Green Options

According to the title of an article published in The City of Lancaster’s Outlook (Fall 2009) magazine “The Future Looks Bright for Solar Power in Lancaster”.

My small town,  all 475,000 of us, are at the forefront of solar energy! On August 5, 2009, eSolar unveiled the 5 MW (mega watt) demonstration plant known as Sierra SunTower. The solar power plant has 24,000 mirrors and two giant tower house boilers. The boilers create what’s known as “thermal solar” which is said to be more cost-effective than the standard photovoltaic approach used in solar cells. The process creates steam to drive the turbine generators. The project was completed in 14 month time frame and has already begun to distribute power to Southern California Edison.

eSolar’s site says “Sierra SunTower will supply 5 MW of clean, renewable energy to the grid. This full-scale power plant, the only one of its kind in the U.S., produces electricity for Southern California Edison (SCE) and will power up to 4,000 homes.”

I’m getting older. I realize this because the arrival of summer just doesn’t matter as much as it did before. Beyond serving as an indicator for when I can stop wearing sweaters and when I need to start giving up my weekends in favor of weddings, summer brings little in the way of day-to-day change.

That’s not the case for the younger kids in my life—little cousins, nieces, nephews. To them, summer is the light at the end of the tunnel. There are no weddings (or at least, nothing they need to plan for). There’s only opportunity.

I am fascinated by what “opportunity” means to this generation. When I was young, I had two non-religious opportunities to get involved. I could volunteer at our local hospital, or I could volunteer with our local congressman. I ended up doing both—and feeling fulfilled by neither.

Select hunters have been given permits in Florida to hunt and kill non-native pythons in the wild.

Experts say the alien constrictors number in the tens of thousands in Everglades National Park, and they are wiping out native endangered species. An official with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said the hunt is just the beginning of a much larger eradication program.

With so many sources of information on sustainability and green living choices, you’d think it would be easy for you and me to live a greener lifestyle. And yet, how many times have you found yourself out there, doing errands, going out, or traveling, and you have no idea how and where to make greener choices?

3rdWhale is a bridge between talk and action, with an iPhone app that allows you to search for green businesses in proximity to you, plus submit your own finds that aren’t already on there, all listings filtered by 3rd Whale and then rated by users, ala Yelp. An Android version is on its way.

But here’s where it gets interesting: As seen first in Mother Nature Network 3rd Whale are joining forces with Creative Citizen, a hub for crowdsourced, specifically measurable sustainable choices. Each is broken down to how much energy, waste, water, emissions you’ve saved, and in what I think will help it bridge to a broader segment of the population, money. When you have this kind of clearly tangible benefit laid out for you, and it’s on something that you carry with you, action is much for likely.

Over the past 2 weeks a number of organizations including National Geographic, Conservation International, and several famous rock bands helped facilitate the “Great Turtle Race”: a fun effort to scientifically track the migration of 11 endangered leatherback sea turtles on their journey from Canada to the Caribbean. In addition to building awareness of the need for turtle conservation, one of the turtles provided the world with the 1st complete set of migration data ever recorded for a sea turtle.

Seen above, the sea turtle known as Wawa Bear traveled 4471 miles and had her entire route tracked successfully. At 1315 pounds, it should not be hard to imagine where the name “bear” comes from. Wawa Bear is, in fact, the largest sea turtle ever captured in Nova Scotian waters.

“Garbage Moguls,” a new National Geographic show that premieres today, Earth Day, at 9 PM ET/PT, follows the team’s unorthodox creative process ― the brain-racking and stress, the silliness and infighting ―all working to build a profitable business with products composed entirely of trash.

World class adventurer, National Geographic Emerging Explorer, and a descendant of the legendary Rothschild banking family, David de Rothschild, will attempt to do what no one has done before, sail half-way around the world from California to Australia on a catamaran made 90% of recycled plastic waste powered only by the wind and the sun.

However this is not the first journey to be made across the Pacific using plastic waste. Last year a raft made of 15,000 bottles called the Junk successfully made a similar journey from California to Hawaii in 87 days in order to promote awareness of the global plastic waste problem.

In central Thailand an enormous freshwater stingray was captured, tagged and released during a National Geographic expedition.

Dr. Zeb Hogan, a biologist from the University of Nevada, Reno helped tag and release the animal. It was estimated to be somewhere between 550 and 770 lbs, but was never officially weighed.

GenGreenLife, National Geographic Green Guide and EVO.com partner to form new online portal to green products and services

Looking for a carpet cleaner that doesn’t use all kinds of dangerous high-VOC cleaning products? Have a hunkering for some tofurkey slices but are out of town and away from your favorite natural foods grocer? If you are searching for either of these or any other green and environmentally-conscious products and services, I have a tip for you.

Got a story, a camera, and some time over the holiday break? Get shooting — the National Geographic Preserve Our Planet College Film and PSA contest is underway. Contest winners can look forward to cash prizes, and screenings of their video the National Geographic Explorers gathering in June 2009.

This year’s theme, “Together We Can Make a Difference,” should get those wheels turning — with so many college organizations, and colleges and universities themselves, taking steps towards sustainability, there are many great stories that need to get told.

Official rules are available at the contest site.  The catch — the deadline for submissions is coming up pretty quickly: December 31 (sorry… just found out about this last week).

Looking for something to do? At an awkward party? Did your boyfriend or girlfriend just dump you?

Or do you think you’re sophisticated because you read a bunch of books and pay attention to world news? Then test your knowledge of geography with these quick and fun online games, you nerd!