The 7 Stupidest Statements Made About the BP Gulf Oil Spill : TreeHugger.
May 032010
Dec 272009
This or Thats | Simple Steps. This site from the Natural Resources Defense Council has some great articles and tips on how to tread gently on the environment. I recommend giving it a look—especially as this year comes to a close and people start thinking about resolutions for the new year. Why not resolve to reduce your carbon footprint as much as possible (or more!) in 2010? Now’s as good a time as any to commit.
Dec 232009
Holey rollers | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine.
They remind me of rolls of insulation. Regardless of what they look like, imagine how unusual conditions must be for them to form!
Nov 222009
Resources for Recycling
Reusing what we use is one of the best ways to limit our impact on the planet. The sites below offer great resources for recycling—how to find a recycling center in your area, things to do to help recycle, and more. Be sure to check them out!
The Internet Consumer Recycling Guide
Environmental Defense Fund’s guide to recycling
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources’ Recycling Guide for Kids
Environmental Protection Agency’s section on Recycling
Do you know any other good resources? If so, please post them in the comments!
Nov 012009
Who Left the Lights On?
Chicago, IL at night as seen from space
Do you leave the lights on when you leave the room? Many people do. I work in an office full of people who leave lights in unused spaces on all the time—the restroom, unused offices, storage rooms, and so on. The owners will turn on every light in the space when we’re having a visitor, thinking that it will disguise the fact that they have drastically reduced staffing levels. I think many people don’t do it simply because they weren’t taught to in the first place. During most of our lives the cost of electricity was so low that the idea of saving money and the environment didn’t enter into our consciousness.
Indeed, a popular myth exists that it costs more to turn a light on than is saved by turning it off when you leave the room. The Mythbusters busted this one on a show from 2006. Unless you’re returning to the room almost instantly, it clearly saves money to turn off the lights. The net wear and tear on components from turning them on and off is minimal; the Mythbusters’ testing was unequivocal here, too.
Turning the lights off when you’re not there does more than just save on electricity bills, though. Extrapolate the effect of turning unnecessary lights off from your home to your city, your state, or your country—a few pennies a month times hundreds of millions is real savings. Beyond that, reduced draw on electrical systems means fewer outages, diminished need for electricity, and a reduction in the consumption of environmentally toxic fossil fuels to produce power. Yes, even at night, when there may be an “excess” of capacity in the power grid.
So give it a thought—and while you’re doing that, why not replace those horribly inefficient incandescent lights with less environmentally-damaging CFLs or even LEDs? We’ll talk more about those another time.
Putting my money where my mouth is…
Have I implemented the changes recommended above?
YES — I am obsessive about this. Although I love bright light when I’m working or reading, Every other light in the house or office is off while I’m not in the room. I’ve also replaced many of my incandescent bulbs with CFLs, and will continue to do so as my incandescents burn out.
%RA=green environment recycling%
Oct 182009
The 2009 Blog Action Day topic for 2009 was Climate Change. (You can see my post on it here.) As part of my contribution, I’ve committed to at least one post a week for the year with tips on how to reduce your impact on the earth—be good to yo’ mama, because she’s the only one you’re gonna get!
Posts in this theme will all appear in the “The Environment” category and will have subjects starting with “[StarkReduzerit],” which is a play on the German phrase, “Stark reduziert,” for “deeply discounted.” It’s an in-joke with my family, so please pardon the diversion…
To start off the series, I have to thank my friend Peter from Plurk (the one in Belgium) for pointing out an article in Time magazine online on an angle that, I warrant, few would think about when considering how to reduce their global footprint.
Eco-Friendly Sex Toys
Yes, people are still having sex, and few probably realize that you can actually help Mother Earth out while having a shag or tossing one off! Now, stop giggling for a second and give it a thought. If you’re a sexually-active adult, chances are you’ve used some sort of sexual accoutrement at least once. Lubricant helps make things move more easily; condoms keep unwanted pregnancies away (as well as STDs); and other items can bring a sense of freshness and excitement to what can sometimes become pretty perfunctory.
Sure, spending some extra money for “organic” lube that doesn’t contain most of the Dow Chemical formulary may seem a bit ridiculous, but don’t just think about “going green” in terms of one person’s (or one couple’s) contribution. If a thousand, or ten thousand, or a hundred thousand people switch to a product that reduces packaging, reduces the need to synthesize or dig up or process to the nth degree some chemical, then the effect multiplier grows. This is part of the trick to reducing your impact—realize that if many people take the same steps, the effect will grow rapidly in size. Use products that require less processing for their ingredients, and maybe we’ll save a mountain from being mined into destruction, or one fewer pollutant-spewing power plant will be needed to satisfy our needs.
Now go out and get nasty 
Putting my money where my mouth is…
Have I implemented the changes recommended above?
No.
Why Not?
The short answer is that I’m far from sexually-active these days, so spending money to get items that have no immediate or practical use is counterintuitive. If things change, however, I’ll definitely be jumping on the bandwagon!
Oct 152009
Although I’ve committed to posting one tip a week on how to reduce your impact on the earth and ameliorate the effects of climate change, I wanted to post a link now to the No Impact Project, which my friend Claudia brought up on Plurk recently. Check out the site and have a look around—will you accept the challenge?
Jun 252009
I think this is a great concept—think of the millions of cardboard pizza boxes that are used for nothing more than delivering the pizza and possibly storing leftovers in the fridge! While there are a few rough edges to work out, the developers of the eco-box clearly have come up with a great idea that could (and should) be inspirational to all of us who want to reduce, reuse, and recycle.