Share. Learn. Shop. Explore. Your world in green.
- Social Entrepreneurs: How to Change the World Through Business
I love to read, but am lucky if I have time to finish even one book a month. Fortunately, I can “cheat” and listen to author interviews on the radio or via podcasts, and I just listened to an engaging interview with Pamela Hartigan, the founding partner of the yet-to-be-launched Volans Ventures and the founding director of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship, about her new book titled The Power Of Unreasonable People: How Social Entrepreneurs Create Markets That Change the World.The podcast is part of Stanford Social Innovation Review’s “Design for Change”
series, and I recommend that you listen to it.But if even that shortcut is too much for you, I’ll give you a couple of highlights.
- Urgent: Sign USDA Petition Demanding Stronger Regulations for Genetically Engineered Crops!
The comment period for proposed rule changes on Genetically Engineered Organisms ends on Monday, November 24th.Sign the Center for Food Safety’s petition and make yourself heard on genetically modified foods and pharmaceutical crops issues!
- Palin Praises ‘Great Country’ in Which Turkeys Are Slaughtered Behind You on TV
Sarah Palin, apparently oblivious to the turkey slaughter behind her, gives a press conference on…oh, who cares what she’s talking about. All I can notice are the turkeys.
This story contains additional media. Click here to view the media.
Video Credit: TheSexyPatriot on YouTube
- Prototype Generator Harnesses Vibration Power
Omron Corp. recently debuted a small prototype generator that harnesses power from vibrations to create electricity. The model will be cheap—approximately $10.36— due to its simple structure and packaging.
- Can a Modern Green Home Be Built for $100K?
Follow Philly’s Postgreen as they attempt to build a modern green home for $100,000.
Just over a year ago, Philadelphia developer Postgreen undertook an ambitious project, to build a modern green home for $100,000. Not only are they seeking to shatter the myth that green homes are unaffordable, but they are documenting every step on their site, 100KHouse.com. Located in the New Kensington area of Philadelphia, the house will be a roughly 1,000 square foot two bedroom one and a half bath modern style home - and will not be a prefab; rather it is being built from the ground up according to LEED for Homes guidelines using such affordable energy saving materials as SIPs (structurally insulated panels.)
Documenting the progress of the 100K House are Postgreen President Chad Ludeman and PR Director Nic Darling. Both are convinced that affordable green building is not only possible, but necessary to bring about true environmental change. Their blog posts are not limited to the progress of the 100K House; they write about a range of interesting green topics.
- Washington Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Wind Power in Landmark Case
Wind energy advocates won a big victory Thursday in Washington when the state’s Supreme Court ruled that local county commissioners can’t block wind farms.The case, Residents Opposed to Kittitas Turbines v. State of Washington Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, represents a big win for renewable energy advocates in the ongoing struggle to site wind energy installations; a struggle that has become a pervasive part of local renewable energy politics.
- UbiGreen Cell Phone App Keeps Track of Your Carbon Footprint
Keeping track of your carbon footprint can be hard; you may walk or take the bus everywhere, but how much CO2 is that cross-country plane trip letting loose? UbiGreen, a new cell phone application developed by Intel and the University of Washington, senses whether you’re in a plane, train, or car to let you know exactly what your carbon footprint is.
- Eco-Pregnancy Makes for Healthy Babies
Many women discover the green lifestyle when they are expecting, or become moms. Wanting to do the best you can for your child includes considerations that you make before your baby is even born – after all, that’s why you’ve given up wine, right? Everyone knows that eating right and getting enough rest will help both mother and baby be healthy, but the green movement has opened our eyes to the effects that the world around us can have as well.Back in 2005, a frightening study by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) found chemicals in the blood of the umbilical cords from 10 newborn babies. These chemicals were linked to cancer, birth defects, and hormone disruptions, and included lead, mercury and PCBs. Since then, moms-to-be have demanded more information about reducing the impact of the chemical soup that we all live in.
We Are What We Eat
According to most studies, it’s not clear whether organic food has higher nutritional value than its non-organic counterparts. Regardless, one thing is for sure: organic food contains fewer chemicals. Organic food is grown without artificial fertilizers, conventional pesticides, or sewage sludge, and processed without ionizing radiation and food additives. That stuff is gross, whether you’re pregnant or not. To label a food product organic, it must be certified by the National Organic Program, which is run by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). A USDA Organic seal indicates that the product contains at least 95% organic ingredients, so look for this label.
- Mini Electric Car Fun But Quirky During My Short Test Drive
At the LA Auto Show today, I had the privilege of testing the 2009 Mini E electric car on a short drive downtown. It’s zippy off the line and maintains the Mini’s sense of fun and performance, yet it also has a few quirks that may make driving it a bit of a hassle — at least during an initial “mental adjustment” phase.
The new-for-2009 Mini E electric car is undoubtedly one of the most highly-anticipated cars being released next year. Initially the car will only be offered to a select group of 500 people in the Los Angeles, New York and New Jersey metro areas who will be chosen by Mini to provide the exact set of testing conditions Mini engineers want to evaluate.
- Campaign Round-Up: Carbon Regulations, Transportation, E-Waste and More
Every week, we're amazed by the number of smart contests, campaigns and other initiatives that organizations around the world bring to our attention. These roundup posts are a way for us to shout out the best of what's crossed our desks. -- The WC Editorial Team
FT Climate Change Challenge
The Financial Times and Forum for the Future have teamed up to search the globe for the most innovative new solution to the effects of climate change. That standout innovation could be a new technology, system or service, novel organization or business model. One winner will receive a $75,000 prize to help turn his or her idea into reality. Entries will be accepted from now until January 30, 2009, and the winner will be announced in April 2009.
Time to Lead
On December 11, 2008, European political leaders will decide what their response to global warming is going to be. Last year, they agreed to a 30 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. Now, with the downturn in the economy, that deal is under threat and time is running out. As a result, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace and World Wildlife Fund through the coordination of the Climate Action Network (CAN) formed the campaign Time to Lead. The movement urges European citizens and organizations to act by contacting local legislators and issuing support of the 30 percent reduction in Europe’s own carbon emissions by 2020.
Transportation For America
We need a bold agenda to fix our roads and bridges; build high speed trains; invest in public transit, infrastructure for biking and walking, and green innovation. Through this initiative, Transportation for America -- an impressive coalition of diverse interests -- invites concerned citizens to join them in calling on President-elect Barack Obama to commit to building a 21st Century transportation system. Their letter asks Obama to lead us in building complete streets; repairing our highways, bridges and transit systems; and pushing ahead with ready-to-go rail projects ... and to commit to that plan within his first 100 days in office. (Obama recently responded to the campaign's earlier call for an agenda: read his letter here.)
Take Back My TV
With only three months to go until the U.S. digital TV conversion, the Electronics TakeBack Coalition (ETBC) released its new TV Recycling Report Card, grading the major TV manufacturers on their efforts to establish national programs to take back and recycle their old TVs. ETBC estimates that tens of millions of old-style TVs, each of which includes 4-8 pounds of toxic metals, will be disposed in the near future. They could end up in our landfills, or be dumped overseas in developing countries, as profiled in a recent 60 Minutes report. The EPA estimates that there are 99 million unused TVs in storage in the U.S.
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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Resource - Politics at 4:12 PM)
- Geoengineering ‘No Substitute’ for Climate Targets, UK Minister Warns
Geoengineering is a topic we often discuss here on Worldchanging. And while we encourage careful debate concerning this topic, we are cautiously skeptical of any ideas that support tinkering with the intricate systems and delicate balances of the Earth. (Click here for a collection of Worldchanging discussions on Geoengineering.)
UK climate minister Joan Ruddock is wary of reliance on radical technology that could be used by some as an excuse to avoid meeting targets to reduce carbon emissions.by James Randerson
Research into drastic solutions to climate change such as cloud seeding, sun shades in space and ocean fertilization risks hampering global climate negotiations by giving some countries an excuse for not agreeing to short-term emissions reductions, a UK government minister warned today.
The remarks by Joan Ruddock, a minister in the Department of Energy and Climate Change, appear to be a thinly veiled dig at the Bush administration, whose delegation attempted to insert a section into last year's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on developing technology to block sunlight and cool the planet. The proposed text referred to it as an "important insurance" against the impacts of climate change.
Speaking to MPs on the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills select committee, Ruddock was defending the government's unwillingness to fund research into so-called geoengineering – large-scale, untested interventions that either soak up carbon dioxide or prevent sunlight warming the planet
"The concern is that people who don't want to enter into agreements that mean they have to reduce their emissions might see this as a means of doing nothing, of being able to say, 'science will provide, there will be a way out'," she said, "it could be used politically in that way which would be extremely unfortunate."
She added that funding research on such projects would deflect engineers away from more pressing solutions to climate change such as carbon capture and storage – extracting carbon dioxide from the emissions put out by fossil fuel power stations and injecting it underground.
The science minister Lord Drayson added that many of the proposals – such as launching huge mirrors into space, adding particles into the atmosphere to deflect light or seeding algal blooms in the ocean using iron fertilizer – were extremely costly and had risks that were poorly understood. "Some of the projects that are being postulated under geoengineering do strike one as being in the realm of science fiction," he said.
But Steve Rayner, professor of science and civilization at the Said Business School in Oxford, pointed out that not all options were expensive. Some such as iron fertilization would be within reach of wealthy individuals - he called them, "a 'Greenfinger' rather than 'Goldfinger'."
Currently, the research councils – which decide how public science funding is spent – do not fund any projects into geoengineering directly, although the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council has allocated £3m for an "ideas factory" into potential projects next year.
According to Dr Phil Williamson at the University of East Anglia, who wrote the Natural Environment Research Council's submission to the select committee hearing, around £50m of the government's research spend is peripherally related to geo-engineering.
The select committee's chair, the liberal democrat MP Phil Willis, said he was disappointed with the government's position of adopting only a "watching brief" over the emerging field. "That seems to me a very very negative way of actually facing up to the challenge of the future," he said. "It's a very pessimistic view of emerging science and Britain's place within that emerging science community."
He said government should support many different avenues to tackling climate change. "There have to be plethora of solutions. Some of which we do not know whether they will work, but that is the whole purpose of science."
But the chief scientific advisor to the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Prof Bob Watson, said that funding should be focussed on the most immediate solutions. "I think the question is whether [geoengineering] is the highest priority at the moment given scarce resources.
"First [priority] is actually putting investment into current technologies and pre-commercial technologies such as carbon capture and storage," he said, "Clearly I think this is something which has to be move quickly. I would call it an Apollo-type programme... we need to go in parallel and try multiple approaches simultaneously." He advocated that the EU, US and Japan work together on research into CCS.
Some scientists and engineers will also be disappointed with the government's dismissal of the field. In the introduction to a collection of scientific papers published by the Royal Society in September on the topic Prof Brian Launder of the University of Manchester and Prof Michael Thompson of the University of Cambridge wrote: "While such geoscale interventions may be risky, the time may well come when they are accepted as less risky than doing nothing... There is increasingly the sense that governments are failing to come to grips with the urgency of setting in place measures that will assuredly lead to our planet reaching a safe equilibrium."
· This article was amended on Thursday November 20 2008 to clarify that the figure of £50m mentioned in the piece is the per annum spend by the UK's research councils, not the total government spend. It covers research on climate modeling, carbon capture and storage and 'geoengineering relevant' research work.
This piece originally appeared on The Guardian, for which James Randerson is a science correspondent.
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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Climate Change at 4:03 PM)
- Recycling for Change: Epic Change uses a pay-it-forward approach to saving the world
If you’re going to change the world, wouldn’t you like it to be epic?
Stacey Monk, Co-founder and CEO of Epic Change, does, which is why she and Sanjay Patel decided to launch their unique approach to sparking social change by converting people’s “epic” stories into financial resources they can use to improve their communities, their lives – and the world.
Rooted in the best practices of successful businesses and charities, their somewhat novel approach to funding uses donations to provide interest-free loans to finance community improvement efforts, which they repay by generating revenue-driving projects based on each epic story, and then recycle by duplicating those ideas in other communities, effectively spreading hopefulness and change to everyone their program touches.
I had the opportunity to talk with Stacey to dig a little deeper into their change model, and this impassioned former management consultant with a degree in Public Policy from the Heinz School of Public Policy and Management at Carnegie Mellon University boasts an impressive resume, but her most compelling attribute by far is a genuine desire to promote positive change and a dewey-eyed hopefulness that makes me believe she can.
- Former Mailman in Federal Court Gets Probation for Refusing to Deliver Junk Mail
Former mailman Steven Padgett received probation in federal court for failing to deliver years worth of junk mail. Although the mailman did not stop delivering junk mail based on the environmental impact of junk mail, which accounts for 30% of all US mail, but he did it because he couldn’t keep up with the volume of mail he had to deliver and still maintain a personal relationship with those on his route. Even so, environmental groups, such as Forest Ethics, have supported Padgett. The federal court sentenced Padgett to three years probation, a $3,000 fine, and 500 hours of community service.Via: News & Observer
Image: uzvards on Flickr under a Creative Commons License
- Real Wall Street Bailout As Sea Levels Rise
A mere four centuries after the Dutch founded a little settlement in a far off land they named Nieuw Amsterdam; New York City could really use their expertize in dealing with sea levels. Even by the end of this century.
According to new sea-level rise research, by 2100, the area in lower Manhattan near the wall that kept the original settlement safe from invasion will need to be protected with Dykes. Or something.
Wall Street was named for that ancient protective wall.
- New Thinkers Series: Joshua Wolfe and the GHG Team
On Tuesday, we had lunch with Joshua Wolfe, president and founding member of GHG Photos, a new collaborative organization of leading climate change photographers.He told us a lot about his job as a climate change photographer, which from what we could tell, is one of the more fascinating jobs around. Whether he's climbing mountains with 90 lbs of sensitive equipment and a stash of protein bars; gazing down dizzily through the lens from the window of a prop jet; or performing yet another death-defying feat to get that perfect glacial shot, Wolfe's work has put him face-to-face with more of the changing landscape than most people will ever see. His heartbreakingly beautiful photographs are proof.
But Wolfe and the other GHG photographers have a larger mission. Through their photographs, they hope to help accelerate the conversation about climate change. The photographers routinely look to climate scientists, like those from Columbia University's Earth Institute, and veteran environmental journalists, like Andrew Revkin and Elizabeth Kolbert, to help tell the story of climate change more clearly through science. With images, science and words, they aim to give thousands of new people a better grasp of what is really happening, and why.
One of the biggest obstacles to the debate about climate change, Wolfe says, is the inequity in basic background knowledge of the issue. "If you're a reporter covering climate change, you always have to start at Point A," he says, and it's tough to introduce really intricate concepts when you're always explaining the basic idea. As a result, he worries that stories about climate change seem to many like a series of catastrophic and overwhelming events – like major hurricanes and other natural disasters – but it's harder to explain how they're all related, and to reveal the more insidious creep of planetary symptoms.
By seeking out images of a warming world, and of the science behind understanding and combating climate change, Wolfe and GHG hope to raise the bar of universal understanding, and to make knowledge not only more accessible, but more vivid.
Worldchanging's New Thinkers Series is our way of calling attention to the emerging leaders in a changing world. If you know of an individual or group that we should profile, send an email to Sarahk [at] worldchanging [dot] com.
Image credit: GHG Photos
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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Worldchanging Interviews at 3:12 PM)
- PureAyre Natural Odor Eliminator Perfect for Bathrooom or Diapers
A friend of mine’s baby just crossed that threshold from sweet smelling breastfed diapers to the offensive food eating bowel movements. Diaper changes are now done in a hurry, especially when other people are around, and the baby has joined the ranks of the rest of the family that can stink up a room.PureAyre makes several organic odor eliminating sprays that really do work for the smells babies, kids, and adults produce in the bathroom.
In our family of four, we have only one bathroom. Sometimes in the mornings, we can’t wait for the air to clear before another family member needs to brush their teeth before school. We keep a bottle of PureAyre on the back of the toilet, and it really does works to eliminate odors without masking them. I don’t really understand how it works, but the strong smells just seem to disappear. I’ve tried lavender bunches, matches, scented candles, etc., but nothing compares to PureAyre’s ability to eliminate odor.
- Schwarzenegger, Bay Area to Build First U.S. Electric Vehicle Network
Bay Area leaders are hoping that a combo of public and private investments can turn the region into The Electric Vehicle Capital of the U.S., by building out a $1-billion electric vehicle infrastructure. The group involves Silicon Valley’s Better Place and a group of wide-eyed politicians: California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and the mayors of San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland.
- Electric Car Infrastructure Announced for California
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, along with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums, and San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed joined Better Place CEO Shai Agassi in announcing a plan for a sustainable transportation model for California.Shai Agassi founded Better Place in October of 2007 with $200 million in venture capital. The vision of Better Place is to reduce global dependency on oil by creating a market-based transportation infrastructure that supports electric vehicles and renewable energy.
Within the first six months of its founding, Better Place forged cooperative agreements with business and government in Israel and Denmark, most recently announcing a deal to bring Better Place to Australia. And with today’s announcement the electric car infrastructure model is set to come to California, starting in the San Francisco Bay Area.
- 3 Finalists For Crazy Green Idea
In September, the X Prize Foundation announced a contest to come up with the next, green-themed X Prize. The challenge was to make a 2 minute YouTube video which focuses on a specific green goal which, if met, would be rewarded with a $10 million X Prize. The maker of the winning video would receive $25,000 of his/her own, granted by Prize Capital – a company dedicated to supporting green startups and causes.
The contest has been narrowed down to the following three finalists:
