The Melting Man

Have you seen this clever ecological ad campaign?

"Located in Buenos Aires’ Plaza Francia, the oozing young man passes out fliers urging spectators to use public transportation, conserve water, reduce, reuse, recycle and to use energy-efficient appliances. This imaginative piece of guerrilla publicity highlights the fact that much of the funding of the Argentinian Red Cross goes to assisting those who have been most affected by natural disasters exacerbated by climate change. "

It's That Time Again! (campaignearth.org)

New challenge: Reduce your water flow!

This challenge is designed to help us lessen the amount of hot water we are wasting, simply by installing low flow shower heads. It's money down the drain:

• If each member of a family of four takes a daily five-minute shower, the family will use more than 700 gallons of water every week, a three-year supply of drinking water for one person. (source: Seattle City Light, http://www.cityofseattle.net/)
  


• The Department of Energy says heating water is the second-largest residential energy user.
  


• To complete this challenge, you simply have to go to your local hardware store and buy the low flow shower heads. This will cost you between $25-30. Then, go home and install them. This should take you no more than 30 minutes per shower.

For that little effort and money, you will be saving around $20 a year and about 30 pounds of carbon dioxide a month! Not bad!!! By simply installing low flow shower heads, you'll be using less water and saving energy!

Campaign Earth Challenge

New challenge: Reduce your use!
This challenge is designed to get us all thinking about the disposable society we live in. Whether it's the drive-thru restaurants, the disposable cameras, or the endless packaging wrapped around everything we buy, it all got created with the use of a lot of energy and will end with it filling more holes in our planetary home. Finding a place to start making an effort to minimize your contribution to this may seem daunting, but it's easier than you think. Try bringing your own coffee (or beverage of choice) mug with you everywhere you go and start using those great cloth bags for your grocery shopping. Many places will even give you a discount for using them. And for further motivation toward taking this challenge:

• 
  "If 25% of American families used just 10 fewer plastic bags each month, an estimated 2.5 billion bags could be saved from landfills each year." (One Makes the Difference, Julia Butterfly Hill)
  


• It has been estimated that landfills in the U.S. are responsible for about a third of this country's total methane emissions.(The Complete Idiot's Guide to Saving the Environment, Greg Pahl)
  Meeting this challenge is as easy as 1, 2, 3:
  


• Buy and use a non-disposable travel mug. Get in the habit of keeping it in your car or backpack at all times. You'll find it coming in far more handy than you imagined. You'll start using it to fill up on water on the way home or as a convenient place to store pistachio shells on a road trip!
  


• Buy and use those great cloth shopping bags. Or, make some yourself out of old cloth. Again, keep a few in your car or backpack so they're there when you need them.
  


• Take this challenge a little further. Start finding other ways to reduce your waste. Do you really need to put 2 oranges in one of those plastic bags? Next time you're leaving the bookstore, carry the book home without the bag. Before recycling your white paper, cut it into scrap pieces to write notes or grocery lists on.
  Every time we use less stuff, we help the planet. It's that simple!

Campaign Earth Challenge's

Sorry... I have been forgetting to post the latest Campaign Earth challenges. Here is a re-cap of all of the challenges I have done so far...

1. Cut Down on Junk Mail/ Catalogs

2. Replace Lightbulbs To Compact Flourescent

3. Wash Clothes In Cold Water

4. Proper Tire inflation

5. Walk Instead Of Drive For Short Trips

6. Increase Recycling Efforts

7. Support Local Farmers

8. Buy A Jacket For/ Replace Water Heater (and set to lower temp)

9. Use Products Made From Recyled Paper

10. Take Public Transportation Or Carpool

Another Campaign Earth Challenge

Support the recycled paper industry!

Are you familiar with that recycled symbol with the three arrows forming a triangle with a circular flow to it? Completing that cycle requires that we support the recycled products industry. An easy way to begin is by purchasing recycled household paper products, like toilet paper, paper towels, and napkins AND looking for packaging made from recycled material.

Unfortunately, until consumer demand begins to catch up with the more polluting means of making our paper, these products will cost a bit more. However, your purchase will use half the energy used to make paper from "virgin" sources and create 74% less air pollution. Surely that is worth a quarter! Here are some more reasons why this challenge deserves the green light:

• 
  In the U.S., the pulp and paper industry is the SECOND largest industry consumer of energy
  


• "Paper production is a leading industrial source of dioxin, a known human carcinogen that bioaccumulates in the fat of fish, seabirds, and mammals." The Paper Project
  


• "If every household in the U.S. replaced just ONE 4-pack of 400 sheet virgin fiber bathroom tissue with 100% recycled ones, we would save 1,450,000 trees and avoid 89,000 pounds of pollution." Seventh Generation

Campaign Earth Challenge

It's that time again!
This challenge is designed to help us lessen the large impact our modern agricultural food production has on global warming. From now on, buy 25% of your produce locally and, when available, organic. Your purchase not only directly benefits your local economy; it minimizes our dependency on fossil fuels, such as oil.
Here is some 'food for thought' on why this challenge is so important:


-It's estimated that most food in the U.S. travels an average of 1,300 miles before reaching the supermarkets, requiring large amounts of fossil fuels.

-Organic farming uses 50% less energy than conventional farming methods. (www.ota.com)

-Modern 'high-technology' farming, which uses synthetic pesticides and fertilizers puts the natural biota of the soil out of work and is responsible for 7% of the carbon that is in the atmosphere (Natural Capitalism by Hawken, Lovins & Lovins).

Vampire Electronics

I read this in the news this morning. 5% of all consumed energy is this "wasted energy" from products that go into standby mode. I knew about my computer peripherals, but toothbrushes, tvs, electric shavers, and cell phone chargers?? Looks like I need to do some unplugging!

You can avoid adding to the problem with some simple tips:

-Unplug any devices you can when not in use. If you're done charging your phone, don't simply disconnect the phone, but unplug the charger completely. The same goes for laptops, electric razors and toothbrushes. When you're done watching TV, unplug the set from the wall.

-Utilize power strips. Plug your home entertainment system, as well as your computer, monitor and other peripherals into power strips or surge protectors so that you can easily shut off the whole set up when you're done. You can try "Smart" power strips, which shut off automatically if a device isn't on for a certain period of time, as well as shut off, say, all your peripherals if you turn off your computer. (That said, make sure to keep your cable box plugged in to a separate, always-on power strip, since the cable box often de-authorizes itself if left unplugged for too long.)

-Look for the Energy Star logo. The government backed program rates electronics on energy efficiency. Looking for electronics with the highest Energy Star rating possible will guarantee you waste as little electricity as possible.

Campaign Earth

It's time for your next challenge!

The environmental benefits to recycling are huge. For example, every ton of paper recycled will save: 17 trees, 4200 kwh of energy (enough to power a home for 6 months), 2.3 to 4 barrels of oil and 3.6 tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere. Need more? For every 54 pounds of aluminum recycled, 1 barrel of oil is saved. Recycling your cans uses 95% less energy than creating them from virgin ore.

To take this challenge, simply increase your recycling efforts. Here are a few ideas:

Recycle those old phone books. A quick phone call to your nearest recycling center will most likely tell you were to bring them.

At the supermarket, recycle your plastic and paper bags. Most grocery stores have a place to recycle these bags. If they don't, ask the g.m. to implement this program. Better yet, reuse the bags at the store or start using those nice cloth bags.

Create a home for your recycleables. Having an easily accessible bin to throw your stuff into that's also easy to transport makes recycling simple.

Already an avid recycler? How about working with a youth group to implement a recycling program in a local business?

go to www.campaignearth.org to sign up.

Campaign Earth Challenge

This month's challenge is to reduce your driving by 5 miles.

By signing up for the "Put on your walking shoes." challenge, you have:

1. Created an average monthly CO2 Savings of 20 pounds.
2. Reduced the amount of congestion in your local community by driving less.
3. Minimized your contribution to global warming.

Here are some suggestions on how to accomplish this goal:

1. Walk or bike or rollerblade. Dust off that old backpack and start using it again to ferry your goods from the local store to home. We're all 'guilty' of becoming lazy to our modern day convenience, like driving to a store that is 1/2 mile away!

2. Plan your road trips. When it's time to run your Saturday errands, include all the places you have to go to rather than making separate trips. Also, park in a central location so you can walk to some of the places you need to go! This will not only shorten the total distance, but it will also keep your catalytic converter hot for the entire trip, which will decrease your fuel consumption.

3. Go ahead and surf. According to a study by the Center for Energy and Climate Solutions, each minute spent driving to the mall uses more than 10 times the energy of a minute spent shopping on line.

The new Campaign Earth challenge is in. This month is about proper tire inflation. You can increase your mileage by 2 MPG just by having tires filled to their proper inflation level. Also you can increase the life of your tires by 50% and keep them out of the landfill. Easy stuff! Get a tire gauge and check your tires today. Have them checked at every oil change and add air whenever necessary. Go to http://www.campaignearth.org/ to sign up.

Campaign Earth

I'm on my third challenge from Campaign Earth. The idea is to do easy things to help conserve energy and lower CO2 emissions. My first challenge was to reduce paper trash by cancelling unwanted magazines and catalouges. The second challenge was to replace two light bulbs with the flourescent CFC bulbs and to turn off computer peripherals when not in use. This third challenge is to turn the washer cycle from hot to either warm or cold, and to turn down the hot water heater a few degrees. Like I said, easy stuff to do to help the enviornment. If you haven't signed up yet, please do.

http://www.campaignearth.org

Spring Cleaning

It's springtime again and maybe time to look into ways we can clean up our own small square of the Earth. My sister sent me a link to CampaignEarth. They offer an easy challenge on how to reduce our junk mail, stop receiving unwanted catalouges, and alternative places to dispose of magazines and catalogues other than the landfill.

If we successfully reduced the number of catalogs produced in this country by 30% we would:
-preserve 16.6 billion gallons of water each year
-conserve over 100 barrels of oil
-keep 3.5 million tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere

Take the challenge. Go to http://www.campaignearth.org/TheChallenge_Detail.asp?caller=C1009 to sign up.

Does anyone else know of other sites that will give us ideas on conservation?