Could I Live The Freegan Life?

Oprah had an episode on Wednesday on freegans.  As I watched correspondent Lisa Ling - formerly of The View and also Laura Ling of Current TVs sister - take a trash tour in NYC, I kept thinking how I could totally give that a whirl.  A freegan is someone who takes useful items that are headed to a landfill and puts them to good use.  This includes groceries. 

I guess I could say that I’ve dabbled in this world before.  I admit it.  I’ve always called it “curb shopping.”  I live in a regular middle-class suburb of Chicago.  If you drive the neighborhoods on garbage night (especially in the spring and warmer months), you’ll find all kinds of useful items.  Have a kid?  You’ll never need to buy a giant plastic toy again.  Many of my finds aren’t even for myself.  I’ll put them on Freecycle [insert link] or just donate them to Goodwill.  We had a great unscathed coffee table in our basement for years that someone threw out.  Maybe they were hoping someone would stop and pick it up.  Sometimes I put items out by the curb and try to place them so someone will stop and take them.  If they are still there when I leave for work, I drag them back in the house. 

I’ve never really thought about obtaining food this way, though.  It does seem logical.  After watching the video, I can see how much waste is thrown out from a grocery store.  Perfectly packaged dry goods and canned items that could go to a food pantry are just being put in a dumpster.  People even get dairy.  They show how a dozen eggs are thrown out just because one in the pack is broken.  Tons of produce is discarded because one little blemish.  Sure - exercise caution and common sense if you’re going to try this. 

Mary at In Women We Trust and I were discussing Oprah the morning after the show.  She was talking about how wasteful of a society we live in and I wholeheartedly agree.  Until we stop looking at this planet as a disposable entity nothing is going to change.  Over consumption and unnecessary opulence for vanity and comfort is disgusting compared to most cultures in this world.  Mary has a challenge out to Oprah: I have a big favor to ask you Oprah, since you are culture and culture is you, could you do us all a favor and have a show dedicated to Sustainable Standards? Maybe if Oprah can continue to push for change - and believe me she has the power to influence this country - things will start to shift.  Get the women who watch her show to start voting with their dollars.  The one problem is that Oprah’s empire is built on commercialism and she needs to make changes in her life and her empire.  The old adage, “Do as I say and not as I do” doesn’t hold much weight with the average adult.

Reference: Freegan.info

Bush Asked About $4/gal Oil

Today at a press conference, the soon to be former President, George W Bush was asked what he thought about the predictions by many experts of $4/gal gas prices. Maybe Bush was trying to do his best Borat impression. I think he thought in his mind “wha, wha, we, wha???” when he responded, “Wait a minute, what did you just say?…That’s interesting. I hadn’t heard that.” I immediately thought “WTF?” Where have you been hiding? You had no idea that gas prices could hit $4/gal this summer when the price of oil is at $102/barrel? It’s like the groundhog poked his head out of the ground to see his shadow and now we have 11 more months of an idiot.  Then no more than four minutes later when asked where money for his presidential library is coming from he said that the deal was just announced and his attention has been focused elsewhere “like gasoline prices.”  So he’s been focused on gas prices, yet he doesn’t know what the price of gas is or the potential for it to rise?  Interesting.

I think you really need to watch the videos to see the response for yourself. To see the arrogance on how he answers the questions. How does he think the country should react? “Make the recent tax cuts permanent.” Then he went on to tell us that we need to build more refineries here and drill ANWAR and find more oil. Maybe he thinks the term locavore applies to drilling for oil?

Skip to 7:25

Then continue here

Source: CNN Money

(Not) My The 11th Hour Review

Last night, my wife and I saw one of the only Chicago-area viewings of The 11th Hour.  I’m not going to give you a full review here.  You can watch it for yourself either at a viewing or when it comes out on DVD on April 15th.  By the way, I pre-ordered the DVD - it’s only $5.  Buy it and donate it to your library after passing it along to all of your friends (I bought it for under $5 and that includes free shipping from DeepDiscountDVD).  I wish that this film had hit a larger market, but the fact of the matter is that another film is titled The 11th Hour and DiCaprio’s group is in litigation over the title.

I will tell you that this is not An Inconvenient Truth.  It’s not Leonardo DiCaprio talking for an hour and a half.  It’s not a sensationalized film.  It is a series of interviews on various topics with the top environmentalist and scientists talking about climate change and the things we do in this world that are detrimental to the planet.  They also talk about what you can do as an individual to make a difference.  If you want to see some of the indivuals involved, go to the 11th Hour YouTube group.  There you’ll find time capsules from many of them.

What I can tell you is that you hear all the time is vote with your dollars.  Everyone needs to stop looking at the world as a disposable entity.  If they do that, then perhaps they might think twice about disposable consumption.  This kinda goes back to Bill McDonough’s Cradle-to-Cradle initiative, too (yes, he’s in the film).  C2C is a design certification where the product will be go back to its basic elements at the end of its useful life versus the alternative, which is Cradle to Grave (landfill).

The 11th Hour Trailer

Vandalism: Paint The Glacier

Mr Doyle sent me a link yesterday that I found rather…well…stupid.  A German tourist, Jan Philip Scharbert, was photographed spray painting a glacier in New Zealand.  He was nabbed by police as he was trying to get on a bus to get away. 

It took Scharbert 1.5 days to clean up the damage under supervision…and tourists glaring at him.  What an idiot.

I know that on the ice part of the glacier, axes were used to chisel away the paint.  What product was used to clean the paint off the rocks that isn’t harmful to the ecosystem?   

Source: Boing Boing

Finally! Diesel-Hybrid Coming?

Finally!  Clean diesel is coming and so are the cars.  I think this is one of many that you’ll see in the very near future.  Right now there are only a few diesel vehicles for the normal citizen to buy as a passenger vehicle.  This is due to the fact that California, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Connecticut (and probably more) have very stringent diesel regulations on emissions.  In 2010, only ultra-low sulfur diesel (ULSD)  will be available for highway use.

Diesel engines typically get more MPG than standard gasoline engines.  So if hybrid gas/electric vehicles are popular, than why not a diesel/electric hybrid?  Volkswagen agrees.  They are taking their Golf model (now Rabbit in the U.S.) and giving it a diesel hybrid option.  The Golf will get 69.2MPG.  That blows the Prius out of the water.  The same hybrid options will be available on the Jetta and the Audi A3.

Now - where is my hybrid diesel/electric PHEV?  I’m guessing that would get some serious MPG!  Hopefully this will be available in the 2009 model.  I want one.

Source: GreenDaily, AutoBlogGreen

Oscars and Spirit Awards Go Green

If you haven’t already heard, the Oscars went green this year…for the second time.  The NRDC has paired up with the Academy to be more environmentally friendly.  The NRDC press release states:

A few highlights of the Academy’s green program include:

• With support from the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, 100% of the energy used for the telecast, the red-carpet arrivals show and the Governors Ball will be supplied by renewable wind power.
• All of the generators used for the production, for press support and the red carpet arrivals area are powered by a fuel mix that includes biodiesel.
• The majority of vehicles made available by General Motors for use by production staff and presenters are zero-emission hydrogen-powered cars and hybrids.
• Nearly all food service ware for all events associated with the Awards Presentation is either reusable or biodegradable/compostable.
• The programs, invitations, RSVP cards, envelopes, parking passes and other printed materials include a minimum of 30% postconsumer recycled content.

If you’re not familiar with The Spirit Awards, then you are missing out.  I’d have to say that they are the best awards show that I watch each year.  They’re the actually called Film Independent’s Spirit Awards.  The show honors independent film and takes place on the Saturday before the Oscars each year in a tent by the beach in L.A.  Not only do the hosts and winners dress down and swear, but the film clips are true in that they don’t censor those, either.  My favorite part is each year they have someone sing a parody song that tells the story of each film nominated for the best of the year.  Brilliantly funny.  Anyway - onto the green part.   

The Spirit Awards went further than the Oscars in going green.  They claim that they produced a zero-waste event. 

To eliminate paper and waste, Film Independent is working with indie film discovery and distribution company B-Side to offer online streaming of nominated films as an option to voting members.

Biodiesel-fueled generators and recycled food scraps, Astroturf, wood, and plastic will power the show. Paper will be printed on 100% postconsumer recycled material with soy-based inks. The catering, provided by Along Came Mary, will use only organically grown produce purchased from farms within a 150-mile radius of Los Angeles.

• All eligible voters were required to register online before receiving a ballot, thus saving thousands of sheets of paper, which was FSC-certified, 100% post-consumer recycled. It would have been even better if voting took place online.
• Some of the nominated movies were streamed via a secure section of the ISA’s site, rather than pressing DVD screeners.
• Biodiesel generators will juice all electrical devices at the show, including LED bulbs.
• Soy-based inks were used for the programs.
• Dinner will be served on reusable dinnerware and all leftover food will be sent to a compost facility.
• The reusable flooring and drywall will be donated to Brad Pitt’s reconstruction efforts in New Orleans.

Source: NRDC, Advocate.com, Wired

Water, Water, Water: What I learned

I find myself in Wheaton, IL at the Rice Campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology in the atrium of the building.  Tonight there is a free event with the man behind the company that put the infamous green roof on Chicago’s City Hall, James Patchett of Conservation Design Forum, Inc.  As I look around the lobby, I see many people who seem to be twice my age sitting enjoying disposable snacks - far from sustainable (I can safely say that this is not your eco-speed-dating crowd).  Not only are the aluminum cans of Diet Coke available, but the ever-evil bottled water.  How can you call yourself an environmentalist and enjoy bottled water anymore? I, myself, indulge in a Diet Coke.  I’m only human and can’t resist the artificial sweetener and caramel coloring.  There aren’t even recycling bins anywhere to be found.  It appears that I will have a crushed can in my pocket to take home as a souvenir.  At least I have something to write on my evaluation form and the event hasn’t even begun.

Water, water, water.  That was the theme of the night.  Jim spoke for two hours and had to even speed through things to get finished.  You know you’re listening to a good speaker when you sat there for two hours and it felt like 15 minutes and you just wanted to hear more.  I don’t even know where to start, really.

Water is going to be, and really already is, a huge issue.  The UN even stated that by 2025 two out of three people in the world will face water shortages if current consumption rates keep going as they are today.  People can live without oil.  Water is a necessity.  The water waste here in the United States is unfathomable, really. 

We’ve either paved the earth or filled it with turf grass.  “What’s wrong with that?”, you ask.  Well first of all, we’re not paving the earth with porous or permeable concrete.  The water has no where to go.  So we create storm sewer drainage to carry away the water rather than letting the earth breathe naturally.  As the water travels from roads and driveways, etc., it collects contaminants.  Eventually all of that water has to go somewhere.  So it goes into streams and lakes and rivers and estuaries and wetlands that we try to restore.  The problem is that these natural resources are being destroyed.  Native plants were never meant to live in these conditions. 

Turf grass and beautiful lawns are another issue.  I’m not totally anti-grass, but people have to be aware of the consequences.  The old law comes into play: “for every action, there is a reaction.”  A natural untouched habitat from the glacial periods to today will flourish in periods of drought or hard winters and so-on.  The top of the hill might be wet and the bottom might be dry.  Natural springs come from beneath the earth below the frost line and trickle to the surface.  Dew and rain water soaks into the ground and the dense root structure.  The plants grow strong and retain moisture and collect that moisture even in times of drought conditions. 

So what do we do?  We take these lands and grade them.  We take all of the topsoil that has any redeeming value from the farm land and push it to a corner.  We run bulldozers all around the land flattening it and grading it to spec.  We get rid of the good topsoil selling it off or giving it away and bring in new topsoil to the required 4 inches.  So now you have a minimal amount of topsoil on top of clay.  The top of the hill is dry. The bottom of the hill is wet.  So we plant a non-native plant like Kentucky Blue Grass which has a shallow root structure and is a cold-weather plant.  The spring thaw comes and everyone’s lawns look lush.  By the heat of the summer, if you’re not watering your lawn (with potable water, most likely) the grass starts to burn out and die.  Grass is delicate in the fact that too much water and the grass dies.  Too little water and the grass dies.  So then sometimes you have storm sewer grates in your lawn which is just ridiculous.  We should be able to easily take on several inches of rain and the ground absorbs it fine, but that’s not the case.

Another ludicrous thing that Jim Patchett pointed out is that we are obsessed with our lawns.  We dump all kinds of fertilizers with high concentrations of nitrogen on them.  The nitrogen really just helps green up the grass and doesn’t promote much root structure.  Then 40-60% of that nitrogen washes away from your lawn into the groundwater systems.  Magically with all of the water and fertilizer, our lawns start to grow.  Uh oh - time to get out the lawn mower because we don’t want the turf to actually look like it is growing.  Lawn mowers are responsible for about 5% of CO2 pollution.  God forbid there be any weeds or we have to go out there and dump more chemicals on the ground.  He also mentioned a 1987 study by the National Cancer institute, a child living in a household using home and garden pesticides has a 6.5 times higher risk of contracting leukemia.

There are some things you can do, however.  Aside from xeriscaping your property, which is a little extreme, but might be right depending on where you live, there are some things you can do to manage storm water.  We’ve already talked about permeable pavement.  Green roofs are gaining a huge momentum here in Chicago.  Mayor Daley went to Germany and got the idea and had to have one.  When Chicago City Hall was completed with half of a green roof, the temperatures on a hot August day were around 90F versus 169F on the normal black tar roof side.  Most air conditioning units draw their air from roof top units in city buildings.  They are much more efficient if they have to cool 90F temps versus 169F.  The green roofs also absorb the rain which keeps the plants growing and then the water evaporates back into the sky.  In Germany, there is an ordinance about dealing with storm runoff.  Basically, you’re taxed based on how much water goes into your sewers.  You really don’t have to do anything to your house, but you’re going to pay for it in your pocketbook.  Other simple items you can do at your own home include rain barrels and cisterns for irrigation.  We’ll go into more solutions in depth in future posts. 

I’ll leave you with the same parting fact that Jim left us with.  30% to 60%  of all potable water in the United States goes towards watering our lawns depending on where in the country you live (east coast versus the arid west). 

Let the earth breathe.

Easy Green: Air Your Clean Laundry

If you think about clothes lines and drying your laundry in the great outdoors here in the U.S., you probably think about the Leave It To Beaver days.  The good old days.  In fact, with suburban sprawl and the need to look “pretty,” many suburban housing associations actually ban clothes lines.  Modern clothes dryers may seem so easy, but there is something special about putting sheets on your bed that were dried in the great outdoors.  It’s that certain je ne sais quoi. 

Technically, I’m not even supposed to have anything up in my backyard.  It’s ridiculously nuts.  Sure, I don’t necessarily want to see the neighbor’s naughty unmentionables flapping in the wind, but it’s only clothing.  I know this is an odd topic in the middle of a cold Chicago winter.  If I put any wet laundry out right now, I’d have a stiff, frozen piece of cloth.  So we just hang some of it in the basement.  Of course I was watching one of my favorite television channels, Current TV.  They recently had a pod called “Dirty Laundry” done by an American living in Spain.  He talks of how quaint and beautiful it is to see everyone’s laundry.  People don’t use dryers like they do here.  I can’t remember the last time I saw laundry hanging in someone’s yard (besides my own) in the five years. 

Anyway - my point is - if you can, air dry your laundry.  I really would like to expand our operations this year and get a better setup to hang more laundry.  I know that I’m probably not supposed to, but until someone stops us, we’ll push the envelope.  How ludicris is it that you can’t do something so simple that saves a ton of energy?  It’s frustrating.

Enjoy the pod! 

Goods 4 Girls

Crunchy Chicken is at it again.  This time she started a new website called “Goods 4 Girls.”  The goal is to collect donations of reusable sanitary napkins to send to Africa.  Other organizations are doing similar collections and sending disposable sanitary napkins to these regions in South Africa, but Crunchy Chicken points out the concern that the main means of trash disposal there is incineration. 

In many areas of the world, access to adequate menstrual supplies is difficult to come by. Many women and girls rely on rags, newspaper, camel skin or nothing at all for their menstrual needs. A lack of sanitary pads can be a big barrier to a girl’s education. [Goods 4 Girls website]

Please donate a pad or two (or three or four).  If you don’t want to purchase a pad and have it sent to Goods 4 Girls, you can sew your own.  There are patterns available on the website for you to follow.  It’s not often that you can donate to a good cause and you know exactly where it’s going. 

P.S. I bought mine from MamaCloth over on Etsy.  For every four pads purchased and send to G4G, she throws in an extra…plus I like to support Etsy.

Want vs Need: Gadgets

While it is true that there are many economical steps to go green without spending money, sometimes you just want things.  That is human nature in America, right?  Shop?  I always read about these green gadgets and really want them.  I don’t really need them, though.   Like a solar charger for my iPod - the Solio - very cool.  Sure I’d love to have one, but the payoff versus cost just isn’t worth it.  I could charge my iPod for its entire life for less than the $100 I’d spend.  Yeah - I know - its about getting clean solar energy versus dirty coal-fired power from the grid.  I’d agree with that argument if it was on a larger scale. 

My question to all of you is: Is there a green gadget that you really, really want (but probably don’t need)? 

I’ll tell you what mine is.  I’ve actually talked about it before.  It’s a product that is readily available in many parts of the world, yet a novelty here in the States.  Its a toilet tank sink.  I happened to see the video for the SinkPositive toilet tank sink (my favorite of the few available) again today.  Of course I want the one with the nice stainless steel ”faucet.”  That ups the price to a cool $110.  Now - I do think about one of these each time I use a toilet and how much water is literally being flushed down the drain.  At least with this gadget I’d feel like I wasn’t totally wasting the water.  I think it would be a long, long time before I’d be able to recoup that cost, though.    There is a way to build one of these on Instructables, but my wife isn’t so keen on the plywood design :-)  Ideally, I’d get a nice Caroma dual-flush toilet with the tank sink built in.  Caroma Gods - Please send me one of those