White is the New Black

I love when an environmental piece is the most popular article on a news website. All day today, NYT readers have been loving this piece about white roofs being the new, hot thing in energy savings. In fact, the article states that "studies show that white roofs reduce air-conditioning costs by 20 percent or more in hot, sunny weather." Awesome, now to see if I can convince my parents to buy into this trend. Since we don't have AC in SF, they'd probably benefit a bit more, you know, living in Atlanta and all.

PS puns intended.

Carbon Offset Cheat Sheet

To accompany my post from about a week ago concerning carbon offsets and Terrapass, I found this handy-dandy website that rates offset providers, Offset Consumer. It talks about different providers, carbon calculators, reasons to offset, etc, etc. According to OC, NativeEnergy is the best US offset provider...but Terrapass isn't on there, so I don't know what to think about that (I'll do more research and get back to you...it's late).

Happy perusing. Night.

San Francisco wins!

Yet again, I'm proud to be a San Franciscan. Why? Well, because the US News and World Report had the following to say about a study that came out last week (as well as a few other recent studies):

In news that surprised absolutely no one San Francisco was declared America's Least Wasteful City in a study sponsored by reusable water bottle maker Nalgene. Indeed, five of the top 10 cities on the list are on the West Coast, mirroring trends in nearly every city-ranking green study that's come out recently. Witness:

• America's Most Walkable City: San Fransicso, joined in the top 10 by Seattle, Long Beach, Calif., Portland, Ore.
• America's 50 Greenest Cities: Portland, Ore., joined by #2 San Francisco, #4 Oakland, Calif. #5 Eugene, Ore., #7 Berkeley, Calif., and #8 Seattle.
• SustainLane's Greenest Cities: mirrors the list above, except Seattle is moved up to third place, Oakland is ninth, and Eugene and Berkeley are knocked out of the top 10.
• America's Greenest Economic Cities puts Sacramento, Calif, in first place, followed by all of the usual suspects.
• America's Top 10 Energy Star Cities put Los Angeles , and San Francisco in first and second place, respectively.

You get the idea. (Find the full list of least wasteful cities here.)

Southern cities consistently rank towards the bottom of these lists, due to lack of public transportation, inadequate recycling, and energy usage, among other factors. What do you think: could Houston, Orlando or Birmingham, Ala. ever be as green as San Francisco? Or are these cities just too fundamentally different?

Dishwashing by Hand or Machine

In honor of the new apartment I will be moving into at the end of the month (that has a dishwasher!!!), I want to educate my readers about energy and water-use involved with hand-washing dishes versus washing your dishes in the dishwasher. A scientific study done at The University of Bonn in German thoroughly explored the age-old question of hand vs machine, and those inquisitive Germans discovered the following: the dishwasher uses only half the energy, one-sixth of the water, and less soap than washing by hand. The study also rated the level of cleanliness achieved by both methods, and again the washing machine won. Don't you just LOVE when the lazy method is also the better method? I do! I do! So, next time you have a dinner party and your guests try to wash the remainder of the dishes in the sink after the washer is full, tell them to DROP THE SPONGE. You can load the rest of those dishes into the machine in the morning. Sometime even the best intentions aren't the eco-friendly ones.

Last note - be sure to use eco-friendly soap and always wait till the d'washer is full before running it. Have a great weekend!

Earth Hour Activities

Initially, I was going to post a list of Earth Hour activities for people to partake in, but on second thought, I'd love to hear what my READERS are planning to do for Earth Hour. Set your fingers a typin' and please leave a comment below letting me (and the rest of my totally devoted YBG following) know what you'll be up to on Saturday night. For example, I'll be out celebrating my friend Jenn's birthday, and since I have no idea where we'll be at 8:30 sharp, I plan to carry candles and headlamps so that I'm prepared to celebrate Earth Hour anywhere in the city. Additionally, because I'll be with a crowd of similarly green-minded friends, I'm hoping to convince them to head to Dolores Park for "Fun in the Darkness" or Medjool to dance under the stars on the rooftop. Howevs, I know no matter what we do, we'll take part in the action...even if we have to crawl over a bar and turn off the lights ourselves (which is not unheard of)!

So what are you waiting for?! Let's up know what you're up to.

Earth Hour: Cast Your Vote

Hi YBGers,

This Saturday, March 28th, from 8:30-9:30 pm local time is the 3rd annual Earth Hour. If you're not familiar with Earth Hour, it is a global movement in which people all over the world turn off their lights for an hour to show worldwide unity in fighting global warming. Famous landmarks all over the world also participate, and I'll have the pleasure of watching the Golden Gate Bridge go dark for an hour on Saturday night. Earth Hour is not simply an exercise in saving energy. It is a demonstration of our personal commitment to sustainability and a greener Earth. So, if you care about the future of our planet and want to be a part of a worldwide movement to make a change, turn off your lights for an hour on Saturday and make a difference.

Stay tuned for fun Earth Hour activities to be posted tomorrow!

YBGly,
Dale

The following information was taken directly from the Earth Hour website:

VOTE EARTH: YOUR LIGHT SWITCH IS YOUR VOTE

This year, Earth Hour has been transformed into the world’s first global election, between Earth and global warming.

For the first time in history, people of all ages, nationalities, race and background have the opportunity to use their light switch as their vote – Switching off your lights is a vote for Earth, or leaving them on is a vote for global warming. WWF are urging the world to VOTE EARTH and reach the target of 1 billion votes, which will be presented to world leaders at the Global Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen 2009.

This meeting will determine official government policies to take action against global warming, which will replace the Kyoto Protocol. It is the chance for the people of the world to make their voice heard.

Earth Hour began in Sydney in 2007, when 2.2 million homes and businesses switched off their lights for one hour. In 2008 the message had grown into a global sustainability movement, with 50 million people switching off their lights. Global landmarks such as the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, Rome’s Colosseum, the Sydney Opera House and the Coca Cola billboard in Times Square all stood in darkness.

In 2009, Earth Hour is being taken to the next level, with the goal of 1 billion people switching off their lights as part of a global vote. Unlike any election in history, it is not about what country you’re from, but instead, what planet you’re from. VOTE EARTH is a global call to action for every individual, every business, and every community. A call to stand up and take control over the future of our planet. Over 74 countries and territories have pledged their support to VOTE EARTH during Earth Hour 2009, and this number is growing everyday.

We all have a vote, and every single vote counts. Together we can take control of the future of our planet, for future generations.

VOTE EARTH by simply switching off your lights for one hour, and join the world for Earth Hour.

Saturday, March 28, 8:30-9:30pm.

Blackle

Ready for something super easy and free to do that will save energy? Meet Blackle, a Google search page that is black and therefore uses far less energy. According to ecoIron (a green IT firm), an all white web page uses about 74 watts to display, while an all black page uses only 59 watts. ecoIron then did a little match to see what kind of savings we'd accrue by using Blackle vs regular old Google:

Google gets about 200+ million queries a day. Assuming each query is displayed for about 10 seconds, Google is running for approximately 550,000 hours every day all over the world. Assuming that each user runs Google in full screen mode, the shift to a black background (on a CRT monitor...aka not a flatscreen) will save a total of 15 watts per view per person. That turns into a global savings of 8.3 megawatt-hours per day (8,300,000 watts/day), or about 3000 megawatt-hours per year. Now, taking into account that about 25 percent of the monitors in the world are CRTs, at $0.10 a kilowatt-hour, that's $75,000 per year, not too shabby for changing a few color codes on a single website.

Eco-friendly ski resorts?

Hi readers, I've been MIA all weekend because of a rad trip I took to Tahoe. Not taking advantage of the incredible snow just wasn't an option, and after spending 3 days shredding (ha), I'm thoroughly worn out and ready to start blogging again.

On my way home, I was thinking about eco-friendly ski resorts and their actual level of "greenness." I remembered an article I'd read in Outside magazine last year, and so I dug it up to refresh my memory. As we all would have guessed, as much as they're trying to do in the industry, greening ski resorts "is putting lipstick on a pig. Name another sport with as much impact on public lands—clear-cut runs, heavy machinery, millions of schussers in the wilderness in winter. And for every ton of carbon saved by an energy-conscious Aspen or Vail or Telluride, you could point to another planeload of jet fuel burned to get there and another new forest of fudge shoppes and condos in what used to be elk habitat. 'There are a lot of things they're doing well, but you cannot deny the long-term and permanent impacts of the industry,' says Myke Bybee, a public-lands specialist at the Sierra Club."

And Myke (really? With a 'y?') is right. But at the same time, few industries get such a large number of people outside and enjoying that same wilderness, appreciating the powder runs through the pines or the views of the mountains from the lifts. If people don't get out and enjoy these beautiful places, they won't miss them when they're gone. So despite skiing's indisputable environmental impact, the sport can't be all bad. Let's continue to encourage resorts to reduce their carbon footprint and avoid urban sprawl, bringing about the necessary changes to make sport as sustainable as possible. Like Auden Schendler says in the Outside article "In a sustainable world, you're probably not going to fly or ski all that much. But in the interim…" let's enjoy the wilderness responsibly.

Four Day Work-Weeks? Yes, Please!

I had heard of a few friends in Alabama who were doing the 10-hour day, 4 day work week, and now it looks like it's becoming more common as reported on by the New York Times last week. Not only would less energy be used IN the workplace, but Grist did back-of-the-envelope calculations to estimate highway fuel saving of $200 million, had such a measure been implemented in 2007.

Let's be serious...who wouldn't want to have 3 day weekends AND save energy? This is brilliant. Now to convince my boss of this....

Grow Your Own Air

YBGers, my pops sent me an interesting article over the weekend that I wanted to share with you. It's a short so I'll make it easy:

A presentation delivered this week at the TED 2009 conference demonstrates how you can “grow” fresh air indoors with just three varieties of plants. The discovery was the result of 15 years of testing at Paharpur Business Centre and Software Technology Incubator Park (PBC™ - STIP) in New Delhi, India, an eco- friendly oasis for businesses avoiding polluted air. The research showed that there’s a 42% probability of increasing blood oxygen by 1% if one is inside the building for 10 hours, boosting worker productivity by 20%. They were also able to reduce the fresh air supplied to the building and still meet industry standards for healthy indoor air, netting a reduction of energy costs by greater than 15%.

Pleased with the results, the consortium is planning on replicating the concept with over 60,000 of these plants in GreenSpaces, a 1.75 million square feet LEED© certified ‘Super’ Platinum Green Building and Technology Park, just outside of Delhi.

Also, if you're interested in learning more, there's a presentation that expands on the concept, naming plant species, the number of plants needed, etc. While it's obviously very cool that you can boost worker health and productivity with these plants (or lack of productivity if, like many of us, procrastination is your drug of choice in the office...what?!?! Who said that? Not me), I'm personally more interested in the 15% reduction in energy costs, and by energy costs, I'm going to assume he also means energy use. Sorry, I don't have time for due diligence on this one. Did you know that buildings consume 40% of the world's energy? If we could all convince our employers to install an indoor jungle in our offices, we could have a relatively significant impact on the world's energy consumption...a hypothetical 6% reduction in energy use worldwide. Obviously, not everyone is going to sign on for this new idea (and heck, it may be bunk), but it's still food for thought.

Maybe I'll stop by my local nursery on my way home...