Green Options

A research team with the CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization) in Australia is working on a project to integrate energy-generating materials into our clothing. By simply collecting the energy in our movement, vibrations, and friction, our clothing could create enough juice to power up our mobile phone, mp3 player, etc. The Australian Defense Department awarded the team of researchers a $4.4 million grant to deem the technology feasible.

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Many green parents (and doctors) have long thought that increased exposure to environmental toxins can lead to childhood diseases such as asthma, cancers, birth defects, and developmental disorders. CNN.com even ran a story last week about industrial chemical buildup in children’s bloodstreams. Now, the Shaklee Foundation and HealthyChild.org have teamed up to produce a new DVD that provides information for parents, teachers, school administrators, and child care professionals on

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Last night, Thursday, October 18th, at the National Design Awards Gala in New York City was the announcement of the Peoples Design Awards. As part of National Design Week, Copper-Hewitt supports an annual competition where people nominate great design.

Voting has been open to the public online since mid September. As it is too late to cast your vote, it isn’t too late to congratulate the winner and find

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Editor’s note: Eating your Cheerios? According to our friends at email tip provider Vital Juice Daily, oats, and other foods, are good for helping to reduce cholesterol.

I’ve heard through ads that Cheerios helps reduce cholesterol. Are there any other foods that may help reduce cholesterol counts?

- Cindy

Dear Cindy,

There are foods that can help reduce your cholesterol counts! Here’s a roadmap on how to work these smart foods into your diet:

How far away do you live from the nearest grocery store? More than likely, you pass one on the way to school, two on the way to work and maybe even three on the way to the gym. If this scenario is something you can relate to even slightly, you do not live in a food desert.

According to The Low Income Project Team, food deserts are "areas of relative exclusion

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In the vegan cooking classes I teach and the outreach I do, I am often asked how to incorporate "organic" food into our diets without breaking the bank. Since I rarely have a simple answer, I usually start off by saying what I think is a really important thing to keep

Keep in mind that the typical consumer is NOT paying the true cost of food. The meat, dairy, and egg industries, in

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Over the past few years fair trade products have expanded into many new markets. With this trend we inevitably have to reevaluate the micro and macro systems involved in producing and providing fair trade products.

There is a rather large difference between fair trade products and fair trade companies, says Mary Morison, executive director of the Fair Trade Resource Network. Large corporations that sell or promote individual

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This November 7-9, Chicago will host the largest GreenBuild Expo in history. Put on by the USGBC (United States Green Building Council), this year over 18,000 attendees will gather to learn about the trends in green construction and get inspired about future projects. In a city aiming to be the greenest, this is a monumental event. On top of it all, GreenBuild will be held in one of

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A few months ago, in an effort to green up my health and beauty products, I ran across National Geographic’s The Green Guide. The site included a handy wallet-sized guide called The Dirty Dozen in Personal Care Products, which allows me to pick products that don’t contain harmful chemicals.

Then last week, my issue of Whole Life Times included a tear-out seafood guide. It lets me know what to

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Thriftiness isn’t really "new" or "green"; people have found ways to reuse scrap or discarded items for years. The pre-industrialization U.S. didn’t have what we call "trash." Every bit of scrap and waste from the home was remade, reused in some way, or sold to peddlers where it was eventually recycled. With the Industrial Revolution came more products to buy with new kinds of packaging, and trash as we know it

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Editor’s note: As we mentioned yesterday, in addition to featuring a weekly tip from Vital Juice Daily’s email tips, we’ll also be featuring their "Ask VJD" column on Wednesdays. Here’s the first one, which was originally published on August 15, 2007.

Dear Vital Juice Daily,