Archive for the ‘Green Living’ Category
December 9th, 2008
Planet in Peril Special on CNN Thursday
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Last year CNN did an award-winning special called Planet in Peril, and they are doing it again this year. ”Planet in Peril: Battle Lines” launches this Thursday, December 11, at 9 p.m. ET on CNN, and it will be hosted by Anderson Cooper, chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta and “The Oprah Winfrey Show” correspondent and National Geographic host Lisa Ling. This series examines the environmental conflicts between growing populations and natural resources.
I was very impressed with the program last year and I highly recommend you check out this new edition.
This new segment is called Battle Lines and some of our favorite CNN journalists have gone out into the field to explore environmental degradation around the planet. You can see Anderson Cooper with great white sharks in South Africa, or Arwa Damon in the rapidly vanishing forests of Sumatra in central Indonesia. You can also learn about the alarming fact that one in four mammals face extinction.
Visit the Planet in Peril website to learn more about this vast, important set of topics.
December 8th, 2008
Green Gifts for Men: Please Your Eco-Dude
Why are you men so hard to shop for??? Mom, sister-in-law, sister– check, check, check. They are so easy! But buying for my father, huzzy, and brother-in-law keeps me awake at night! Then add to that that I’m trying to buy eco-friendly gifts and it gets even harder. So I’ve searched and pondered and here are some ideas I’ve come up with for the sweet eco-dudes in our lives– I hope they help!
Idea #1: Give an experience instead of stuff. By far the most eco-friendly type of gift you can give someone is the gift of an experience. It’s much more green to take someone to a play or buy them a massage or make them brunch than it is to buy them some item. Don’t we all have enough stuff anyway? So I encourage all of us to think of experiences we can give to our eco-dudes. How excited would he be if you actually bought him baseball tickets? Wow, that would get you major points. Or how about you call his mom and find out what his favorite childhood meal was and whip that up? (Organic) comfort food is the way to any man’s heart.
Idea #2: Get that man some learnin’. How about a cooking class? Or some yoga lessons? Or some golf coaching? My cute husband recently told me he wanted to learn how to play the ukulele…. so you guessed it, he’ll be strumming away in class come 2009. Classes or coaching are great eco-gifts.
Idea #3: Dudes love gadgets. Every man I’ve ever known loved electronic gadgets. So here are some eco-gadgets that might float their boat. This nifty item is a hand-cranked LED light, radio, cell-phone charger combination. It’s amazing! (I actually own one.) It uses no electricity and is great for natural-disaster preparedness. It is really satisfying to crank the little handle and see the light come on and the radio start to play! Better still– it’s only $25.
Solar chargers in general make a great gift– you can get them for laptops, cell phones, iPods, and more. Check out lots of solar chargers here.
Another super-cool gadget my husband got that has changed his life is the Kindle from Amazon. It is a complete book and periodical replacement. You just download books and or magazines and newspapers with this wireless reading device and you’re off and running. The screen is the size of standard paperback and the whole device is very easy to use. You can have 4-5 books and weeks of newspapers and take them all on vacation! Or you can program it to download your paper automatically every morning. Think of all the paper you’ll save! The Kindle is pretty nifty.
Idea #4: Get that man some eco-style. There are so many cool companies making clothing now out of bamboo and organic cotton and even recycled plastic bottles….every man deserves to look good and support the planet at the same time. Patagonia is a wonderful, environmentally-minded company that make tons of great looking clothes for men…and I also love these t-shirts from Fuse Organics.
Good luck with those dudes!
December 6th, 2008
Spend a Cozy Winter Evening Off the Grid
Ever consider taking your home “off-grid” for an evening? Well, short, cold winter days provide an ideal opportunity to celebrate the season, shift your schedule into neutral and save a little energy (with an added potential bonus of creating a romantic atmosphere).
For starters, turn down the thermostat, don a warm sweater and brew a hot cup of tea. Next, unplug your refrigerator and appliances for a few hours. Finally, turn off all the lights and opt for candles or oil lamps. Whether during dinner or while reading in bed, nothing gives cause for reflection and relaxation like burning candles or an oil lamp.
Chicago artisan candle maker Margo Breznik recently shifted from petroleum-based paraffin to soy and beeswax when creating her much sought after luminescent creations. Scented or unscented, pillar or square, Breznik’s candles are as green as possible and are even packaged using recycled materials and vegetable-based inks. You can see them at her company’s website, Tatine.
According to Breznik, “Beeswax is derived from a totally natural process using no chemicals…[and] makes the cleanest, greenest, most natural candles on the planet.”
Both Breznik and long-time Midwestern candle producer Waxman Candles, based in Lawrence, Kansas, offer an illuminating selection of beeswax candles. Beeswax candles not only smell good, their scent perhaps reminiscent of Italian hill town chapels or Notre Dame at Christmas, but they also help support beekeepers, generally small, family-owned businesses.
Moreover, bees are an essential component of the environment, responsible for the pollination of nearly every flower on the planet.
If you’re looking for something more substantial, try a pewter lamp crafted by the Danforth family in Vermont. Imbued with contemporary sensibilities, the sophisticated lamps created by these New England artisans aren’t your Founding Father’s lamps. Instead, look for clean, sinuous shapes, refined designs and a luster that the family’s 18th century, founding lamp-makers would have found impossible to achieve.
While the oil burning lamps don’t use the most earth-friendly fuel, it could be argued that using them on occasion instead of lamps fueled with electricity generated by coal-burning power plants is eco-friendly. And just a few years down the line, it’s likely that olive and other more earth-friendly oils will be available for such lamps.
And if their attractive design and warm glow aren’t winning enough, the fact that the pewter-makers recycle all unused materials and choose recycled packaging, including cornstarch loose-fill which instantly dissolves in water, should excite any greenie. The company also counts itself as a charter member of Vermont Business for Social Responsibility while practicing an art and craft that has nearly disappeared from New England—and America.
When you’ve snuffed out the candles and you’re prepared to reconnect to the grid, check out eco-friendly, electric lighting options here.
December 4th, 2008
Hand-Build an Earth Sheltered House For $5,000
Written by Susan Kraemer, courtesy of GreenBuildingElements.com
Cash, that most basic element of our economy, can be in abysmally short supply for new young families scraping by on marginal jobs. Sustainable housebuilding may not be foremost in their minds.
But one young couple in Wales managing on an annual income of just $10,000 went ahead and built their own cheap home anyway, sustainably, mostly out of materials from “a rubbish pile somewhere.”
They had wanted to spend as much time as possible at home while their two children were young. Their nearby woodlands ecological management work would have been impractical if they were paying a mortgage.
So they enlisted some help from family, and sometimes just from people passing by, and from any of their friends who stopped by to visit.
The result was their very low impact homemade house. A hand built unique setting for a charmed life for their two young toddlers. I’ll bet they’ll remember this first home for the rest of their lives.
Four months of hard work and they were all 4 moved in and cozy.
Total expenditure? $5,000. Tools? A chisel, a chainsaw and a hammer. Building expertise? Simon Dale says:
“My experience is only having a go at one similar house 2yrs before and a bit of mucking around in-between. This kind of building is accessible to anyone. My main relevant skills were being able bodied, having self belief and perseverance and a mate or two to give a lift now and again.”
Sustainable design and construction:
- Dug into hillside for low visual impact and shelter
- Stone and mud from diggings used for retaining walls, foundations etc.
- Frame constructed of fallen trees from surrounding woodland
- Reciprocal roof rafters are structurally very easy to do
- Straw bales in floor, walls and roof for super-insulation and easy building
- Plastic sheet and mud/turf roof for low impact and ease
- Lime plaster on walls is breathable and low energy to manufacture compared to cement
- Reclaimed (scrap) wood for floors and fittings
- Other items were reclaimed from “a rubbish pile somewhere”: windows, wiring, plumbing
(Maybe there should be a new LEED rating just for building so inexpensively: Sustainable Financing. This is one mortgage bill that’s not going to be haunting their mum and dad for years.) Inside there’s a wood-burner for heating - waste wood in the old-growth forest is locally plentiful. To get the most of the heat, the flue goes through a big stone/plaster lump to retain and slowly releases the warmth.
December 3rd, 2008
Greenpeace Guide to Greener Electronics
Greenpeace publishes a periodic report on electronics, and has just released its November 2008 Greener Electronics Guide. The report ranks the leading mobile and PC manufacturers on their policies and practices for eliminating harmful chemicals and for taking responsibility for their products that are discarded by consumers.
The news is not good. According to the report, “Very few firms are showing true climate leadership. Despite many green claims, major companies like Dell, Microsoft, Lenovo, LG, Samsung and Apple are failing to support the necessary levels of global cuts in emissions and make the absolute cuts in their own emissions that are required to tackle climate change.”
Nintendo and Microsoft own the bottom of the rating scale, and Nokia scores the highest. Learn more about the individual ratings of the companies here.
Of the 18 market-leading companies included in the Guide, only Sharp, Fujitsu Siemens and Philips show full support for the necessary cuts of 30 percent of greenhouse gases for industrial nations by 2020. According to the report, “All the other companies in the Guide make vague or essentially meaningless statements about global emissions reductions and have no plans to make absolute emissions cuts themselves. With the need for deep emission cuts becoming ever more urgent it’s vital big companies support a global deal and take effective measures now to reduce their overall emissions.”
December 2nd, 2008
Global Green USA: Gorgeous And Green Party
Tonight in San Francisco, Global Green USA is holding their 4th Annual Gorgeous & Green benefit. This celebrity-studded event at the stunning Bently Reserve is co-hosted by Kate Bosworth, along with Jason Lewis, Daphne Zuniga, and Bay Area darling, Michael Franti. Chairing the benefit is Matt Petersen of Global Green, Nadine Weil from Heart of Green, and Zem Joaquin of ecofabulous.com, who has pulled out all the stops to make the event well, ecofabulous.
There will be spa treatments by International Orange, Jane Iredale, and Juice Beauty, food by O Organics, artisanal wines by Iron Horse and Newton Vineyard, organic spirits by VeeV and Square One, and an eco fashion show featuring sustainable designs by Stewart + Brown, Bahar Shahpar, EDUN, Lara Miller, Del Forte Denim, Eco Citizen Boutique, Loyale, Thomas-Ray Eccles, John Patrick Organic, Linda Loudermilk, Cari Borja, Juleselin, Larsen Grey, Loomstate, Sara Shepherd, shoes by Charmone, Cri de Coeur, Olsen Haus, and jewelry by Amber Marie Bently.
Continue reading Global Green USA: Gorgeous And Green Party at In The Loop…
