Alfi and knocked off by a Guangzhou China company with a leaky jug named Albi. Second prize was a German knockoff of an Italian Moleskine notebook. We don't know who gets the gnome, the plagiarizer or plagiarizee.
They admit that "there is no progress and development without referring to already existing patterns, ideas and rules. However what counts is the willingness to develop the existing and give it an individual and distinctive style. The imitators pursue one goal only: to profit at the expense of the hard work of others – and this affects the creatives and the consumers likewise."
We would like to see an online version soon! ::Plagiarius via ::Yanko...
Linfen, China: China’s Most Polluted City Moves up a Notch
by Mairi Beautyman, Berlin, Germany on 04. 3.07
According to China's latest pollution rankings, the country’s most polluted city is now Urumqi. Linfen, the city that formally held this title, is showing some small progress, says a recent article in The Guardian. Swallowed up by 50m tonnes of coal mined each year in the nearby hills of Shanxi province and located smack in the middle of a 12-mile industrial belt, Linfen plains to shutdown 160 of 196 iron foundries, and 57 of 153 coking plants by the end of 2007. In 2006, if you lived in Linfen, you inhaled 163 days of unhealthy air—but that’s a 15 day improvement when compared to 2005. Despite recent green policies, cleanup efforts, and the launch of a green building program, economic growth usually crushes environmental concerns in China. In Bejing, the curtain of smog over the city was only recently labeled haze--previously, it was called fog. Therefore, the improvement in Linfen is remarkable. “The changes are being driven by business (nobody wants to invest in such a polluted place), bureaucratic self-interest (local officials find it difficult to be promoted) and shifting political priorities,” The Guardian reports. Thanks tipster Mike. ::The Guardian...
Better Thinking's New Ethical Magazine Online Now!
by Petz Scholtus, Barcelona, Spain on 04. 3.07
Better Thinking, the UK-based consultancy that ‘helps brands create strategies for sustainability’ and whose Perfect T-Shirt we featured here, has just launched their online magazine to ‘celebrate the people and brands who are having a positive impact on our world’. Or, as Cate Trotter puts it: 'Our magazine primarily looks at what companies are doing to reap the benefits from a more sustainable approach’.
The magazine is theme-driven with edition #1 being about involvement. Why? Better Thinking explain that just like when we were 14 and in chemistry lab, we learn more by actively doing something rather than just listening or reading. And that’s what they relate to today’s brands. Nowadays consumers need a little more than just a pretty logo. In this first magazine, Better Thinking present five organisations with an active involvement in ethical consumerism and climate change. ...
Cartoons Are Funny; Manipulating Science is Not
by Union of Concerned Scientists on 04. 2.07
Last year’s editorial cartoon contest from the Union of Concerned Scientists was such a success that we’re doing it again this year. Amateurs and professionals alike are invited to submit a cartoon on political interference in science.
The judges for this year's contest include Washington Post editorial cartoonist Tom Toles and "Doonesbury" creator Garry Trudeau. They will be joined by Dave Coverly, the man behind "Speed Bump," and James MacLeod, the Evansville, Indiana history professor who won last year's contest.
The Science Idol winner will get $500 and a free 3-day trip to the nation's capital to have lunch with Toles. The contest deadline is May 22. If you know someone who might be interested, you should tell them about the contest.
For additional inspiration, or for a few laughs, check out last year’s finalists....
Parking Costs Linked to Emissions
by Matthew Sparkes, London, UK on 04. 2.07
Richmond, in South London, has introduced new parking charges linked to carbon-dioxide emissions. Large and heavily-polluting cars will pay three times the standard cost, which could be up to £750 a year, according to the BBC. In many parts of London there is completely free parking for green cars, as in other cities.
Personally I think that a family with two SUV-type cars, living in London, should be penalized a lot more that £750 (around $1500). Justifications for owning such a car have never made sense to me. Claims that they are safer don't make much sense in London, where you rarely get the opportunity to drive above 30mph anyway....
Futurama Farming in New York
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
Mike covered the Vertical Farm ideas of Dr. Dickson Despommier earlier, and my, how they have grown. New York Magazine has a spectacular spread on his vision of "a cluster of 30-story towers on Governors Island or in Hudson Yards producing fruit, vegetables, and grains while also generating clean energy and purifying wastewater. Roughly 150 such buildings, Despommier estimates, could feed the entire city of New York for a year. Using current green building systems, a vertical farm could be self-sustaining and even produce a net output of clean water and energy."
A lot has changed since the idea was first proposed. Local has become the new buzzword, we now weigh the carbon footprint of our food, and there have been a few recent disasters in our food production system that make one want to look the farmer in the face. As New York says "Cities already have the density and infrastructure needed to support vertical farms, and super-green skyscrapers could supply not just food but energy, creating a truly self-sustaining environment." Imagine an urban highrise CSA where we just walk across the street from our highrise to the next to pick our dinner.
The article is like the Popular Science Moonbase of the Future essays of my childhood, in a round structure "Inspired by the Capitol Records building in Hollywood." ...
Video: Janine Benyus on Biomimicry
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 2.07
TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is hosting a video of Janine M. Benyus, author of Biomimicry. We recommend that you check it out.
See also: ::Hang On Tight: Biomimicry Explained in Lay Terms, ::Biomimicry Lectures: Janine Benyus Down Under, ::Sto Lotusan — Biomimicry Paint, ::DaimlerChrysler's Bionic 70 mpg Concept Car, ::Gecko Adhesive Mimic from Carbon Nanotubes, ::Dyesol: Titanium Solar Cell, ::Sea Sponge Soaks up Sunlight, ::TreeHugger Picks: Biomimicry in Product Design, ::Biomimic Database
Another must see video: William McDonough speaking at Bioneers in 200....
Sludgie Hosts Carnival of the Green
by Kara DiCamillo, Newport, Rhode Island on 04. 2.07
This week is Carnival of the Green # 71 and not only is it being hosted by Sludgie but it's also the revealing of our new logo! We are very excited about it, especially since the Carnival has been so successful. It's currently booked until December! So, head on over to this week's Carnival to check out a round up of last week's green news and events, submitted by other bloggers and green sites. To learn more about Carnival of the Green, where it will be and how to host, please click here to link to our previous post.
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Getting Ready for Earth Day: Saving Energy at Home
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 2.07
[Ed. note:] This is another entry to TreeHugger's series of posts featuring easy, high-impact ideas and tips to help you get ready for Earth Day; previous entries have covered greening your car and saving water when you flush. Stay tuned for more!
The vast majority of energy that comes from the American grid is generated by coal, a really stinky, dangerous, nasty, unsustainable, and silly way to make power. By using less energy, and greening the electricity that we do use, we can lighten our footprint immensely, so, in preparation for Earth Day, here are some quick 'n easy ways to do it.
1) Change a lightbulb from standard incandescent to compact fluorescent bulbs and read up on how to maximize their use.
2) Cut back on phantom loads, vampire power, wall warts and idle current with a combination of handy devices and diligent use.
3) When it comes time to replace old appliances, be sure to pick the most energy-efficient ones you can find.
4) Check out Consumer Reports 20 Free Ways to Save Energy for some handy tips on saving energy without burning up any green.
5) Take a cruise through Energy Star programs Energy Star @ Home interactive tool, which provides a very thorough list of tips to save energy around the house.
For more tips about saving energy at home in preparation for Earth Day, check out TreeHugger's How to Green Your Electricity guide and stay tuned for more!...
Ten Canadian Companies that Think Green
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
The Financial Post doesn't believe in global warming, and hosts every denier who ever lived on its editorial page, but that doesn't stop it from profiling ten companies that are trying to make a difference.
Some we have seen in TreeHugger, like Iogen with its straw to ethanol process; TIR, maker of the Lexel, VRB Power's Vanadium batteries, and the Green Goat hybrid locomotive.
Then there are others that are new to TH, like Paradigm's Microsludge (hey, we thought that was software) "patented waste activated sludge (WAS) pre-treatment system that improves the performance of anaerobic digesters at wastewater treatment plants;" Whale Power, that makes a more efficient turbine, Enwave, that cools Toronto with lakewater, and Hydrogen Link, that develops metal hydride hydrogen storage systems. Not online at ::Financial Post...
Sweden Introduces “Green Car” Cash Bonus
by Celine Ruben-Salama, New York, NY on 04. 2.07
Congratulations Swedish car buyers. Thanks to a "new “green car” bonus program that went into effect yesterday April 1st, 2007, those who buy a new eco-friendly car can expect SEK 10,000 ($US1,400) in cash from the government. Scheduled to run until the end of 2009, it is estimated that sales of green cars will increase at a rate of 10 to 15 percent per year.
In order to qualify for the bonus the car must consume less than half a liter per ten kilometers (47 mpg US). By no means limited to hybrid or bio diesel vehicles a conventional gas-driven car can also qualify for a cash bonus. Based on fuel consumption standards, a broad range of cars qualify for the bonus. In fact, more or less all car makers have at least one model that meets the Swedish criteria for classification as a green car....
TreeHugger Picks: The Lighter Side of TH
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 2.07
Though TreeHugger remains steadfast in our goal of presenting the world with solutions for a modern, green future, we can't take ourselves seriously all of time. We like to lighten things up every now and then, to insure that talking about global warming, habitat loss and other enviro-bummers haven't dulled our sense of humor. Here are some of our picks for the lighter side of TreeHugger.
1) Who knew? Solving global warming is as easy as eliminating daylight savings time.
2) Electromagnetic Fields (EMF) from cellphones, routers and microwave ovens worry some people, but it turns out that EMF from power lines are responsible for the "electrobonsai effect," causing trees to grow in a distinct "Y" pattern. As long as you stay eight feet away, you might be okay.
3) Forget metal or carbon fiber; maple leaves hold the key to the next green auto body material.
4) Lee Raymond, former CEO of Exxon-Mobil, was hand-picked to lead an influential study to develop policy solutions to America’s energy crisis. Oh, wait, that one's real...
5) The Venom bike concept by Specialized looked too good to be true, and it was. Even TreeHugger isn't immune to a well-executed prank every now and then....
The Hundred Mile Suit
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
If the world were fair, Malcolm Gladwell would get a quarter every time someone used the phrase Tipping Point and Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon would get one as well when anyone used the Hundred Mile Something. Today we present the 100 Mile Suit, a project by designer Kelly Cobb to make a man's suit from materials produced within 100 miles of her home in Philadelphia. It took 20 artisans several months to produce and Ralph Lauren it's not.
"It was a huge undertaking, assembled on half a shoestring," Cobb said at the suit's unveiling one recent afternoon at Philadelphia's Institute of Contemporary Art. "Every piece of the suit took three to five pairs of hands to make," Cobb added. "Every garment you wear took three to five pairs of hands to make too, but you don't know whose hands or where."
Local sheep, local spinners, knitted underwear, local brain-tanned buckskin leather for the shoes, the outfit is 92% local. "If we worked on it for a year and a half," Cobb says, "I think we could have eliminated that 8 percent." ::100 Mile Suit via ::Wired...
Interviews with Simran Sethi of TreeHugger
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada on 04. 2.07
You all probably already know Simran from TreeHugger TV and TreeHugger Radio or her appearances on Martha Stewart or Oprah Winfrey's Show. Well, Simran never stops! She was recently interviewed by Common Ground Magazine and by The Keeper (audio interview with a text summary on the site - but this interview is from December so some stats about TreeHugger are no longer up to date). Keep up the good work, sister!...
Project Earth Day Fashion Show
by Kyeann Sayer, Nomad on 04. 2.07
New Yorkers: o2-NYC and the New York chapter of Emerging Green Builders (part of the USGBC) want you to celebrate Earth Day by watching some of your best up-and-coming and established eco-fashion designers on the catwalk!...
Save Your Watts With Emergy-C
by Mark Ontkush, Boston, Massachusetts, USA on 04. 2.07
Many electronic devices, such as cathode ray tubes, plasma screens, and OLEDs consume more energy when displaying certain colors. These devices use the three primary colors of light - red, green, and blue - and turn them on at varying intensities to produce a particular color. As a result, colors such as white which use all three primary colors turned on at full intensity cost a lot of money (and energy) to display. In the electronic world, white is expensive....
Green Cottage Guide from Cottage Life
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
If you are going to have a second home, at least it should be as green and sustainable as can be. Cottage Life Magazine has produced a useful green cottaging guide, much of which is available online. Susan Nerberg's article "The Conserving Cottage" is full of very good points. “The greenest thing you can do for nature is to leave it alone,” says Trevor McIvor, an architect with a keen interest in sustainable design. “When this is not an option – as in building a cottage – minimize the disruption.” Making the cottage fit the topography – not the other way around – saves the -parcel from blasting and extensive grading and landscaping. It also spares existing trees and other vegetation, which provide habitat for birds, butterflies, and other wildlife.
Tips on heating and cooling (stressing the passive) are useful, as is the discussion about septic systems and renewable energy, pointing out that A well-designed structure can eliminate many of the problems cottagers try to overcome with technology (think air conditioning or space heating), and minimize the electricity need in the first place. Graham Smith of Altius Architects concludes: "“The bottom line,is that conservation by design is still the first and best option to consider.” Great drawings by Greg Latimer and Amanda Reed, of Levitt Goodman Architects. ::Cottage Life...
Convergence Festival: Earth Day Conference and Celebration in Ireland
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 04. 2.07
Earth Day is sneaking up on us; with only 20 days to go, it's time to start taking a look at some of the activities and happenings that surround the big day. In Ireland, a country that cares enough about green to put it on its flag, we'll train the spotlight on the 12th Convergence Sustainable Living Festival, a six-day gathering and melting pot of ideas for a more sustainable future from April 17 to April 22. This year, the theme is "Powering Down Our Communities," and, like the Earth Day Network, are focusing on the issues of climate change and Peak Oil as catalysts for sustainable development. The event program features conferences and lectures about eco-travel and sustainable tourism, the relationship between biodiversity and climate change, Ireland's potential development and use of biofuels, even a bicycle maintenance masterclass, all leading up to an Earth Day celebration on April 22. TreeHuggers in Ireland can learn more about the festival on their site and pencil it in for April 17 to April 22. ::Convergence Festival...
Green Walls Growing Everywhere
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
Treehugger loves green walls like ELT's simple do-it yourself system, Shimizu's Parabienta or Germany's Indoor Landscaping. Another entry in the field is Vancouver's Gsky, which is installing a six storey high outdoor wall at Vancouver International Airport. According to the Globe and Mail: "The green walls in particular are just taking off like crazy for us," says Chad Sichello, G-Sky's president and chief executive officer. "We cannot keep up with demand." Another G-Sky wall is going into a new Whole Foods store in Vancouver, and they are big hits in condo lobbies in the US.::G-Sky
The Globe also talked to Alan Darlington, the pioneer of green walls, and builder of the Biofilter. He originally was involved in research on growing plants in space, but says "My interest was much more terrestrial," says Mr. Darlington, president of Guelph, Ont.-based university spinoff Air Quality Solutions Ltd. "But the same principles apply for a space station or an office building -- you're talking about a controlled atmosphere and a barrier between us and a hostile environment."
::Globe and Mail...
Jewish Passover and its Connection to the Environment
by Karin Kloosterman, Jerusalem, Israel on 04. 2.07
During the Jewish Passover holiday (starting Monday) it is customary for children to ask questions – a lot of them! And since here at TreeHugger we are curious how the faith/spiritual dialogue can be added to the environmental canon of knowledge, we sought out a rabbi dealing with environmental affairs. We found Rabbi Yehudah Leo Levi from Jerusalem to answer a few questions of our own. This is what the Physicist/Rabbi/Author said:
Q: How is Passover connected to the environment?
A: The connection between Passover and the environment is somewhat indirect, but extremely profound. According to the Torah (Jewish tradition), one central purpose of the creation of the human being was to complete the development the world God had created in His wisdom. The human being was put into the wonderful Garden of Eden, not, primarily, to enjoy its delicious fruits, but rather "to serve it and guard it" (Genesis 2:15). Or, in the words of the Midrash: "When God created Adam, he took him to survey all the trees of the Garden of Eden and said to him: 'See My works, how pleasant and praiseworthy they are… be careful not to spoil and ruin My world. For, if you spoil, there is no one to repair after you" (Qoheleth Rabba 7:13). ...
Trek, With a Twist of Lime
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 2.07
When we first noted the Trek Lime auto transmission city bike it had not yet been unleashed in the wild. It is now and has it own dedicated website with attendant flash style graphics! His and Hers frames available in six colours each. And we’d failed to observe earlier that the seat (saddle, if you wish) flips up to reveal a mini trunk-like pocket for storing goodies. Add-on extras include chrome fenders, a bell and bike computer. That rear hub, which shifts the three gears automatically, is electronically driven, with its power coming from a generator on the front hub. We love the idea of a return to pedal brakes. Oh, weren’t those the days! And a gearing system that drops back to First, when coming to stop, like at traffic lights. Bliss. Click around the site and you’ll get the opportunity to hear a podcast with Hans Eckholm, Trek's senior industrial designer, discussing the Lime project. The $500 to $580 USD you’ll have to find for yourself. ::Trek Lime....
China's Panda Poo To Make Paper
by Alex Pasternack, New York, NY on 04. 2.07
Last week, as the US raised a stink about China's paper imports, placing high tariffs on certain glossy papers, researchers in Sichuan province announced they were looking to manufacture a new breed of the stuff--made out of panda poop. According to the Associated Press,
Liao Jun, a researcher at the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding Base in Sichuan province, said the idea came to them after a visit to Thailand last year where they found paper made from elephant dung. They thought panda poop would produce an even finer quality paper, he said. "We are not interested in doing this for the profits but to recycle the waste," said Liao. "It's environmentally friendly. We can use the paper ourselves and also we can sell whatever is left over."Do we smell a poo-paper rivalry brewing between China and Thailand?...
More Hot Poop on Composting Toilets: Biolan
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 2.07
We were at the Cottage Life Show in Toronto this weekend, but soon there might be a whole spinoff, "Compost Toilet Life Show" , there were so many new products in the alternative toilet world. One that surprised us was the Finnish Biolan- we are used to some complexity in these things and this is little more than a well insulated container with an insulated toilet seat. According to the distributor, adding a peat moss and sawdust mixture after each use and sealing it up tight generates enough heat and biological action to do the job and evaporate most of the liquid. The literature says that it can serve a family for a year without emptying.
Most of the other composting toilets we know of have mechanisms to aerate the poop and electric fans to keep the air moving; this has none of that. Can something so simple work and be odorless as the manufacturer claims? ::Biolan In Canada, email Larry @ Patronproducts.com
Biolan also makes interesting gray water handling systems and garden composting products like the "stone" shown below the fold - a big plastic composter disguised as a rock to be "inconspicuous."...
c,mm,n: The Open-Source Hydrogen Car
by Jeff McIntire-Strasburg, St. Louis, MO on 04. 2.07
We've seen some pretty cool concepts rolled out at various auto shows in the past few months, but the c,mm,n (pronounced "common"), unveiled at Amsterdam's AutoRAI show last week, may be the most revolutionary of the bunch. Conceived by the Netherlands Society for Nature and the Environment (or "Stichting Natuur en Milieu") and technical universities of Delft, Eindhoven and Enschede, the c,mm,n was designed for more sustainable driving with a zero-emission hydrogen engine. More unique, though, is the fact that the designers are using an open-source model to improve upon their work: according to Core77, "The vehicle's technical drawings and blueprints are freely available online, and everyone is invited to add their own ideas and modifications, provided of course that these are shared again with the community."
Additionally, sharing of information is a part of the driving experience that c,mm,n's inventors envision, as they plan to incorporate technology that will allow drivers to "easily share information on traffic conditions, route planning and parking availability."
The vehicle does have a website; unfortunately, if you don't read Dutch, you won't get much from it (English pages are in the works). So far, the reactions to the photo above have been less than kind: one commenter at endgadget called it "dorky, ugly and silly looking." The open-source model, though, means that we're not necessarily seeing the final product. For some readers, that's probably a good thing; for others, a clean, green concept open to improvement may be beauty enough. ::Core77 Design Blog via engadget via linton at Hugg...
New Consumer asks: Is Eco-Furniture Going Mainstream?
by Warren McLaren, Sydney on 04. 2.07
The other day we took some flak for showing a design students concept of a folding bike. And while we agree it can be frustrating seeing ideas, not actual products, we firmly believe supporting fledgling designers who show a bent towards eco-design can only be a positive thing. A thought echoed by South African designer Ryan Frank, commenting on the state of furniture in the current issue of the UK’s New Consumer magazine, “You can see the design graduates coming up now using reclaimed, recycled and sustainable materials,’ says Frank. ‘They have a better education about such issues now and know they’re important. But consumers will have to be more demanding if the benefits of eco-friendly furniture are going to be seen beyond just small batch production.” However, David Colwell, founder of eco-furniture company Trannon says, “Conceptual sustainable furniture is important to get the message across, [...] but it could be so much better.” He suggests that designers should also be striving for works which are sustainable, sexy and inviting, give long service, and “minimise the desire for a rapid turnover of styles.” In short, classics. Though he does concede the high price of designer eco-furniture is holding back its broader uptake. A concern we are well familiar with here at TH. [In a related New Consumer piece you can read of Kresse Wesling, a young Canadian, selling furniture made from salvaged fire hose. A stool goes for £600 (~$1175 USD).]The first article explores further the issues in taking eco-furniture mainstream. ::New Consumer on Eco Furniture....
Earth Mart - An Environmental Department Store
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 04. 2.07
Opening in April 2007, Earth Mart was co-founded by Alison Durinzi, Cathy Sorman and Lisa Longo. The store's premise came from many conversations about how difficult it was to find the environmentally friendly products that they wanted to have in their homes. In addition, all three have children and have a deep concern about child labor and the unfair labor practices being used to manufacture many of the products for sale at other stores. A wide range of products will be available, including flooring, cabinets, sinks, counters, flue-less fire places, paint, stain, solar attic fans, dinnerware, glassware, kitchen utensils and textiles, clothing, bedding, bath, hand bags, beauty products, toys, school supplies, office supplies, CFL bulbs, pet products, household cleaning products, and healthy foods to-go. Earth Mart is located in historic Phoenixville, Pennsylvania at 235 Bridge Street. The store features the artistic and innovative creations of Iola Design (covered by TH here), with bamboo wall shelving, and of Littlewood Biddison Arts (LBA table top, pictured), with a reclaimed tree sculpture....
Tim Lang: Inventor of Food Miles
by Bonnie Alter, London on 04. 2.07
Professor Tim Lang is the winner of this year’s Observer Food Monthly Hall of Fame award. Although his name is unknown to the general public, Lang has been carrying out important work on food additives, obesity, diet and food policy long before it was fashionable. He coined the phrase “food miles” in the early 1990’s to describe the distance our groceries have to travel to reach us. Now everyone uses the term, including the supermarkets. He began thinking about the food chain and how industrial societies were severing links with the land and founded a network of NGO’s concerned with the health of our food supply. Then he moved on to set up a commission which did some of the first work on additives to food. Early on the group publicised the fact that many additives were for cosmetic purposes only—brown being added to kippers and green to peas. As a result they were removed. In the 1980’s when the Conservative government decided that school, nursing home and hospital meals should be contracted-out to the private sector, his group raised the red flag. They saw local councils cutting their budgets and nutritional standards falling. Fifteen years later, Jamie Oliver’s plea for better school lunches is still a reaction to that legacy. Lang acknowledges that the growth in local, artisanal farms and markets has been beneficial. However he warns that “My own view is that we're still sleepwalking into a shock. I think obesity is the health shock, healthcare costs because of obesity are the economic shock and climate change is the environmental shock. In the next few years the big issue will be food security, how we get what we need to eat. And I don't think we're paying anywhere near enough attention to that”. Important warnings from an important man in the field. :: Observer...
TreeHugger Welcomes writer Joey Roth
by Joey Roth, Brooklyn, USA on 04. 1.07
Not Your Average Backcountry Camping Trip
by Kenny Luna, North Babylon, NY on 04. 1.07
Is that because everyone's required to wear formal dress? Well, actually not... It's more the fact that the participants pictured above are all past winners of the Earth Island Institute's Brower Youth Awards that includes a backcountry trip, a week in San Francisco for the award ceremony, and a $3000 cash prize. It's an award given yearly to youth who show leadership, creativity, and a passion for protecting the environment that has led to outstanding results in their own corner of the world. And I think it's also worth pointing out that the deadline to nominate someone for this years award is right around the corner on May 15th.
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Let's Get It On - Condom Applicator Wins Design Prize
by Leonora Oppenheim, London, UK on 04. 1.07
Earlier this month there was a surprise winner of the Most Beautiful category at the Design Indaba awards in South Africa - a condom applicator was chosen by the Dutch designer Jurgen Bey. Beauty and condoms have never been intrinsically linked in my mind, but then again a device which encourages the use of condoms, the practice of safe sex and the prevention of the spread of HIV/Aids does seem like a beautiful idea. For some couples putting on a condom is a quick and painless action before the main event, for others it's a fiddly and awkward task best avoided for fear of ruining the heat of moment. The Pronto condom, invented by Willem van Rensburg (back in 2001) and designed by industrial designer Roelf Mulder of South Africa’s XYZ Design, was created to make the crucial act of putting on a condom as smooth as possible. ...
Celebrities in Small Cars: VW BlueMotion at the Echo Awards
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 04. 1.07
Treehugger is used to US celebrity award ceremonies promoting greener cars, however, it is nice to see the trend to ditch the limo taking over in Europe too. Apparently, this year’s ECHO Award ceremonies, Germany’s biggest music awards, saw stars arriving in Volkswagen’s efficient (62mpg), and small, Polo BlueMotion TDI, a car we reported on here. We couldn’t find info on what fuel these guys were running on, but we hope it was good, locally produced biodiesel from waste resources. Either way, the smaller, more efficient a car is, the closer we get to kicking our oil addiction. Now if only we could get these people to bike to the awards…...
New Study Proves EMF Affects Living Things, Discovers Electro-bonsai Effect
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 1.07
There has been much discussion at TreeHugger about the danger of Electromagnetic Fields (EMF) generated by cellphones, routers, power lines and microwave ovens. Some people think it is a serious issue; WIFI is banned at Lakehead University, and in Scandinavia there are cellphone-free beaches for people with electro-hypersensitivity. Clarins even makes a spray to protect your skin from it. Other people feel that it is not a problem.
Treehugger Labs wanted to determine this once and for all, and has spent the past year studying the issue. We wanted to pick a life form that would not move around a lot so that we could ensure that there were no other factors, and we are, of course, against animal testing, so we chose trees as our subject. We searched for trees that grew near power lines to see what the effect of the EMF was on the form of the tree.
We were surprised to find that maple trees growing up under power lines were profoundly influenced by the lines. They tended to develop a bifurcated "Y" formation as the limbs seemed to grow away from the lines themselves. We call this effect "electrobonsai" because it looks like it might have been shaped by humans....
Auto Parts from Maple Leaves
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04. 1.07
Hot on Justin's post about turning maple syrup into bioplastic, we learn about biochemist Frederic Acer in Espanola, Ontario, who is trying to make use of one of Canada's greatest resources: Maple leaves. "Year after year, I'd rake up tonnes and tonnes of maple leaves and just place them in a compost pile, I kept thinking that there had to be some way of using the complex chemicals formed in maple leaves to produce a product more useful than a mountain of mulch."
Peter Kenter of the Post continues: Acer's initial research involved studying the intricate chemical processes of different types of maple leaves found in the area. "Sugar maple leaves, for example, contain a variety of phenolic compounds, such as myricetin, querecetin and cyanidin," he says. "By grinding leaves to a fine grained product, then adding simple aldehydes, we create phenolic resins that can be used to bind the leaf particles into a material that's as hard as iron but much more flexible. Think about a space-aged version of Bakelite, the product once used to make plastic casings for household appliances."
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