We’ve talked about the awesomeness of crafting with fabric scraps before, but not everyone has a shamefully stuffed scrap bin like the one in my craft room. If you’re not a hoarder of fabric scraps but still want to get your craft on, don’t fret! Etsy seller Scrap Ecochic has you covered!

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Two seperate scientific studies have revealed that global warming is leading to significant reductions in the size of sheep and fish species, more evidence that climate change is forcing a huge range of species to adapt to a hotter world.

The first study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, investigated fish populations in French rivers and the Baltic Sea and discovered that fish are shrinking as their habitats heat up.

Results show that average fish size in many French rivers have declined over the last thirty years, while the geographical range of tiddlers in the Baltic expanded as species such as herring and sprat also shrunk.

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The last time I visited a family member in hospital, I was struck by how many disposables they used. I know that it’s important to keep things sterile, but I’m talking about things like personal grooming. Rather than give her a sponge bath, for example, they gave her individually wrapped wipes that were pre-soaked in some sort of chemical. I was thrilled to learn that many new hospitals are focusing on sustainability. Maybe practices like those disposable wipes are on the way out? In the meantime, you can reduce your impact with just a bit of planning!

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“We are each other’s harvest; we are each other’s business; we are each other’s magnitude and bond.” Gwendolyn Brooks

Dave Lowenstein and Gwendolyn Brooks hooked me. Just over two years ago, I was contemplating my stay in Lawrence, Kansas and sorting out future plans. The circumstances that brought me there weren’t going to keep me there. All my work was in New York and Los Angeles. I had no compelling reason to stay. Then I walked by a mural.

The mural, replete with brilliant images of incredible African-American artists connected to Kansas, is the backdrop for Lawrence’s Saturday Farmers’ Market. But that particular Sunday was scorching hot and downtown was a ghost town. The one car parked in front of the colorful wall at 9th and New Hampshire featured a bumper sticker demanding a living wage for Lawrence. I got up close to the words. I took a photo of the bumper sticker. In that sticky, solitary, epiphanic moment, everything became clear. I wanted to stay in this small town in a flat state, because of our magnitude and bond.

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One Jackson Hole, Wyoming business, WordenGroup Strategic Public Relations, has announced a “Go Paperless” initiative for Arbor Day, April 24, 2009.

The company wants to reduce office paper flow and save trees in honor of the national tree planting holiday.

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Irish scientists have discovered that adding just a small amount of fish oil to the diet of cattle can vastly reduce the amount of methane produced by, ahem…cow farts.

Climate scientists have long known that, pound for pound, methane is 20 times more powerful than carbon dioxide at trapping the suns rays, making it a highly potent greenhouse gas. An incredible 900 billion tonnes of the noxious fumes are produced each year by methanogen bacteria that live in the digestive systems of ruminants such as cattle, sheep and goats.

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I can’t stop drooling over these cozy, upcycled houses from Snugville!

Artist Amy Larson creates each little snug from scratch out of vintage materials. She says that she is drawn to materials that give her the opportunity to reduce, reuse, and recycle! All of that scavenging for just the right vintage bits and pieces gives each snug a unique personality and charm.

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A US-based company has successfully tested a revolutionary solar panel that is expected to cut the costs of photovoltaic solar power generation by more than 50 per cent, and herald a new era of improved efficiency and lower production costs of solar energy globally.

The panel, known as the Alubond Solar Collector Panel (SCP), was created by American Building Technologies, a subsidiary of the UAE-based multinational group Mulk Holdings. Commenting on the breakthrough, a spokesman for Mulk said, “We hope the success of this project will lead to an upsurge in the development of more solar energy plants, which will not only lessen the strain on existing energy resources, but also severely reduce the pollution levels that are currently witnessed in power generation.”

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Nasa scientists have told government’s that a simple cut in worldwide emissions of soot could lead to a dramatic reduction in the effects of global warming, as well as preventing hundreds of thousands of deaths from air pollution.

Soot contains black carbon, thought to be the second largest cause of global warming after carbon dioxide. Whilst airborne, it it spread around the globe by wind, heating the atmosphere by absorbing and releasing warmth from the sun’s rays. When it falls to the surface it also darkens snow and ice in polar regions or high mountain ranges, further reducing the Earth’s ability to reflect solar radiation.

Cutting soot emissions has a virtually instantaneous effect since it disappears rapidly from the earth’s atmosphere, unlike CO2, which can linger for hundreds of years.

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I’m not sure what the solution is in the grand scheme of things, but I know that I can contribute to a small part of the solution. I can step up the reduce and reuse part of reduce, reuse, recycle. If I produce less recyclables, and you produce less recyclables, it will help. It might not solve the entire problem, but it will help.

Here’s what I plan to do:

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Over the past couple of years, I’ve watched with perhaps a little too much pride as the pile of trash I’ve put out on Fridays has shrunk and the pile of recyclables I put out on Thursdays has grown. I have successfully reduced the amount of trash I generate. Recently I’ve realized that’s not enough. I need to now start reducing the amount of recycling I generate.

About a month ago, I started to see news reports stating that the demand for recyclables has dropped. The economic plunge has taken the recycling market off the cliff with it. According to an article on GreenBiz.com,

Consumers are buying fewer products made in China, and with fewer products being shipped overseas, there is a lesser need for boxes and packaging materials to move those items, according to The Journal of Commerce. Chinese producers, therefore, need fewer materials to make packaging and items.

“A lot of the material was going to China to make boxes for all the things they were shipping back to the United States,” Bruce Savage, spokesman for the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries in Washington, told the Sacramento Bee. “When they aren’t producing products, they don’t need the packaging materials.”

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]]> http://sustainablog.org/2008/12/09/reducing-your-recycling-part-1/feed/ http://cleantechnica.com/2008/11/18/verdiem-launch-free-software-to-slash-pc-power-use-up-to-80/ http://cleantechnica.com/2008/11/18/verdiem-launch-free-software-to-slash-pc-power-use-up-to-80/#comments Tue, 18 Nov 2008 20:25:13 +0000 Andrew Williams http://cleantechnica.com/2008/11/18/verdiem-launch-free-software-to-slash-pc-power-use-up-to-80/

PC energy saving specialists Verdiem have today released free downloadable software designed to help users slash their energy use up to a massive 80 percent.

According to Allison Cornia, vice president of product management at Verdiem, “If we could get just 10 per cent of the world’s one billion PCs using [the product] properly we could save 32 billion kilograms of CO2 a year. That’s equivalent to taking half a million cars off the road.”

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]]> http://cleantechnica.com/2008/11/18/verdiem-launch-free-software-to-slash-pc-power-use-up-to-80/feed/ http://sustainablog.org/2008/11/15/five-resolutions-for-america-recycles-day/ http://sustainablog.org/2008/11/15/five-resolutions-for-america-recycles-day/#comments Sat, 15 Nov 2008 15:15:54 +0000 Jeff McIntire-Strasburg http://sustainablog.org/2008/11/15/five-resolutions-for-america-recycles-day/ Editor’s note: I originally published this post on Intent.com

November 15th is America Recycles Day! As Robin noted on Tuesday, it’s an occasion that can create mixed feelings for us “greenies”: yes, it’s great to have recognition of the importance of recycling in our daily lives, but the very existence of America Recycles Day reminds us that, in many cases, American’s don’t recycle… or, not nearly enough of us, anyway. We need to address that issue on the level of mindset as well as accessibility: many of us don’t think about our disposal of “waste” as we should, but many others don’t have access to convenient recycling services… and we’d like both to change.

I’d imagine both of those issues will receive plenty of attention today. I’d like to bring up another concept that doesn’t get discussed as much: recycling as a moral yardstick for one’s commitment to environmental protection and restoration.  You know what I’m talking about: the mixture of disbelief and downright contempt many of us experience, and express, when we find out someone doesn’t separate recyclables out from their home waste stream.  “You don’t recycle?!” We often “ask” this rhetorical question with a tone reserved for question like “You don’t vote?” or “You don’t wash your hands after using the bathroom?” Failure to recycle is a personal and social failing akin to passing gas at a cocktail party…

OK, maybe that’s a little strong, but I do think we tend to approach the act of recycling as a sign of virtue.  I don’t know that this is always the best way to get more people not only separating out waste paper and aluminum cans from the “trash,” but also thinking about the impact of their consumption choices.  As someone who’s been guilty of all the above-mentioned sins, I’d like to share my resolutions for this America Recycles Day (why wait until New Year?).

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]]> http://sustainablog.org/2008/11/15/five-resolutions-for-america-recycles-day/feed/ http://craftingagreenworld.com/2008/10/24/green-pumpkins-with-ready-made/ http://craftingagreenworld.com/2008/10/24/green-pumpkins-with-ready-made/#comments Fri, 24 Oct 2008 17:30:34 +0000 Kelly Rand http://craftingagreenworld.com/2008/10/24/green-pumpkins-with-ready-made/ We sure are excited about the upcoming Halloween holiday here at Crafting a Green World. Do you have your costume ready? What about decorations?

Ready Made Magazine has this great refresher course on pumpkin-carving how to; including a clever CFL template to carve into your pumpkin! What a perfect idea to not only make your own costume for Halloween, but carve your green ideals for all the trick-or-treaters to see.

You could carve other environmental symbols into pumpkins and have yourself a very Eco-Ween with many different green jack-o-lanterns. You could carve a Prius, the Reduce, Reuse, Recycle symbol, or even a Windmill.

Let us know some other fun ideas to make your Halloween truly green!

[Image courtesy: Ready Made] ]]> http://craftingagreenworld.com/2008/10/24/green-pumpkins-with-ready-made/feed/ http://redgreenandblue.org/2008/10/16/mean-joe-green-31-the-purple-demoblican-to-the-rescue/ http://redgreenandblue.org/2008/10/16/mean-joe-green-31-the-purple-demoblican-to-the-rescue/#comments Thu, 16 Oct 2008 19:11:39 +0000 Joe Mohr http://redgreenandblue.org/2008/10/16/mean-joe-green-31-the-purple-demoblican-to-the-rescue/ Enough politicking!
Enough he said/he said!

Keeping the earth clean and healthy is not Right vs. Left, it is right vs. wrong!

We all breathe the same air, drink the same water, eat food that comes from the earth’s soil. It is my observation that my Republican brother-in-law needs the same clean water and air as I in order to live. It is also an observation of mine that the health effects of toxic air and water will equally effect the children of my bro-in-law as much as it will my own. Therefore, it is up to the majority of us whether right or left, liberal or conservative to join together as one group of people that inhabit one planet and address the degradation of our environment.

For the Environment, we are not red or blue, Republican or Democrat–we are the Purple (Blue+Red) Demoblicans (Democrat+Republican)!

Purple Demoblicans unite!

Power tho the Purple!

Purple is the new green!

Demoblicans are the new environmentalists!

The below average catch phrases are endless…

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]]> http://redgreenandblue.org/2008/10/16/mean-joe-green-31-the-purple-demoblican-to-the-rescue/feed/ http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/09/12/conference-on-local-solutions-for-the-energy-crisis/ http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/09/12/conference-on-local-solutions-for-the-energy-crisis/#comments Fri, 12 Sep 2008 17:42:39 +0000 The Dave Room http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/09/12/conference-on-local-solutions-for-the-energy-crisis/ While the presidential candidates are talking largely about offshore drilling, nuclear, clean coal, and large scale renewable energy strategies to be undertaken at a national level, there is a whole slate of community-based solutions that We The People can be working on locally.

To find out more, consider attending a conference on local community-based solutions to the energy crisis starting at the end of October in Rochester, Michigan.

Plan C: Individual and Community Survival Strategies for the Energy Crisis

The Fifth US Conference on Peak Oil and Community Solutions
October 31 – November 2, 2008
Rochester, Michigan
www.plancconference.org

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]]> http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/09/12/conference-on-local-solutions-for-the-energy-crisis/feed/ http://gas2.org/2008/08/27/us-could-cut-fuel-use-50-by-2035/ http://gas2.org/2008/08/27/us-could-cut-fuel-use-50-by-2035/#comments Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:24:13 +0000 Andrew Williams http://gas2.org/2008/08/27/us-could-cut-fuel-use-50-by-2035/

A new report by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Energy Initiative predicts that a 30-50% reduction in fuel consumption is possible in the US over the next 25-30 years. Initially, this will be achieved through improved gasoline and diesel engines and transmissions, gasoline hybrids and reductions in vehicle weight and drag. In the longer term, the study concludes that plug-in hybrids and, later, hydrogen fuel cells may begin to have a significant impact on fuel use and emissions.

The report, ‘On the Road in 2035: Reducing Transportation’s Petroleum Consumption and GHG Emissions,’ summarizes the results of an MIT research project that assessed the technology of vehicles and fuels that could be developed and commercialized during the next 25 years.

The research team assessed the effect of new vehicle and fuel technologies on the performance, cost and lifecycle emissions of individual vehicles. It then assessed the effects on the total on-the-road fleet of introducing these technologies using “plausible assumptions about how rapidly they could be developed, manufactured and sold to buyers to replace existing vehicles and fuels or to add to the existing fleet.”

Other key findings include:

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]]> http://gas2.org/2008/08/27/us-could-cut-fuel-use-50-by-2035/feed/ http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/08/15/reduce-reuse-recycle-your-way-to-lower-overhead/ http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/08/15/reduce-reuse-recycle-your-way-to-lower-overhead/#comments Fri, 15 Aug 2008 20:57:56 +0000 Megan Prusynski http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/08/15/reduce-reuse-recycle-your-way-to-lower-overhead/ It seems like the price of everything is going up lately, and so is the cost of doing business. One of the best pieces of business advice I’ve heard so far is to keep your overhead costs as low as possible. This can be tricky for a green business, since we often spend a little bit more on sustainable and organic materials and office supplies. But with a little green thinking it’s possible to lower your costs while making eco-conscious decisions. Here’s where our old friends reduce, reuse, and recycle come in.

The key to lowering your overhead while greening your business is simplicity. Keep your operations as simple as possible, and cut out the fluff you don’t need. For some this may mean working from home rather than renting office space. For others it may mean scaling your business down and working smarter with what you already have. Every choice you make has the potential to save (or cost) you money, as well as help (or harm) the environment.

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]]> http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/08/15/reduce-reuse-recycle-your-way-to-lower-overhead/feed/ http://ecochildsplay.com/2008/08/14/go-green-mommy-discourage-gluttony/ http://ecochildsplay.com/2008/08/14/go-green-mommy-discourage-gluttony/#comments Thu, 14 Aug 2008 20:25:43 +0000 Jessica Gottlieb http://ecochildsplay.com/2008/08/14/go-green-mommy-discourage-gluttony/ There are seven deadly sins. I can’t rattle them off to you but I’ll apologize in advance, because I’m fairly certain I’m guilty of some many most of them. With that being said I have two children and an obligation to turn them into stewards of the Earth. My children (like yours) are kind little people, but they have a propensity towards gluttony.

The common thread with families who conserve is that they’re part of a community and their children have a sense of obligation. Children are born narcissists and can evolve into selfish beings or amazing, giving and inspired members of our society.

How do we grow them up green?

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]]> http://ecochildsplay.com/2008/08/14/go-green-mommy-discourage-gluttony/feed/ http://sustainablog.org/2008/07/29/life-after-desk-dont-toss-that-tropical-hardwood/ http://sustainablog.org/2008/07/29/life-after-desk-dont-toss-that-tropical-hardwood/#comments Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:55:34 +0000 Simran Sethi http://sustainablog.org/2008/07/29/life-after-desk-dont-toss-that-tropical-hardwood/ Simran Sethi and Sarah Smarsh are writing a series on the surprising journeys of everyday things. They will be posting previews on Green Options before launching the posts on Huffington Post. Here’s a sneak peek at the desk you threw away.

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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