Monday, October 20, 2008

Yes, you can become a greener Canuck in 30 days (or less) and in 30 really simple ways

By WorkCabin.ca Staff

OK, another list. We know what you're thinking. Humanity is getting list-ed ad nauseam these days about how to save the planet. Drive a hybrid car. Don't eat meat. Ride a bicycle. Print on both sides of paper. All great ideas we've heard zillions of times before, but always worth remembering. We're not going to recycle those ideas here. This list is simple. Really simple. In fact, you probably haven't thought of many of them (maybe some, but not many). And don't worry: We won't suggest you go out and spend $35,000 on a wind turbine for your home (but it's still a nice thought!).

1. Don't trash those rechargeable batteries found in tools, cordless phones, flashlights, etc, when you think they're kaput. Ask your electronics store if they have a battery-rebuild program (in Canada, The Source, formerly Radio Shack, offers such a program). Your battery will be rebuilt to full power, at a fraction of the cost of buying a new one.

2. Trade in your energy-sucking rented hot water heater and replace it with an energy-efficient rented tankless water heater.

3. Pledge to use your dishwasher at least once less per month. Go ahead and fill it up with plates and tableware as usual, but at least once per month, don't start your dishwasher. Remove the items and wash by hand.

4. Start rethinking your money-saving obsession with dollar stores, especially all those products that aren't made of recyclable materials.

5. Start an annual family fun day called Homestead Day and reduce your footprint. Yep, that means no electricity, etc. Do pre-event research online or visit a local museum or tourist pioneer village. See what you can live without for a day.

6. Enrol your kids in Boy Scouts or Girl Guides, the original eco clubs for kids.

7. Put up a birdhouse. No, wait, put up several birdhouses. Our feathered friends need lots of help these days.

8. Where possible, reintroduce the childhood concept of walking to school, and walking home after school. Yes, that means you'll be driving less to pick them up.

9. Don't sit under those power-devouring heaters at your local ice rink. Wear extra clothes and tough it out like a true Canuck in the unheated section (hot chocolate in reusable mug is permitted).

10. Instead of buying CDs or packaged software, start downloading them.

11. When you go to a store and buy products that have excessive packaging, make a statement: Leave the packaging at the store (just be sure original packaging isn't required as part of warranty).

12. Buy simulated bacon bits for your salad, meals, etc.

13. Consider taking a train, instead of a plane. (You'll travel through Canada's vast wilderness and see why we need to protect it)

14. Instead of idling your vehicle when going through a drive-thru to get your morning coffee or muffin, park your vehicle and go inside to order at the counter.

15. If you absolutely insist on going through the drive-thru, request that your coffee be poured into your reusable travel mug.

16. Start brewing your own beer or making your own wine. Firstly, you'll have a ready supply (a great idea, eh), and you won't have to drive to the liquor store all the time. Secondly, you'll recycle your bottles. And did we mention you'll save money for other environmentally inspiring ideas?

17. Get a home energy audit. You may be surprised what is discovered, and even more surprised how easily -- and cheaply -- you can start saving on energy costs.

18. Spend less time in the shower. Yes, even if that means singing shorter songs.

19. Plant native plant species in your garden, rather than non-native plants.

20. Don't buy a rubber doormat. Buy one made from natural fibres.

21. Pick up at least one piece of litter every day. It might the easiest thing you can do to help the environment.

22. Don't throw away your printer toner cartridges and ink cartridges. Take them to your nearest Staples and be part of the Million Cartridge Challenge. Between now and Earth Day, April 22, Staples stores across Canada are accepting used cartridges. Collected cartridges will be sent for recycling.

23. If the magazine or newspaper you enjoy has an e-edition, subscribe to receive it, instead of a hardcopy.

24. Recycle old chipped hockey pucks. Use them as drink coasters.

25. Rather than use an electric blanket at night, throw on an extra comforter. It'll keep you just as warm.

26. Don't throw away your old computer. Contact reBOOT (www.rebootcanada.ca), a non-profit organization that repairs old equipment and distributes it to charities. To date, more than 6000 organizations have received such equipment from reBOOT.

27. When you rent a great movie and have seven days to return it, loan it (popcorn included at your descretion) to a friend so they won't have to make a separate car trip to rent it later.

28. Reuse old nails and screws. Unless they're rusty or chewed, they're probably fine for your next project. Making new nails and screws, like any steelmaking, consumes large amounts of energy.

29. Find a soapbox derby event near you and enter your kids in it. It's a great way to teach kids that going fast and having fun doesn't require gasoline.

30. Inspire a friend. Email this list today.

WorkCabin.ca is Canada's green outpost for green jobs.

PHOTO: Andrew McLachlan ©

Grandma’s Green Recipes

By Jackson Kern

What might we find in the deep drawer of Granny's Secret Recipes?

We oftentimes turn to the wisdom of the ages when seeking direction and guidance in our lives. Why not when going green?

Here are two trends of previous generations which have often been neglected in favor of less eco-friendly alternatives.

1) Although certainly not unheard of, the presence of home gardens is much reduced today in comparison to years past. A resurgence of home gardening is positive for the green movement for a number of reasons. The first is that a sustainable cultivation of homegrown fruits and produce liberates consumers from dependence on large-scale agro-business. While this is not always the case, such mega-farming enterprises often negatively impact the environment with their patterns of land use and their utilization of herbicides and pesticides. Home growing often eliminates the need for these harmful chemical agents, thus promoting your own physical health along with that of the ecological environment.

Aside from all of this, home growing entirely eliminates the fuel consumption (and resultant release of carbon into the atmosphere) that is a necessary step in delivering all goods from afar. For those long winter months away from the growing season, we have the option of canning and freezing our yields. Compost piles are a strong compliment to home gardening, providing at once a green place of disposal for much of our waste and a source of potent, organic fertilization for our gardens.

2) Our parents and grandparents inhabited a world which was marked by much less plastic. Plastic is harmful because it is petroleum-based and is not biodegradable; unlike paper packaging, for example, our plastic waste will be around for many years to come.

There are several approaches we can adopt to reduce the presence of plastic in our world (and in that of our children). As always, we must begin with small steps. One large source of plastic waste is grocery store bags. We can implore our supermarket chains to revert to an age of paper-only grocery sacks. We could also move one step further and collectively encourage them to do away with grocery bag provision altogether. The obvious effect of this is to force shoppers to bring their own multi-use bags. In the interim period, grocery stores could impose a small fee on grocery bags. Some stores have also allowed their customers to use cardboard boxes and crates received from their suppliers which would otherwise be recycled.

Consumers can also shun products which are excessively wrapped and packaged, and write letters to firms' management asking them to adopt more eco-friendly packaging practices.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

When mammals are threatened, we are threatened !

By David Suzuki and Faisal Moola

We humans sometimes forget that we are animals. We’re mammals, and like all mammals, and indeed all animals, we are connected to and dependent on the web of life. When part of that web is in danger, we are all in danger.

And our mammal cousins are in danger. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, one quarter of the world’s 5,487 known mammalian species face extinction in 30 years if we don’t act now to protect them. This includes many of the planet’s apes and monkeys; bears such as polar bears, sun bears, and pandas; and dozens of marine mammals, such as sei and fin whales. The causes of this biological crisis include habitat loss and damage, introduction of invasive species, pollution, harvesting, and climate change. Because many mammals are large (elephants, hippos, rhinos), exhibit extraordinary intelligence (chimps and gorillas), or have a ferocious nature (lions, tigers, and bears), we have often assumed that they are somewhat resilient to human impacts. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

Scientists now believe that the biology of many mammals contributes to their vulnerability. For example, polar bears and grizzlies are particularly susceptible to decline because they require a lot of food for energy, they are large, and they reproduce infrequently and have few offspring when they do reproduce. Human impacts such as unsustainable hunting or habitat destruction put more pressure on the ability of these species to survive.

There is some good news, though. The IUCN assessment showed that “concerted conservation efforts” can bring mammals back from the brink. For example, by reintroducing the black-footed ferret into eight western U.S. states and Mexico, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service managed to move the animal from the list of animals that were extinct in the wild to the endangered list. But who cares about the black-footed ferret, or the wild horse, or the African elephant? We humans are not in danger of extinction, are we? Humans are the most numerous mammal species and our influence now extends to every square inch of this planet, as well as the atmosphere. But if we think we can survive such a rending of the web of life as the extinction of one quarter of all mammal species, we’re living in dreamland. The long-term consequences could be catastrophic because, as the top predator on the planet, our survival and well-being depend on the health and well-being of all life that supports us. (And remember that long-term in this case is only 30 years!)

Even if we look just at the short term, we see that it’s in our best interest to protect our fellow animals. As Dr. Jane Smart, head of the IUCN’s species program, points out: “The longer we wait, the more expensive it will be to prevent future extinctions. We now know what species are threatened, what the threats are and where – we have no more excuses to watch from the sidelines.” The rapidity and scale of response to failing financial institutions shows that we are capable of action when we perceive danger. Well, the extinction crisis on the planet imperils our very survival. In Canada, we’ve seen some recent progress in the area of habitat protection. The federal government announced that it will protect 10.1 million hectares of boreal forest in the Northwest Territories, and the Ontario government announced that it will protect 50 percent of its intact northern boreal forest.

But, as always, we must do much more to ensure that all species at risk survive. Besides the mammals, the IUCN added the iconic Pacific sockeye salmon to its red list of endangered species. People on the West Coast know that the salmon is the lifeblood of coastal ecosystems, providing food for people, bears, and birds, and fertilizer for the forests. That’s a perfect example of how interconnected our web of life is.

We have to make some big changes in the way we do things on this finite planet. We can’t just keep destroying habitat, polluting water and air, and killing fish and other animals faster than they can reproduce. And because we are all connected to this fragile web, we need to protect animals and their habitat not just for their sake, but for our own as well.

Take David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge and learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Responsibility… an article for Blog Action Day 2008 Against Poverty

By Alternative Channel's Youth Contributor Cody Larocque

Pick up any dictionary and look up the word responsibility and you’ll find synonyms like; moral, legal or mental accountability, reliability, trustworthiness and burden. Now throw the word “social” in front of responsibility and now we have a dilemma. How many of us are actually socially responsible, truly and honestly live up to the tenants of the golden rule? For the most part I hear crickets chirping.

Being responsible is something we all need to take some time to think about. Our parent’s time is over; they are set in their ways and unless convinced otherwise for the most part will not change. Just because they are comfortable with the way the world is, in her (Earth) totally disastrous state both environmentally and socially, DOES NOT give us the right to do the same. I don’t seem to recall when apathy became the “in” thing to do; I guess it snuck in with all the cars clothes and shoes. Empathy subsequently was tossed into the corner like an old stuffed animal of childhood on the eve of adolescent self realization. It is with that very same fact of self realization, which North America is famous for that caused us (the youth) to be turned off from our connection to the rest of the world.

We are our brother’s keeper, whether we want to be or not by the mere fact of being alive and human we are responsible to and for each other. No human being should be left cold, hungry and homeless in today’s world of more then plenty. Just imagine what a happier place the world would be if just these three basic needs where met, not to mention the right to education and decent healthcare. Just because I live on the east of the Atlantic and on the Westside of the pacific doesn’t mean I do not have brothers and sisters in sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia, who like me deserve every right I have to the aforementioned essential human needs.

How are we going to change? There are two words which will be the saving grace of our generation, Compassion and Kindness. The first being the knowledge of the worlds’ suffering with the drive to alleviate it and the second one, open and friendly regard for those other than oneself will help humanity to bounce back from its terminal obsession with both apathy and selfishness. It does not take much; in fact even helping out our own poor in our own neighbourhoods would start the spark which would eventually rekindle the fire of human brotherly love.

All this being said, please don’t get me wrong, I have the utmost hope for us(youth), every day I see new student and youth run charities, fundraisers and generally an increased awareness in social responsibility. We do care about the world, we where raised wanting to change the wrongs that the past created, lets keep going and who knows what will happen in the next decade or two.

Photo by:*Darinka* courtesy of flickr.com

Thursday, October 09, 2008

Newsletter: Good lively news from Alternative Channel!

Click here for the original Newsletter E-mail

		Alternative Channel will be live from the 2008 North American Holcim Awards! On Thursday October 16th Alternative Channel’s team will be doing a live web coverage of The Holcim Awards, held in Montreal at the Hilton Hotel Bonaventure. This Awards ceremony will announce the North American winners of this international competition hosted by the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction. To learn how to watch this event live click here.

To subscribe to this newsletter , please contact Joanie Bergeron Poudrier.

Industry Newsletter: Alternative Channel’s Monthly Review

Click here for the original Industry Newsletter E-mail

Live from Alternative Channel !

It has been a busy past few months as Alternative Channel has been live on location at a series of live events across North America. From Montréal to Las Vegas to Boston to New York, Alternative Channel is proud to have established media partnerships and served leading green expos, CSR conferences, and forums on socially responsible investment, strategic philanthropy… the full gambit!

		Live Events via Alternative Channel! Capturing video content and broadcasting it online is a powerful means for extending the value of the event experience that has been built up through the effort and dedication of the organizers. Here is how Alternative Channel manages to make these event's highlights publicly available to serve our shared mission of driving further awareness and dialogue on sustainable development.To read this article, click here.

Alternative Channel will be live from the 2008 North American Holcim Awards ! On Thursday October 16th Alternative Channel’s team will be doing a live web coverage of The Holcim Awards, held in Montreal at the Hilton Hotel Place Bonaventure. This Awards ceremony will announce the North American winners of this international competition hosted by the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction. To read more, click here. Alternative Channel can cover one of your events! Contact Alex Salzman, VP Corporate Partnerships for an information exchange and draft proposal. If you are interested in submitting your company’s story for coverage throughout our network, or if you want to subscribe to this newsletter , please contact Joanie Bergeron Poudrier to receive more information.

Featured Offering: Live Event Coverage !

Alternative Channel offers a comprehensive approach to capturing video content at live events, editing this content for web-ready video, supplying tools for publishing this content into online social media, and syndicating this content throughout North America via our targeted, online network.

We tailor a plan for collaboration based on our client’s goals and expectations. We rely on a basket of tools and talent, including:

°Video Blog
°Pre-event, Online Promotion
°Dynamic, on-camera Interview Team
°Experienced Editing & Creative Team
°Video Production Team available for events anywhere in North America!
°Online Content Distribution: Featured Video, Syndication and more!

Join our community of event partners:

*The Green Media Show
*The Go Green Expo
*The earthNOWexpo
*Tremblant Forum
*Net Impact Conference
*Holcim Canada Awards
*YouthNoise DROP Summit


Please contact Alex Salzman VP Corporate Partnerships to discuss how we can bring these capabilities to your event.
alex.salzman@alternativechannel.com
Tel:917.470.9886.

We can design a collaboration to meet any budget and timeline!

Alternative Channel will be live from the 2008 Holcim Awards North America !

Alternative Channel will be live
from the 2008 North American Holcim Awards
on October 16th! On Thursday October 16th Alternative Channel’s team will be doing a live web coverage of The Holcim Awards, held in Montreal at the Hilton Hotel Bonaventure. This Awards ceremony will announce the 9 North American winners of this international competition hosted by the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction.

Do as thousands of web viewers and watch this event live via Alternative Channel’s website here !

The competition celebrates innovative, future-oriented and tangible sustainable construction projects from around the globe and provides prize money of USD 2 million per three-year competition cycle.

The Holcim Awards aim to progressively generate a worldwide community of recognized practitioners of excellence in sustainable construction. They recognize also any contribution to sustainable construction – irrespective of scale – in architecture, landscape and urban design, civil and mechanical engineering and related disciplines.

The competition’s main category showcases projects at an advanced stage of design with a high probability of execution. A "Next Generation" category features project visions at a conceptual level, early stage of design or with a low probability of execution by individual and teams less than 35 years of age.

The Winners of the 2008 Europe Holcim Awards competition showcasing sustainable buildings across Europe were announced at a ceremony in Madrid, the Foundation gave USD 2 million in prize money to ten projects that demonstrate the latest in eco-friendly and sustainable approaches from the building and construction industry. To learn more about the winners’ projects visit Holcim Foundation website here.



For more information about Holcim Foundation visit their website here.

Live From Alternative Channel!

It has been a busy past few months as Alternative Channel has been live on location at a series of live events across North America. From Montréal to Las Vegas to Boston to New York, Alternative Channel is proud to have established media partnerships and served leading green expos, CSR conferences, and forums on socially responsible investment, strategic philanthropy… the full gambit!

Capturing video content and broadcasting it online is a powerful means for extending the value of the event experience that has been built up through the effort and dedication of the organizers.

Video content can be used as a tool to continue to engage attendees, post-event, in ongoing discussions and Web 2.0 networking environments. Content can also be used to extend the reach of the event to virtual participants that were not able to attend. As well, video content serves as an ongoing promotional vehicle, racking up impressions online and generating awareness for the event identity, and the brand messages of all sponsors woven into the content.

All the while, making these highlights publicly available serves our shared mission of driving further awareness and dialogue on sustainable development.

One might think of Alternative Channel as the broadcast station and production company, while each event we serve a programming channel – all committed to a shared mission. Who needs Desperate Housewives and ABC when you have us!?

“But, do people really want to sit at their computer watching a talking head at a podium for 40 minutes?” you might ask. The magic of post-production, that is, the editing work that goes into a piece after the video content has been shot, can create a very dynamic, entertaining experience for web-ready view. If done with Alternative Channel’s technical savvy and with creative vision, editing can serve to trim and compile the content captured at a given event, while staying true to the depth of the personalities involved, and the richness of their discussions that took place.

Some techniques that Alternative Channel uses in post-production editing:

Introducing and concluding the piece with a jazzed-up ‘branded’ clip is just the beginning of how Alternative Channel addresses the challenge of summarizing highlights from the events it has worked with. Watch an example here .

Other strategies include capturing sit-down interviews with key individuals after a panel discussion, and then integrating these into the edited version of the panel discussion itself. Watch an example here .

Alternative Channel offers a variety of options for pre-event promotion as well as web publication and syndication of content after the event, including our fan favorite Video Blog. Watch an example here.

Alternative Channel opens up the discussion with a potential event partner by seeking to understand their goals for hosting the event, and their desired approach towards using online promotion, video capture, and Web 2.0 tools to publish content from the event. We then prescribed a draft vision for collaboration and work with the partner to refine that vision on a set budget.

Interested in have Alternative Channel collaborate on your event? Reach out to Alex Salzman VP Corporate Partnerships.

Alternative Channel has had the benefit of collaborating with the following events:

*The Green Media Show *The Go Green Expo *The earthNOWexpo *Tremblant Forum

We are excited for the following upcoming events:

*2008 Holcim Awards North America *Net Impact Conference *YouthNoise DROP Summit