Green Options » EcoBrain

Ebooks - Green Holiday Gift Ideas From Ecobrain

Reenita Malhotra — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:14:38 +0000

Consider the gift of a green book this Holiday season.

Ecobrain, a green publishing company offers ebooks, the ideal green reading choice. Ebooks can be instantly downloaded to your desktop. Ecobrain has a series of ebooks that make ideal reading for Ecopreneurs.

The Next Sustainability Wave: Building Boardroom Buy-in, by Bob Willard ($16.95)

This book provides a compelling business case emphasizing the importance of how sustainability is presented to corporate leaders. It applies effective selling techniques to reposition sustainability strategies as a means to achieving existing corporate ends, rather than as a separate priority to worry about. It sells sustainability as a solution, a business strategy, and a catalyst for business transformation.

Want to Green Your Addiction to Books? Buy Ebooks

Jeff McIntire-Strasburg — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 16:27:16 +0000

OK, I admit it: I’m a book whore (hardly a shocking confession for a former English professor). I’m most vulnerable to impulse buying in a book store. When a publishing PR rep contacts me about a book for review, I jump on it like an addict desperate for that next fix.

But, of course, I also know that book publishing takes a fairly heavy environmental toll: as our friends at EcoLibris have pointed out, “more than 30 million trees are cut down annually for virgin paper used for the production of books sold in the U.S. alone.” The WorldWatch Institute notes that the average American uses over 300 kilograms (or over 660 pounds) of paper annually. And Erika Engelhaupt, in Environmental Science & Technology, observes:

Reducing paper use does more than save trees. Pulp and paper mills are also a major source of pollution. They release into the air CO2, nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur oxides (SOx), carbon monoxide, and particulates, which contribute to global warming, smog, acid rain, and respiratory problems. In addition, bleaching paper with chlorine can produce dioxin, which is known to cause cancer. Paper mills also produce large amounts of solid waste and require a lot of water. The industry is trying to clean up, but anyone who’s driven past a paper mill has smelled the challenge.

Yep, that book addiction has quite the footprint. There are numerous approaches to dealing with this impact: “cradle to cradle” book design, Ecolibris-style offsets, used of recycled and non-toxic materials, and, of course, ebooks.

Back to School with EcoBrain: Green Up Your Bookshelf

Derek Markham — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 23:37:27 +0000

I just found out about an online green living bookstore dedicated to providing quality educational materials with minimal environmental impact. With the rate of books we go through in our house, anytime I can get a digital version, I choose to download instead of getting a paper copy.

With global paper consumption increasing at a staggering rate, and forests disappearing overnight, our society really needs to look at ways to decrease our rate of consumption. One online company is focused on giving you an option when buying books for yourself or your kids.