Planning on throwing a backyard bash? Below, find some ways to keep it as eco-friendly as possible.

Grill Green:

For many (we’re looking at you, macho men), grilling is more than a summer tradition; it’s a right of passage! The backyard BBQ is the quintessential summer pastime, not to mention the foundation of many a memory spent with the family or neighbors.

There’s just one catch: grilling improperly can be toxic, polluting, and even dangerous. Burning charcoal and/or wood can irritate lungs, allergies, and asthma and create smoke and smog. Buying the most energy-efficient equipment is one way to ensure that you’re grilling green.

Did you know that they make hybrid grills? Consider this equipment the Rolls Royce of green grilling. For a more economical option, electric grills may be the perfect choice. Electric grills release 99% less carbon monoxide and 91% less carbon dioxide than grilling with charcoal. Propane and gas also provide alternatives to the traditional charcoal grill. Do some research and read customer reviews online, keeping in mind that you want to find the most efficient and highest quality equipment, with the longest lifespan, in order to get the most bang for your buck.

Eat Green:

Has anyone else noticed that grilled vegetables aren’t only healthy; they’re actuallydelicious too? Asparagus, peppers, portabella mushrooms, onions, squash and even corn are great healthy options. To step it up a notch, consider homegrown greens from a vegetable garden. If you’re feeling ambitious, check out our summertime gardening tipshere.

For the meat-lovers out there, consider free range or organic meat. Beware, however, of labels claiming “natural” as the definition is more loose and arbitrary. To be sure, look for the Canada Organic Seal or the USDA Organic Seal. Not only are organic meats generally hormone/preservative free, you’ll notice a difference in taste and quality, too.

Party Green:

When it’s time to chow down, consider recycled paper plates and cups, and try to use metal utensils (instead of the plastic, disposable ones) that can be hand washed or cleaned in the dishwasher. Disposable napkins may be a necessary evil, but be cognizant of how many you grab at the end of the BBQ line – you probably don’t need an entire handful for your salad and hot dog.

For the adults:

Consider checking out these delicious organic beers. You’ll be sure to impress the neighbors with your creativity!

For the kids:

Show them “Life in Action”: the more kids see, touch, and experience, the more they respect life in all its forms.  Create projects around the house to make nature part of your daily living: bird houses, bird feeders, lady bug houses.

Lastly, if you’re attending one of these summer shindigs in your neighborhood, chances are you’re only headed a few blocks away. Try to walk or make a family biking trip out of the occasion instead of hopping in the car. If you’re hosting the party, encourage your friends and neighbors to do the same.

from http://blog.justenergy.com/

Back to School shopping is a stressful and frustrating time. You are juggling lists of supplies the schools expect you to get with budgets, long lines and short tempers. On top of that, you want to get products that are not toxic to use, made locally that have some chance of surviving at least a few short months as well as being easy on the environment.

Lets face it, those vinyl binders, while cheap, are not fitting the bill. Cheaply made products that fall apart don’t save you money. You may need to replace those binders two or three times a year, and the worst part is that they are not recyclable in any way.

Vinyl has a long list of health issues, even in using it. The vinyl is flexible because of Phthalates which have been linked to everything affecting puberty, to asthma and even obesity and autism. While phthalates were banned by President Bush from children’s toys, they are still prevalent in their school supplies.

So what are your options? Cardboard binders won’t last any longer than the vinyl, but are much healthier. Well Naked Binder has an array 3-ring binder option that is strong and PVC free.

Naked Binder was dreamed up as a healthier, sustainable alternative for schools, offices and home. Tested to 250,000 flexes, there is no way the cover is going to fall off of these binders. The binders are made from 100% post consumer waste binders board and have four styles from bare board (that is the one that flexed 250,000 times without failing) to binders with 9 color options of book cloth. Naked Binder’s are manufactured in the US and do not contain plastics, PVC’s, or phthalates.

Healthier, stronger 3-ring binders that are better for the environment are just the thing for this years Back to School shopping lists.

For more information on PVC, Vinyl and Phthalates check out the Center for Health, Environment and Justice website. They have links to all of the studies and tons of information.

To view all these products visit www.nakedbinder.com.

For most of us, the hotter the beach is in summer, the cooler and better to enjoy the long, sunny day. But hotter beaches due to climate change is the last thing leatherback turtles need.

Increased hot and dry conditions in leatherbacks’ nesting areas cause buried eggs to be desiccated in the blistering sand, spoiling them. Even when turtle hatchlings are fully developed, they die because they are unable to break their way through the substrate.

Projected climate patterns revealed that the eastern Pacific population of leatherbacks could decline by as much as 75% by 2100.

This is according to a study published earlier this year in Nature Climate Change by a research team from different institutions like Princeton, Drexel University, etc. as reported by Science Daily.

Leatherback turtles are already critically endangered and are a priority species of WWF. They are the largest marine turtles and one of the largest living reptiles today. Leatherback turtles are thought to have existed on the planet for more than a hundred million years. Today this ancient creature is threatened by habitat loss and degradation, wildlife trade, collection of eggs and meat for consumption, bycatch or incidental capture, pollution, and climate change (WWF).

Increased protection against illegal collection of eggs has boosted the population of leatherbacks in several areas, particularly in southernAfricafor the last three decades. WWF along with other conservation groups continue to work toward conservation of leatherback habitats, critical nesting beaches, and migratory pathways. This includes establishment of sanctuaries, raising local community awareness and regional agreements in marine turtle conservation, and reduction of marine turtle bycatch through promotion of modified gears.

Such conservation efforts and measures should help the species’ population to regain lost numbers, but the research suggested that climate change could seriously hinder the leatherbacks’ recovery.

Temperature dictates the gender of baby turtles, with warm conditions producing females and cooler ones producing males. Even if leatherback hatchlings survive baking beach conditions, the predominance of females could potentially lead to difficulties due to a lopsided population.

However, changing climate conditions in critical nesting areas may not even give the hatchlings a chance. Local climate data and models overlaid with the hatchlings’ success rate revealed that climate variability will significantly influence egg development and the leatherback babies’ emersion from the sand. Climate variations also influenced the female leatherbacks’ preference for nesting sites, as they are likely to return to nesting beaches in cooler and rainier years when jellyfish (one of leatherbacks’ preys) are abundant. Leatherback eggs and hatchlings also have greater chances of survival in these seasons.

The leatherbacks’ famously long lifetimes may also hinder natural selection and adaptations from helping their species survive, because they are likely to succumb to climate change effects before these are developed. This is especially probable with leatherback populations in the Eastern Pacific, which is the study’s focus.

Leatherback turtles are included in National Geographic’s Ten U.S. Species Feeling Global Warming’s Heatlist. The list also included elkhorn coral, bull trout, Canada lynx, and tiny bog turtles among other species that are vulnerable to climate change and rising temperature.

The research team which conducted the study is looking into methods such as using shading systems and sprinkler units to mitigate conditions that prove deadly to leatherback eggs and hatchlings. In a NY Times Green article however, researchers from the team admitted that such local interventions can only go so far and will not suffice to replace global efforts in addressing climate change.

Artificial lighting is perhaps one of the most important conveniences of the modern age. It allowed our civilization to continue working and moving on with our lives even as we enter into the night. The day suddenly became a lot longer because of proper lighting technologies.

Unfortunately, even if artificial lighting is traditionally used during the darker night time, we still seem to use them during a bright day. Why is that? That is because some of our homes are not really good at letting fresh sunlight in. We continually waste energy in using lighting at times when it is actually not really needed.

Is there are way to catch all that sunlight in our homes then? Yes of course, by building a proper daylighting system.

Daylighting systems are as what you have already conceived in your mind. They are simply construction and renovation techniques that involve the redirection and diffusion of sunlight inside a room. With proper application of these techniques, a room with a daylighting system could be well illuminated just as if it was lighted by artificial lighting. Some of the simpler ways that designers do to create daylighting systems is the proper orientation of sunlight, using an array of different “light-manipulating” materials such as mirrors. The designer could also try to orient the entire structure in a specific direction, so that even as the sun travels from east to west, the establishment would still get near perfect illumination from natural sunlight.

The most obvious benefit taken from daylighting systems is of course the decreased energy consumption from artifical lighting. Since the room is perfectly lit by the sun, there is practically no need to use artificial lights. But while a daylighting system in theory can save up to 70% in lighting costs (ideally, since the only time you would have to use lighting would be from dusk to midnight), the application of the system and its design in accordance to the structure’s original design is paramount to its efficiency.

If the builders decide on a regular, traditional modern home, then it would be quite difficult to set up the daylighting system. It would create conflicts such as increased glare, uncontrolled heat gain and the eventual use of artificial lighting (since the owner of the house would then have to cover the windows). For maximum efficiency, the designers of the daylighting system should collaborate with the home builders at the very start of the project, so they can discuss thoroughly how the final design of the daylighting system for that home would be.

Nevertheless, when the home construction project is executed perfectly, the potential of a daylighting system to save costs would be crucial to any energy conscious homeowner. Because in addition to controlling sunlight, daylighting systems also have another bonus benefit: temperature control. That’s right, when engineered carefully a special daylighting system could also keep the room warm (through passive solar heating) during winter, while minimizing heat gain during summer. This again contributes to a decreased energy consumption rate, this time though from your home HVAC systems.

“A ‘loophole’ in a global moratorium” was how AFP described the license SouthKorea is taking advantage of to hunt whales despite conservation concerns.

The statement made by Dr. Joon-Suk Kang, head of the Korean delegation in the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting in Panama, raised criticism and disapproval. Dr. Kang began with a ‘reminder’ that the republicof Koreahad an active whaling history dating back to prehistoric times. He stated that the long coastal whaling traditions were suspended in 1986 to comply with the IWC decision and that whalers had been waiting for the IWC ban to be lifted for more than 25 years, citing the community of  Ulsan as an example. Incidentally, Ulsan is also an area where minke whale meat is easily bought in restaurants as well as markets. The whale meat is officially reported as accidental catch, but local environment groups say minke whales aredeliberately caught.

In his opening statement Dr. Kang reports that fishermen in the area are pushing for limited whale hunting because the minke whale population in the north Pacific has recovered and is now eating large numbers of fish, which should instead be eaten by humans.

Dr. Kang also added that the Korean government has conducted non-lethal sighting survey of whale populations since 2001, and that the survey method is inadequate in assessing resources and identifying different whale stocks and feeding habits. In consequence the Korean government is at present considering initiating whaling for scientific research.

The full opening statement made by Dr. Kang in the annual IWC meeting is available here.

The announcement was criticized and condemned by many delegations at the IWC meeting. Gerard van Bohemen, head of the New Zealand delegation, called the move “unnecessary” and “reckless,” referring to whaling of the critically depleted J-stock that are found in the region along with other groups of minke whales. Murray McCully, the Foreign Minister of New Zealand, declared the South Korean plan as a serious setback to whale conservation work. Furthermore, he stated that whaling under the label of “scientific” programme does not fool anyone.

“The portrayal of this initiative as a ‘scientific’ programme will have no more credibility than the so-called scientific programme conducted by Japan, which has long been recognised as commercial whaling in drag. In this day and age there is simply no need to kill whales in order to conduct effective research.”

Park Jeong-Seok, a delegate of South Korea in the meeting, said that Seoul does not have any obligation to inform others about its whaling activities but was doing so for good faith and transparency. Park also added that the forum was a legal debate and was not in any way a moral debate, condemning the “moral preaching” as it does not stand relevant to the forum. He also declared that as a responsible member of the Commission they are not accepting the categorical and absolute proposition of not killing whales.

Conservation groups as well as anti-whaling governments point out that “scientific whaling” is designed for taking of only a small number of whales, and not hundreds every year to provide meat supply. Monaco’s IWC Commissioner, Frederic Briand, said that “Scientific whaling is an obsolete and sad consequence of a document drafted 60 years ago…There’s no reason to do it, given the enormous body of scientific literature obtained via non-lethal means.”

When loopholes are used to undermine long-standing global agreements and decades of conservation work, it is a sad consequence indeed – both for people groups and the environment.

This one’s for the road…are you listening Mr. Bourdain? inBloom is a new app, created by 2 indie musicians who grew tired of eating poorly while on their way to their next gig… Andy Ross of OK Go and Eytan Oren of Eytan and The Embassy designed this user friendly app to be easily customized to suit one’s personal dietary and eco preferences — it features the nearest organic, locavore, vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, raw, Paleo-friendly and environmentally-friendly businesses in New York City’s five boroughs as well as biz members of Musician’s Energy Conservation Alliance (MECA) … more cities will continue to be added throughout 2012.

With a nice clean interface, there’s no shortage of listings for

-restaurants
-farmers’ markets
-grocery stores, CSAs & co-ops
-green hotels
-thrift shops
-biodiesel and electric charging stations
-green supply stores
-clothing stores
-retail businesses powered by renewable energy

Compatible with iPhone, iPad and iPod touch … it’s an easy way to support people and places you believe in, and stay on the right sustainable track when roaming around.

Download in bloom for free via the iTunes store.

from http://www.alternativeconsumer.com

The heat is on as summer approaches, and many of us will be escaping it with the press of a button. Air conditioning is a big reason cities and suburbs can be built they way they way they are, but the cost of running an AC is high and the cost to the environment is even higher. To help beat the heat in a sustainable way, we’ve rounded up a list of 6 things you can do to stay cool and keep your electric bill low — all the while giving your electric company an opportunity to reduce their emissions and expensive equipment. From the simple stuff like window shades, to delving a bit further in and tuning up your house, there are plenty of proven ways to cut the AC out of your summer without sweating.

1. WEAR THE RIGHT CLOTHES
After the Fukushima Nuclear disaster, and resulting energy crisis in Japan, the government asked workers to not wear neckties and and other formal clothing to work. The obvious lesson here is that wearing weather-appropriate clothing makes it a lot easier to keep comfortable inside while dialing back the AC.

2. KEEP THE HEAT OUT
The next step is to keep the heat out of your house to begin with. Covering windows with light colored blinds inside helps, especially on west windows that allow much more heat to permeate later in the afternoon. Another often overlooked heat source comes from electronics inside your house. Turning off the TV and flicking off the light switch goes a long way in keeping the heat down. Shades and awnings on the outside of windows are also incredibly effective ways to cool a home down, as are shade trees and other plants – particularly when they are planted on the west and east side of a home.

3. GET THE AIR MOVING
Moving air, even a little, makes a big difference. Install a ceiling fan or use a portable fan to increase air circulation and to cool your room down in a low-energy way. Opening windows for cross-ventilation is effective as well, but try to avoid doing so during the peak of a heat day. If you live in a dry climate evaporative coolers can use 1/5 the energy of a typical AC — there are even ones like the Coolarado that don’t introduce moisture into the house.

4. USE COOL NIGHTS TO CREATE COOL DAYS
Many regions can be hot in the day, but cool at night. An effective way to keep out the heat in these climates is to do a night air flush. A well-sealed and insulated whole house fan is a great tool to complete this process. The fan draws in the cool evening atmosphere through open windows and flushes out the day’s hot stuffy air. Close the windows in the middle of the day and a house can stay surprisingly comfortable.

5. BUTTON UP THE HOUSE
If you’re ready to pull up your sleeves, then consider adding insulation to your house and sealing the air leaks. Only after you’ve button up the home does it make sense to look at replacing windows – a task that can be complicated and expensive. Attic fans and radiant barriers are popular, but not proven to be very effective.

6. TUNE-UP THAT AC
If you need to run the AC you can have the unit serviced by a professional to make sure it is operating in tip-top shape. Many utility companies happily offer discounts on air conditioning and heat pump tune-ups. Leaky duct work can also eat into the efficiency, so sealing ducts could make a big difference.

from http://inhabitat.com/

There’s a lot of health alternative of plastics that you can come up with. To begin with, you can reuse it as container for other more things you have at home. While, most people would usually throw it away you can actually take it at home, clean it and then reuse it. Now, if you have time you can also cut out some parts of it and then try to decorate it to make it look better.

The healthy alternative of plastics can even be a good bonding time with your kids. As mentioned above, you can turn that simple plastic to a piece of art. You can allot at least a week end with your kids and do some art activity out of the plastics that you have at home. For instance, the bottle plastic you had in the grocery store can be part of the decorations you have in your child’s room. You can use stickers and other more means in order to make it look more attractive. You can let your kids use their own imagination in coming up with his own art. Through this, you can both create a better bonding time with your kids and at the same time you can stir the imagination of your kids.

There are a lot of other healthy alternative of plastics that you can come across as you read through informative books and surfing the internet at the same time. What you just need to do is to take some time to read it thoroughly so that you can start up your own alternative way of using this piece of junk into a useful one.

Lastly, you need to remember that you never have to worry about the bad effects of plastics for there are a lot of healthy alternative of plastics that you can come up with. All it takes is a lot of creativity in your end. Through this, you can at least take part in making earth a better place to live in. You can really do your share in making earth healthier, cleaner and better.

from http://plasticsareforever.org/the-best-healthy-alternative-of-plastics/