If your New Year’s resolution is to be greener …

Add comment December 31st, 2008

… and you don’t have recycling pickup, here’s a reminder on recycling dropoff from GO, which also has New Year’s celebration ideas and menus for you last-minute types.

If you just want to make the regular kind of resolutions, here’s how to make them greener, too.

And if you want to know whether to choose butter or margarine in 2009, go here. (Hint, each has its own downside.)

The environmental story no one is paying attention to …

Add comment December 30th, 2008

Because of the holidays, even I didn’t notice this until a few days later: On Dec. 22, more than a billion gallons of coal ash broke free from an earthen dam in eastern Tennessee, destroying three homes and ruining 300 acres of landscape.

I can’t even imagine what it takes to clean up all this toxic stuff.

Mr. President is Mr. Green Genes

Add comment December 23rd, 2008

Sorry for the lack of local posts lately. What can I say? It’s the holiday season, so I haven’t gotten around to people as often as I’d like.

In case you missed it, Time named its Top 10 “Green” Stories of 2008, and Barack Obama’s election is No. 1.

Do you like green pens?

Add comment December 22nd, 2008

I had an editor once who liked green pens. It was his “signature” thing. I think it still is.

This week, someone dropped off a set of “green” pens for me. The Zebra Eco line is made from more than 70 percent recycled materials like car headlights, CDs and electronics. So far, they work like any other pen. Prices range from $1.75 to $5 at Staples and other general merchandise stores.

Let’s call it the Department of Food

Add comment December 20th, 2008

That’s what Nicholas Kristof says about the Department of Agriculture. He says in the New York Times that we need to address food eaters, not businesses:

A Department of Agriculture made sense 100 years ago when 35 percent of Americans engaged in farming. But today, fewer than 2 percent are farmers. In contrast, 100 percent of Americans eat.

Renaming the department would signal that Mr. Obama seeks to move away from a bankrupt structure of factory farming that squanders energy, exacerbates climate change and makes Americans unhealthy — all while costing taxpayers billions of dollars.

P.S. Some greenies are not thrilled with Obama’s choice on Ag Secretary, Tom Vilsack (for his support of ethanol and big agribusiness), and Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar (because of a seemingly mixed record). But they’re both seen as centrist.

‘To the dump, to the dump, to the dump, dump, dump’

1 comment December 19th, 2008

That’s a little song my dad sang when I was a girl — back when all of us in rural Wisconsin put our trash in burn barrels and hauled our big stuff to the county dump.

Back then, we were much more aware of how much trash we had because we personally had to take care of it, even it it wasn’t in the greenest of manners.

This article about northern Illinois’ trash reminds you what happens to your bags and boxes after you put them to the curb. It also asks if we’re ready to handle more trash in the future.

“Garbage, in its nature, is a very long-term business,” said Gary Marzorati, president of William Charles Waste Co., which runs the Winnebago Landfill. “We are always preparing for the future. Right now, we’ve got 19 to 21 years of capacity, probably a couple more.”

Mmmm. Meat.

Add comment December 18th, 2008

This week, I received two “green” gifts. One was a recycled, dressed-up canister of cookies from our Rockford Woman designer, Margo “Better Than Martha Stewart” Morgan. The other was “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” by Michael Pollan, from Margaret Larson at the U of I Extension. I told her it was totally unnecessary, but she is overly thoughtful and the book sounds interesting. Here is one review:

“What should you eat?  Michael Pollan addresses that fundamental question with great wit and intelligence, looking at the social, ethical, and environmental impact of four different meals. Eating well, he finds, can be a pleasurable way to change the world.”

—Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation and Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market

P.S. I have so far avoided wrapping presents by recycling gift bags or just using shopping bags. In one case, I didn’t bag at all. I figured a 6-year-old only cares that he’s getting “WALL-E.”

Something’s fishy. ‘Patsy for polluters’?

Add comment December 16th, 2008

The Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protectional Agency are fighting over how much fish we should eat, based on health concerns. One side points out the dietary benefits. The other worries about mercury poison. Wow, they’re fighting for the well-being of us Americans, I thought at first.

Well, maybe.

This accusation was made, courtesy of healthyrockford.com:

“The FDA was once a fearsome protector of the public health. Now it’s nothing more than a patsy for polluters,” Richard Wiles, executive director of the Environmental Working Group, said in a statement.

 If you are curious about local advisories, go here.

Give the gift of a happy green year

Add comment December 15th, 2008

This weekend, I was shopping locally (!) when I saw this calendar with green tips for every day in 2009. Good ideas, I thought, but have to admit that I bought a shoes calendar for this particular friend instead. More up her alley.

I’m sure the bookshelves are also filled with green books to buy as gifts. I got a press release last week for one — “The Green Year” ($14.95, by author Jodi Helmer) – that takes the day-by-day approach.

Examples include:

* August 18: Place tennis balls in the dryer to speed up the drying time as well as to fluff up items like comforters and pillows.* December 14: Wrap presents in gift bags. If every family in the United States reused two feet of holiday ribbon, it would save 38,000 miles of ribbon-enough to tie a bow around the entire planet.

* May 26: Plant mint in your garden for a natural solution to keep mice at bay.

* July 17: Try the 100-mile diet – eat food that is grown within 100 miles of home

‘Green dream team’

Add comment December 12th, 2008

In case you missed it, here are President-elect Barack Obama’s choices for top energy and environment posts. And this article says they represent a major shift in policy (no shocker there).

Carol Browner, Energy czar
Age: 52
Current job: Principal with the Albright Group, a lobbying firm, 2000-present
Previous positions: Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, 1993-2001; head of Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, 1991-1993
Family: Husband, Thomas Downey, former Democratic congressman from New York; son from a previous marriage.

Steve Chu, Energy secretary
Age: 60
Current job: Director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, an Energy Department facility focused on research into alternative energy, 2004-present
Previous positions: Professor at Stanford University, 1987-2004; chairman, physics department, Stanford, 1990-1993 and 1999-2001; head, quantum electronics research department, AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, N.J., 1983-1987
Family: Wife, Jean Chu; two sons.

Lisa Jackson, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator
Age: 46
Current job: Chief of staff to New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, 2008-present
Previous positions: Commissioner of New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, 2006-2008; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1987-2002
Family: Husband, Kenny; two sons.

Nancy Sutley, White House Council on Environmental Quality chief
Age: 46
Current job: Deputy mayor of Los Angeles for energy and environment since 2005
Previous positions: Member of California State Water Resources Control Board, 2003-2005; energy adviser to Gov. Gray Davis, 1999-2003; special assistant to then-EPA administrator Carol Browner in the 1990s
Family: Single