Tuesday, April 07, 2009

Green Memo to All Staff

If you’re like me, you probably work in an office. You also probably spend two-thirds- or more- of your day there - it is your second home. Have you ever asked yourself whether your office is as “green” as your home?

If not, here are some practical tips to make your office and (your office mates!) as green as it could be:

-BYOM - if you start your day with a coffee or tea at your favourite local coffee shop, Bring Your Own Mug. You might even get a discount for bringing it!

-BYOC - same rule, different meal. If you buy your lunch, Bring Your Own Container. Throwing away those take away styrofoam or paper containers every day does not do the environment any favours.

-Recycle paper printer - dedicate at least one office printer as the “green” printer by putting in paper that have already been printed on one side.

More tips: www.simplegreenaction.ca

Wal-Mart – Small but fertile

Wal-Mart’s adoption and adaptation of a farmers’ capacity-building programme in Central America shows the big retailer can think small

José Méndez and his wife, Martha, used to scrimp a living harvesting cushaws (winter squash) from a seven-acre plot. Over the past three years, they have quadrupled their land under cultivation and turned their hands to growing a wide variety of vegetables. Even better, they have a guaranteed purchaser for their produce: Wal-Mart.

The US retail giant entered the Central American market through the acquisition of local supermarket group Central American Retail Holding in 2006. As part of the deal, it inherited a farmer assistance programme dating back more than three decades.

The Terra Fértil (fertile land) programme offers technical expertise and business management advice to more than 5,000 small farmers. It also provides producers annual contracts at a fixed price, enabling farmers to plan ahead. With a contract in hand, farmers traditionally excluded by credit providers can obtain business loans.

The benefits are not all one-sided. Wal-Mart is provided with a reliable, more diverse net of suppliers. By extending its supplier base, it exercises more influence over prices as well.

“There is a clear commercial benefit. We can help our suppliers grow, which is very important for a supermarket in Central America,” says Jorge Calderón, regional director for institutional relations at Wal-Mart.

To its credit, Wal-Mart has not just sat back. In the past 12 months, it has exported the Tierra Fértil model from its established bases in Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras to new markets in Guatemala and El Salvador.

To read the full article visit www.ethicalcorp.com.

Solar railway system envisioned for Michigan

Taking renewable energy systems to a new level, the Interstate Traveler Company LLC is envisioning an outrageous railway system from Detroit to Lansing, Michigan, which will be powered by solar energy and hydrogen. The trains will use maglev power and the project is set to cost at the rate of around $15 million per mile.

The trains will be known as Hyrail or Hydrail, and will use maglev power upon stainless steel tracks to accelerate up to 200 mph on clean energy.

The Interstate Traveler LLC intends to get financing from the private sector, but will split the profits 50-50 with the state and the local communities. The rail train will not only carry passengers, but will also be carrying freight, including liquid and vapor-based fuels.

Full article visit www.ecofriend.org

Glee Photography Contest

Say «Glee-ze!»

If making environmentally-friendly choices fills you with Glee, take a picture for posterity!

Send Glee your best shot of you or a friend doing something green. Whether you're recycling or bicycling, make sure to include a pack of Glee Gum somewhere in the scene.

The top three photographers will each win a brand new Glee Gum Dispenser!

More about Glee Gum.
For contest information visit www.gleegum.com

Energy urgency pits tree-huggers against smokestack pluggers

Energy urgency pits tree-huggers against smokestack pluggers

By David Suzuki with Faisal Moola

If we want to put the brakes on global warming and reduce our reliance on nonrenewable fossil fuels, we must look to renewable energy such as solar, wind, hydro, and sustainable bioenergy. Given what the world’s leading climate change scientists are saying about the consequences of continuing to burn fossil fuels, we have little time to lose.

But the rush to develop new sources of clean energy has created surprising division among groups that should be allies in the fight against global warming: “tree-huggers” who focus on the need to protect wildlife and wilderness and “smokestack pluggers” who advocate for a rapid and massive increase in renewable-power production.

In my home province of B.C., a coalition of environmentalists, resource nationalists, and public-sector unions is calling for a moratorium on new renewable-power production, citing concerns about impacts on biodiversity and the absence of proper government regulation, among other issues.

In response, Andrew Weaver, a Victoria scientist and lead author for the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, argued in a Vancouver Sun article that “some environmental groups have chosen to abandon science and campaign against clean energy and climate policies.”

Dr. Weaver went on to argue that, “We need staggering amounts of energy conservation, emissions cuts and renewable energy. And all need to be deployed at an unprecedented rate.”

He’s not alone in criticizing opponents of wind and run-of-river power. American environmentalist and writer Bill McKibben said in a recent article that “the environmental movement has reached an important point of division, between those who truly get global warming, and those who don’t.” He added that “when local efforts to delay or stop low-carbon energy projects come into conflict with the imperative to act urgently on global warming, they have to take second place.”

I’m worried about the escalation of rhetoric on both sides. Yes, it is urgent that we find ways to tackle the problems caused by fossil-fuel use and excessive energy consumption. And it is true that some opponents of technologies such as wind power are motivated more by NIMBY self-interest than science or true environmental concerns.

But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t worry about the impacts of these projects and technologies. Nor does it mean that we should allow run-of-river power projects or windmills anywhere without proper government oversight and planning. Panic shouldn’t guide policy.

It’s ludicrous to think that we must sacrifice all environmental considerations to get green energy onto the grid. It’s not green if it causes negative ecological impacts. In British Columbia, BC Hydro and the B.C. Transmission Corporation have identified more than 8,200 potential sites for run-of-river hydro projects in B.C.’s 291,000 watersheds. That should give us plenty of choice, and surely we don’t have to harness all of them.

What we need, in B.C. and elsewhere, is to guide development toward areas that have high energy potential but are less susceptible to environmental damage. Governments must also act quickly to ensure that renewable-energy options are considered as a whole rather than in isolation. An individual project may appear to be environmentally benign, but the cumulative impact of many could be detrimental.

We also need a better system for water licences and Crown land licences to avoid the gold-rush mentality that is leading numerous private interests to stake claims on rivers for power projects. And we need strong environmental regulations, along with monitoring and enforcement, to ensure impacts are minimized.

It’s in our best interests to act quickly to get as much renewable energy into play as possible. As well as getting us off fossil fuels and combating global warming, renewable energy is also one way to dig ourselves out of the economic mess we’re facing. It’s good for business. But that doesn’t mean environmental safeguards should be relaxed in the name of green energy.

Global warming is, without a doubt, the most critical environmental issue we face. Clearly, there’s no time to waste, but unless we tie our shoelaces before we race out the door, we’re guaranteed to trip ourselves up long before we get to our destination. We need to ensure that our solutions don’t lead to the destruction of the very thing we're trying to protect.

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

Ride Sharing Solution you’ll love!

Driving our car is the most common way to go to work, as few of us have the chance to live right next to their office. So, is there any other way we could green our transport habits? Sure, we can always take public transit -and be limited to bus schedules- or why not ride our bike to work - and arrive all sweaty to our board meeting. These are not so much attractive ideas after all. This is where www.rideamigos.com comes handy.

Rideamigos.com is an online tool that offers ridesharing solutions to corporations, event planners, and the public anywhere on Earth, as well as luxury hybrid transportation services. Using its free online Ride Matching tool, Ride Amigos allows you to post your desired destination and arrival time and then helps pair you up with anyone else on the same route Whether it is for the daily commute to work or class, the one time ride to the airport, or even a road trip across country, RideAmigos will find your match. Plus, browse all current listings in your city with just one click!

To be a Ride Amigo, the rule is simple: Act like an amigo. How?

•Be Honest: Don’t lie or post phony things about yourself online.
•Be on Time: Be respectful of your ride amigo’s schedule. Being late is a no no!
•Communicate: Once you connect online, confirm with each other personally.
•Plan Ahead: Pick obvious meeting locations so that you don’t get lost, etc.

Ready to find your next amigo? Visit www.rideamigos.com and get started.

Now’s the time to take science seriously

Now’s the time to take science seriously

By David Suzuki with Faisal Moola

Looking at the enormous changes the world has experienced over the past century, it’s clear that the most powerful force shaping our lives and society was not politics or economics but science when applied by business, the pharmaceutical and medical industries, and the military.

Think of the impact of antibiotics, chainsaws, nuclear weapons, computers, oral contraceptives, cars, television – the list is long.

And what lies ahead? Human cloning, genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and space weapons – to say nothing of environmental issues such as climate change, deforestation, and toxic pollution. How can any society make important decisions about these issues without being scientifically literate and informed?

Too often, the role of science in solving our social, medical, and economic problems is poorly understood because the nature of scientific research, discovery, and application is not understood.

The Globe & Mail recently reported that the federal government has radically reduced its support for science. Well, why should Canadians support scientific research?

First, good scientists make important discoveries, and to maintain a top group of scientists, we need a culture that supports and honours its researchers. That can’t happen when science funding becomes a political hockey puck slapped around by whichever party comes into power. We need generous long-term support for our top scientists so that they can create clusters of enthusiastic, inspired researchers.

Canadian scientists are a small fraction of all scientists, but they occupy front-row seats to the world’s best research because, if they’re good, they get invited to small meetings of experts, they are consulted about new insights, and they receive scientific papers before they are published. They become our eyes and ears to the discoveries being made worldwide.

Many people believe that we must identify important areas like cancer, energy, or pollution and then direct the money to those areas so that we can look for solutions or new technologies. That is not how science works. Scientists need money to do their work, and when funding is directed at specific areas, scientists will find ways to make their work relevant to those areas. It’s a game that’s played to get grant money. I did it when I was an active researcher. I was interested in genetic control of cell division. When cancer-research money became available, I used the rationale that understanding the process of cell division would give us insights into the process by which cells begin to divide out of control as they become cancerous.

Scientists don’t go from experiment A to B to C to D to find a cure for cancer. That’s just how we write up our results or our grant proposals. Many scientists who have made important discoveries would have never qualified for research grants if the grants were specifically targeted. Let me give you two examples from my area of training, genetics.

In the 1960s, microbial scientists puzzled over an arcane area to do with bacteria and viral infection. They found that certain viruses could infect and kill bacterial hosts while other bacteria seemed immune. How could the bacteria fend off viral infection? You might wonder who cares whether bacteria get sick. But out of this very esoteric work came the answer: Bacteria had enzymes that recognized specific stretches of viral DNA and cut them up. These “restriction enzymes” turned out to be vital tools for genetic engineering, something that could not have been predicted when this Nobel Prize-winning work was started.

I remember as a student in the 1950s slaving over research papers by a woman studying corn. Barbara McClintock was a meticulous scientist and we agonized over her experiments because they were so complex and elegant. She was studying genes in corn that had a peculiar property of changing locations on chromosomes. We never imagined that her work would lead to the discovery of “jumping genes” that are now a vital part of the toolbox geneticists use to modify gene behaviour. Dr. McClintock won a Nobel Prize for work that would never have qualified for grants had there been restrictions for applications.

I would urge politicians and scientists to resist rigidly restricting funding to specific research areas. Instead, they should support scientists who can be judged by their track records, by their papers and talks, in the knowledge that those scientists will have ideas, make observations, and hear about work that will be useful in some area that can’t be predicted. And we must have a culture in which science is as important a part of our education as reading, writing, math, and music.

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

Photo : www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Peapod -car of the future- ready for Earth Day!

Peapod car of the future ready for Earth Day!

Peapod Mobility, the new Chrysler division whose birth has been largely overshadowed by its parent company’s troubles, will begin taking orders — online only — on Earth Day, April 22, its lead director, Peter Arnell renowned brand designer, said in a recent interview.

It will sell for $12,500, and Mr. Arnell said the company planned to produce 25,000 to start. Deliveries begin in the fall.

The tiny «neighborhood electric vehicle »is shaped just like the shell of a pod, some say it has a cartoonist-iconic appearance while Mr. Arnell prefers the word ”charming”. Peapod’s arrival on the market aims at a big impact, as revolutionary as Dyson’s nouveau genre vacuum cleaner, Arnell said.

This personal transport pod is made for city drive only, as its top speed is 25- mile-an-hour, it cannot go on the highway. Its small shape combined to its 0 emission factor makes it the best green solution for transportation in busy North American cities like New York and L.A.

The best part is that it comes in an array of bright and amusing colors. We cannot wait to get our own little futuristic eco-friendly vehicle, available for order on Earth Day.

More info visit: www.peapodmobility.com