This year, the ozone hole extended to approximately 27 million square kilometers. This compared to 2007’s 25 million square kilometers and 2006’s 29 million square kilometers.

Want a size comparison? That’s about the size of the North American continent!

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Environmentalists and anyone else attempting to derail wind farms have often turned to the fate of birds for scientific back up. In the case of the environmentalists, I’ll let it pass, but it’s when the senators and other politicians who have never shown an ounce of interest in the outdoors – let alone an animal in the outdoors – jump on the “PROTECT THE BIRDS” bandwagon that gets me riled up (among a host of other things).

Thankfully, new research out of England has lain to rest at least some of the claims saying that wind farms, and to a lesser extent singular wind turbines, represent a real threat to bird populations.

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And now, thanks to researchers from the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and the Center for Space Research (CSR) in America, a new and accurate picture of Greenland’s shrinking ice cap has been formulated.

Subsequently, the researchers have found that Greenland is currently responsible for an annual increase of sea levels of up to half a millimeter.

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Ever since I first saw Ernie and almost the entire felt-cast of Sesame Street do “The Rubber Duck, Duck” dance on Sesame Street, I have had a strange fascination with rubber ducks. They aren’t the common toy here in Australia that they appear to be elsewhere. And though looking back at that video now presents me with a bit of a moral and architectural dilemma, considering just how many people are naked together in that tub, my love for the rubber duck continues.

And now, once again, the rubber duck is coming to the aid of science. US rocket scientist Alberto Behar of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California has sent 90 rubber ducks into the Jakobshavn Glacier in Greenland in an attempt to figure out what is happening inside Greenland’s fastest moving glacier.

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It’s no secret: businesses who build durable internal systems breed long term and sustainable profits.

In fact, the rule on the street, and this applies to enterprising green businesses who are past their mainstream ‘breaking point’ and are now swimming with the rest of the so-called ’sharks’, is often ‘automate or perish’.

But automation (business speak for “doing it better and faster”) is hardly a Darwinian one-way street – eco-minded companies are benefiting more than just their own bottom line by developing or partnering to develop software that automates green decision making: they are greening entire industries.

And, the three who are doing it – Green Printer, Workforce Software and Sustainable Minds – have a lot to share on what it takes to get there.

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My assumption is that kids are already well ahead of their parents in terms of incorporating green living (with less fuss than adults) into their lives and those of their peers. In fact, kids often pressure parents to recycle, according to a study published in the BBC.

Still, raising children to be good citizens and those that can quickly make the link between paper usage, recycling, deforestation, government action and climate change later in their life (I coin these savvy “Forest Citizens”) is not easy but it is well worth it on many levels. Here is who we are watching to help us raise good Forest Citizens as we embark on the craziness of the school year:

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With ye olde cobbler long dead (re-soling Jesus’s Birkenstocks in forgotten profession heaven) and cheap production methods shortening the lives of shoes, Americans have gotten into the habit of pitching worn out (or simply undesired) kicks and buying new ones. Shoe-shopping has become something of a fetish, a joke, an emblem of the spoiled housewife who fills her emotional void with Italian suede.

We could go into Manolos, but we’ll focus here on sporty treads, not just to stay on-topic but because they account for a third of the U.S. shoes market.

The production of athletic shoes is infamously shady, from a human rights perspective. Historically, manufacturing giants such as Nike have followed cheap labor, exploiting workers in developing countries so that they might enjoy enormous profit margins. (Nike has really turned itself around in recent years, however, and is now one of the greener players on the field.)

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Apparently, community colleges in North Dakota, among other states, are beginning to train wind turbine technicians; those who are trained in maintaining and repairing those giant wind turbines that make us all that lovely energy.

“The demand (for wind technicians) is such that some (colleges) have been trying to keep companies away from the program because they want everybody to graduate first,” said Christine Real de Azua, a spokeswoman for the American Wind Energy Association. “In some cases, students are being picked up after only a couple of months.”

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How can a mahogany desk, made of slow-growing hard wood plundered from the Amazon, be eco-friendly?

When it’s re-used.

Often, the greenest consumer route is not buying new products made with Earth-friendly methods but rather scoring used products made with traditional, possibly heinous methods. Reduce, reuse, then recycle.

This rule of thumb certainly applies to office furniture. Unlike energy-consuming products such as appliances, furniture is somewhat innocuous to the environment during that period between factory and landfill known as “in use.” The impacts on indoor air quality, however, are like Britney: Not that innocent.

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What you may not realize, cherie, is that whatever you flush down comes back around. Our waste fertilizes our fields and is pumped back into the waterways that are our major sources of drinking water. Let’s take the journey from toilet to tap, shall we? Oui oui. (We’re affecting French here for a touch of sophistication in a post centering on fecal matter.)

Americans use about 70 gallons of water indoors, every day.  About three-quarters of that is used in the toilette—shower, bath, sink, crapper—and over one-quarter is used whisking away our waste.  You can cut this water usage by making sure your toilet isn’t leaking, using a composting or low-flow toilet or even displacing the water in the tank with a brick or container filled with sand .  Your toilet is not a trashcan, so save cigarette butts, tissues and used condoms for the basket, not the bowl.

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This week I’ve been hunting down linen.

Linen is that elusive fiber that I sometimes come across in interesting summertime knitting patterns for open weave shirts, tunics and shawls. I always make a mental note of it, thinking, huh linen. But I’ve never actually made anything with it.

Linen itself is harvested from the flax plant which produces long and strong fibers known as linen. It has a natural luster and is found in creamy white to tan and can easily be dyed other colors. It is mostly known for bedding and towels made from the strong fabric that is created when the linen is woven.

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Seminars that go by blockbuster titles - as least for green entrepreneurs - such as “How to manage carbon risk” have authentic learning value.

In our over-wired world, live events are a luxury, an hour or three to feel how much we really love context and contact, not just stoic information glaring out at us from a screen when we’re learning complex stuff - like international carbon trading markets.

More to the point, events are becoming an even more attractive “pull” medium than ever. And, the savvy, green entrepreneur should know how to harness the reputation and client lead potentials of a well-orchestrated event - an eco-friendly supplied event, that is.

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Dedicated to providing entertaining films (with an emphasis on the entertaining part) that raise social and environmental awareness, this isn’t your mother’s old book-of-the-month club. With ECC, members receive four films (short, full-length, and documentary films) on one DVD through the mail every other month. The films are yours to keep, or pass along to friends. All packaging is 100% recyclable, and the shipments are carbon neutral, thanks to contributions to The Conservation Fund’s Go Zero program.

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In his blog, Tim focuses on applied energy politics, and the global green movement. While continuing his education in graduate school, he’s actively involved in environmental advocacy in his adopted home town in Colorado.

Here’s our interview: This story contains additional media. Click here to view the media.

Image source: http://timblair.net | Lights out for Sydney, Australia 2007

An http://greenprinteronline.com dispatch. 

Earth Hour is tonight, March 29th from 8 to 9 pm. The idea is to turn off the lights as a symbolic gesture that us citizens, business owners, uber-corporations (hello, Google’s black screen, hello McDonalds in Toronto saving 10 000 kilowatt hours) local governments and non-profit groups are taking climate change seriously.

Despite gripes that Earth Hour falls on the NCAA basketball regional, it’s lights out for over 23 major cities worldwide like Toronto and Bangkok.

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Image source | www.jiinjoo.com

An http://greenprinteronline.com dispatch.
When asked: how “green” are you, the brains behind accounting, IT and architectural firms who, kudos to them – both the closet greens or eco-warriors who proudly bear their eco-badge on their sleeve – jump up to say that they are helping their clients drive sustainability solutions.

Even lawyers are realizing their impact on their environment. No seriously, lawyers are sharp enough to know that using all that virgin paper cannot be good to the environment.

But when it comes to driving internal sustainability initiatives? Many still respond by: “we recycle”. Period.

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Gavin has majors in French, Italian, and Comparative Literature from the University of California, Davis. He currently teaches English language in Gangneung, South Korea.

Gavin’s favorite environmentally-minded work has included: co-founding the grassroots Nature Conservation Club at about age 8; interning for the Jane Goodall Institutes’s Roots & Shoots (R&S) program; representing R&S at the World Social Forum VI in Caracas, Venezuela; volunteering at the Marine Mammal Center of Sausalito; being a research assistant for a CAL lab studying climate change in Colorado; bicycling lots.

Join me as Gavin and I talk about his world, and Eco Worldly.

This story contains additional media. Click here to view the media.

Link to Barefoot Solar Engineers mentioned in my summation.

Link to Eco Worldly

Warning: so, as the video and Oprah’s darling du jour and guerrilla closet warrior Peter Walsh so clearly outlines, our pack-rat habits are making us chubby. They can also be a barrier to us going green. Not surprising, did you notice that your lean and toned friends also tend to have pretty darn spotless, sustainability-forward and organized homes, while your plumper friends tend to lavish in “chaotic creative” spaces. Hmmm…

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For another part, the common people don’t have the conscience or awareness of “not littering.” They throw anything out the window of their cars, as the laws won’t fine them money. Nevertheless, the people adore nature, because it´s beautiful, and they like to enjoy it, only that very few take care that it continues to be beautiful.Some people see [environmentalists] as hypocrites for calling themselves ecologists while continuing to consume pollutedly in their daily lives. Others applaud them, but continue with the course of their lives.

[I don't consider myself an environmentalist] because apart from trying to be, I continue to pollute in one form or another.

Michael Hudson: Environmentalism in Venezuela | I see the Venezuelan’s stance towards the environment as identical to that of the U.S. There is the odd practicing environmentalist who walks, bicycles or climbs into a packed tram, minibus, or subway just in principal. However the majority are mostly talk. Just like in the U.S., people here complain constantly about pollution, and the environment is always at the front line when they don´t want something to happen, but very few are willing to consume less packaged goods or drive less.

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Here is something that might surprise you though: Singaporeans don’t recycle. Or if they do, it’s not as blatantly apparent as in the United States. Occasionally, you’ll see a receptacle on the street that is divvied up into plastics/metals, paper and waste, but for the most part, everything gets tossed into one big trash can. Trash shoots aren’t sorted into blue recyclables and black everything-else-goes here. I remember once during the summer, I was sorting trash while at work when my boss came up to me and asked what I was doing. Apparently it’s all just trash over there — nothing specific about it.

Lately, however, there has been a growing concern in the country, due to rapid industrialization and urbanization. Over recent months, the government has been giving the country a massive developmental face lift, introducing towering high-rise apartments and chicly designed shopping plazas to rival those of Paris, Tokyo and New York City. There are more plans to introduce casinos (”integrated resorts”) and a Formula One race track — all for the sake of drawing more tourists to Singapore and boosting the country’s economy.

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