Hybrid Living

All those green heads… they’re always saying, “Go plant a tree!” but no one really comes up, hands you a tree, and makes it easy do they? Well, good news it really is easy to plant trees where you live. The Arbor Day Foundation has all sorts of ways you can get involved and plant [...]

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Get involved with tree planting

Plastic pumps of hand soap are an eco-baddie. Not only are you continually buying new soap containers, but not all parts of the pump are always recyclable. For example, said pump. These sorts of containers also have labels, packaging at times, and cost you ongoing money.

Better choices for hand soap for the kitchen or bath [...]

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Are you using reusable soap?

Korean tire maker Kumho has produced a concept for an electric SUV utilizing a tire maker’s favorite material – rubber.  The Fortis SUV features body panels made from recycled rubber and the rest of the design is pretty cool too.

The SUV’s wheels contain one 100-horsepower motor each, allowing the production of front-, rear- or all-wheel-drive models.  Built-in software controls the motors so different types of traction control can be programmed in.

Of course, the neatest feature of this concept car is the tires, which change Transformer-style depending on the terrain.  During off-road driving, they deflate, revealing metal lugs that up the traction.  When you get back on the road, the air cavaties expand, inflating the tires and covering up the metal lugs for smooth driving.

The SUV deisign also includes a Lithium-ion battery pack and regenerative braking.

via Autoblog Green

Um, unless you’ve been living in a cave you’ve likely seen that UK’s Food Standard Agency study splashed all over the web and news. In fact here’s a link to one – Organic Foods Not More Healthy. I actually left a comment on this one because a pal of mine wrote it, and to sum [...]

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Wait Organic Food Is More Healthy?

McKinsey & Co. have released another report about climate change, but this time they’re putting it in motivating terms:  money, money, money.  The consulting firm has calculated the amount of cash the country could save over the next decade if we fully commit to becoming more energy efficient, and the amount is huge:  $1.2 trillion.

Of course, this savings can only be accomplished through a large investment in weatherizing homes, retrofitting buildings, efficiency education and government initiatives, etc. – costing about $520 billion over that same decade.  So, you’re actually looking at a net savings of $700 billion, but that’s still a nice big incentive to cut our energy consumption and help the planet at the same time.

The firm states that homes and businesses could trim 28 percent off their current energy bills and industries could trim 20 percent.  The report doesn’t factor in transportation, just “stationary” uses of energy, but the study shows that through that large investment in efficiency, the country could slash 23 percent of its energy demand by 2020 and prevent the emissions of 1.1 gigatons of greenhouse gases yearly, the equivalent of taking the U.S. passenger fleet off the road.

As ecogeeks already know, a large portion of wasted energy is consumed by vampire power loads.  The study revealed that efficiency standards that prevent our electronics from sucking energy while not in use could lead to energy savings equal to the yearly electricity consumption of the Netherlands.

Click here to read the full report.

Congratulations America! When we give you free money, you take it! And that is the only lesson learned from the “Cash for Clunkers” legislation. The stated environmental goals, of course, were thrown out of the window ages ago. But we gave Americans (and car companies) more free money to sell and buy the inefficient vehicles of today so they won’t need to buy the efficient vehicles of tomorrow.

Here’s how Cash for Clunkers should’ve worked. You bring in an old, extremely inefficient and polluting car or truck. The government gives you some money for taking that car off the road, allowing you (who would otherwise not be able to afford it) to get a more efficient used car, or an extremely efficient new car. New cars, originally, had to be extremely efficient.

Then the environment took a back seat to the auto industry and, unfortunately, it wasn’t wearing it’s seatbelt when the whole thing slammed into a brick wall.

So, with the environment flying through the windshield, suddenly you can get a cash for clunkers credit for a 15 mpg truck or an 18 mpg SUV or, and honestly this is the worst of it all, a 22 mpg car! Of course, the government has mandated a fleet-wide efficiency of 27 mpg in just two years for cars. So, yeah, we’ve basically set ourselves up to have a bunch of extremely inefficient cars on the road for the next ten years while new, efficient cars sit on dealer lots, not getting sold because everyone interested in a new car bought one on July 30th 2009. Just one year before true alternative vehicles hit dealer lots. Just two years before the fleet-wide average was bumped up 5 mpg. So basically, what I’m trying to say is *facepalm*.

Welcome to the government trying to spur innovation and, instead managing to stifle it extremely effectively.

Sponges aren’t that green. Basically you’ve got three choices:

Typical cheap sponges made with toxic and non-renewable polyurethane. These sponges won’t biodegrade and will last and last in a landfill.
Animal derived sea sponges which some people have an issue with because they are living at one point and some don’t.
Sponges made from wood pulp cellulose. These [...]

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What to use instead of sponges

If you’re using pesticides to fight creepy crawlies you’re not only spreading harmful chemicals and pesticides around your home and family but you’re helping the bug population to become super strong. According to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and other sources,
“Sometimes an insect does more than develop resistance to a pesticide. It grows to depend [...]

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Greener Bug Management

On Tuesday, at the footsteps of the US Capitol, six companies accepted keys to their brand-new Smith Newton vehicles, the world’s largest all-electric truck.

Mine shafts on the point of being closed down could be used to provide geothermal energy to local towns.