The City of Los Angeles is considering a ban on plastic bags. Definitely a step in the right direction!
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Monthly Archives: July 2008
Good Cause: Engineers Without Borders
Like most people, Enviro-Girl gets hit up by charitable organizations on a regular basis — fulfill dreams for sick children, cure cancer, support political candidates, help paralyzed veterans. She’s skeptical of most organizations and keeps her money local for the most part — the food pantry down the road, her church, the neighborhood Girl Scouts. But one day Enviro-Girl found a national organization that she CAN support with clear conscience: Engineers Without Borders. In fact, Enviro-Girl hopes to go so far as donating her firstborn son one day as an engineer in their program — after Mr. T graduates from UW-Madison, of course!
Engineers Without Borders (EWB) is a non-profit organization that partners with developing communities around the world. Their goal is to implement sustainable engineering projects in a culturally and environmentally sensitive way and improve people’s quality of life. The idea is to get communities to own and operate their own systems through training of local people and the use of local resources. EWB’s role is to provide support, mentors and training.
Some of EWB’s projects include building a water system in Rwanda that doesn’t waste a precious natural resource and gets water to areas that desperately need it. EWB is designing wind turbines for off-the-grid Guatemalan villages, recycling water sachets in Haiti and providing footwear for Haitian children, and building a cistern to capture water for crop irrigation in the Ecuadorian Andes.
Enviro-Girl first read about EWB in her Wisconsin Alumni magazine and she’s been excited about it ever since. By putting our best and brightest scientists and engineers alongside developing nations, EWB can make a lasting impact on the problems with water and food these nations face every day.
By creating sustainable solutions, EWB reduces these countries’ dependence on government aid and increases their productivity. These countries’ environmental impact is reduced through more efficient water supplies, sanitation, food production, housing, construction, transportation, energy and communication. The students and engineers participating in EWB become more globally aware and responsible. It’s win-win either any way you look at it.
EWB – learn more about it and consider supporting them. They ARE a worthy cause and they’re lending a hand to get to the root of the problems in developing nations.
The breakfast of champions
Last week, the Eco Women talked about why they are not buying Kellogg’s brand cereals for their families any more. Actually, Recycla’s family hasn’t bought Kellogg’s cereals in a while, because they made the switch to organic years ago. If you’re looking to make the same switch, check out some of Recycla’s favorite ones:
Hands down, Recycla’s children’s favorite organic cereals are made by EnviroKidz. With such flavors as Panda Puffs and Gorilla Munch, there are a variety of options to please every palate. Nutritionally, the cereals average 6-8 grams of sugar and 2 grams of protein per serving.
Instead of putting cheap plastic toys in each box of cereal, EnviroKidz instead makes the boxes themselves interesting. Each has photos of various animals and facts about them. There are puzzles and games to stimulate young minds too. Best of all, each box of EnviroKidz cereal tells kids what they can do to help the environment. Every year, EnviroKidz donates a portion of their profits to help environmental causes.
‘s family also likes various cereals made by Kashi, including Autumn Wheat, which is her children’s favorite. As with the previously mentioned cereals, Kashi products are low in sugar, but some of them actually contain more protein. Autumn Wheat, for example, has 5 grams per serving.
When served with milk, some fruit, and a cup of juice, these cereals give Recycla’s children the energy they need to start the day ready to save the environment. They’re healthy, they’re organic, and they’re good for Planet Earth.
Images courtesy of the companies’ websites. The Eco Women are not employed by the companies mentioned here, nor were they paid to review these products. Darn.
Fast Fact: Reusing old linens
Have some old sheets that are too ratty for your bed but too nice to throw out? Take a look at this list of ways to reuse them:
- Drop cloth for painting or other messy projects
- Christmas tree skirt
- Building a fort for a child to play in
- Make a toga for a Halloween costume or a really great party
- Picnic blanket
- Dog bedding (or donate the sheets to your local SPCA for the same purpose)
- Cut the sheets up and use the smaller pieces to make cloth napkins or a quilt squares or some other sewing project.
Posted in 3 Rs, fast facts, house stuff
Recycle your phone, earn $$$, and save Planet Earth
Do you have an old cell phone lying useless in a drawer? If it still works, it could be worth $30 or more –- enough to balance the emissions of a small car for a year. TerraPass and RIPMobile are offering to accept your old cell phones in exchange for gift certificates for TerraPass products.
People buy and toss out cell phones every day. RIPMobile estimates that there are 850 million unused cell phones in the U.S. Since cell phones contain lead, cadmium, mercury, beryllium and arsenic, they become toxic waste when they end up in a landfill. By recycling your phone you help to protect local water and food supplies from toxins, while making industry less dependent on destructive new mining for metals. You are also getting functional phones into the hands of people who need them.
Reselling a used cell phone is far more energy efficient than manufacturing a new one. All materials accepted by RIPMobile and not sold for refurbishment or reuse are recycled according to the highest environmental standards. RIPMobile handles all materials according to EPA standards and in compliance with the stringent requirements of the Basel Action Network.
For more information, click here.
Posted in Uncategorized
What is “Fair Trade” anyway?
You’ve seen it on coffee, chocolate and more, but what does Fair Trade really mean?
Fair Trade is a designation developed to help people support products that come from farms have been certified to pay fair wages and safe working conditions. Obviously, there is no forced child labor.
Fair Trade Certified also ensures that farmers obey internationally monitored environmental standards. They are offered financial incentives and offered resources for such programs as converting to organic, reforestation, water conservation, and more.
Fair Trade Certified goods are guaranteed by an independent third party. The farmer received a fair price for the crop.
For more on Fair Trade, go to fairtradefederation.org.
Posted in Uncategorized
Green Works Works (Sort of.)
Chlorox has launched a new line of cleaning supplies — Green Works. They’ve gotten the Sierra Club to paste their logo on the label and they list their ingredients in unusual disclosure. Enviro-Girl decided to give them a whirl — she loves Mrs. Meyers, but was seduced by Green Works’ price — over a dollar less per bottle than her beloved Clean Day. How did Green Works pan out?
First, holy bubbles, Batman! A little product goes a looooong way, so pour with care. A splash in the sink mixed with water created more bubbles than Enviro-Girl knew what to do with. She definitely uses less Green Works than she’s ever used of other cleaners.
The smell is supposedly “natural,” but it smells Industrial Citrus to Enviro-Girl. She’s not a huge fan of the odor, it reminds her of the stuff school custodians used to clean up puke when she was a child. Other people may not find the smell quite as offensive, though. Enviro-Girl has a sensitive nose.
Green Works’ performance is good. It’s not a disinfectant, but killing all those germs is overrated in Enviro-Girl’s book anyway. It cleans up better than Target’s Method line, leaving no residue and certainly wiping away the grime and grease and grit. The toilet cleaner is performing up to par and doesn’t smell as chemical.
Green Works isn’t tested on animals, it’s biodegradable and boasts 99% natural ingredients. Interesting to note that one of those ingredients is “corn based ethanol.” Enviro-Girl isn’t sure what “Cocounut-based cleaniing agents (anionic and anonionic surfactants)” are, so if any readers can clue her in, please do so.
Bottom line: for the price, it’s a good deal and it’s brewed in the U.S.A. Enviro-Girl applauds Cholox for taking a stand and responding to consumer concerns by developing this line, but she thinks it could use a little work in terms of ingredients and aroma. Really? White vinegar and baking soda do just as well. But if you’re looking to buy your cleaning supplies a little (or a lot) greener, skip Mr. Clean and Comet and go for the Green Works line. Your planet will thank you.
Freecycle
Recycla and her family will be moving in about eight months and she is already trying to deal with the STUFF that has accumulated in her basement, attic, and assorted closets in the nine years she’s lived in her current house.
Recycla has hauled boxes of books to the local library to be donated for the next major book sale. She has donated boxes and bags of items to a charity like Goodwill. She has also gone through her children’s closets and put together a large pile of outgrown clothes to give to a friend whose child is just the right size. And she is trying to convince her children to give away or sell some of their toys, even if it’s just one single Barbie.
One other way Recycla has been dealing with all this clutter is to post items on Freecycle.
If you aren’t familiar with Freecycle yet, Recycla encourages you to become so. Freecycle is a global network whose mission is to keep stuff from ending up in landfills. All transactions are money-free; Freecycle is all about FREE stuff and selling items is forbidden.
Have a mattress you don’t need or a bike your child has outgrown? Just go to the website linked above and search for the group located closest to you — there are thousands of them. After a quick registration process, you can start posting for things you want to get rid of or things you are trying to find. The chances are quite good that the mattress or bike (or whatever) will be off your hands and out of your house within hours.
Getting rid of stuff is usually easier than finding what you need, but it really depends on what you’re looking for. Recycla once needed a small piece of lattice for a project, but didn’t want to buy a large sheet of lattice. She put a request on the Freecycle network and got an email almost immediately.
Last week, Recycla posted two bikes her children had outgrown and a bed frame on Freecycle. Within ten minutes, she emails from interested parties and within a few hours, all posted items had been picked up.
There are rules about what can and cannot be posted on Freecycle. For example, some groups allow offers of kittens and puppies, but others do not. There are also some basic courtesies that need to be observed, such as if you say you’re going to pick up an offered item, you need to actually follow through. (This is one of the biggest gripes Recycla has seen posted on her local network.) That said, Recycla herself has never had a problem with this and has always found the process to be super easy.
Now if only Recycla could figure out what to do with her husband’s Little League trophy from second grade…
Graphic courtesy of Freecycle.org.
Posted in 3 Rs, house stuff, websites & blogs
Kellogg’s Boycott: Banning Snap, Crackle & Pop
Team Testosterone is on a limited cereal diet. If they had their way, they’d eat Captain Crunch and Lucky Charms every morning, but Enviro-Girl doesn’t want to watch the sugar high–or the subsequent burn out. She’s selective, buying mostly General Mills and Quaker brands supplemented with some organic brands like EnviroKidz. The only Kellogg’s cereal she buys is Rice Krispies. And that’s about to change.
Enviro-Girl’s not too annoyed by Kellogg’s smaller package of cereal for the same cost. A lot of food companies have gone that route to save money–so what if ice cream comes in a smaller container or she’s buying less butter for the same price?
No, Enviro-Girl will boycott Snap, Crackle and Pop because Kellogg’s plans to use Monsanto’s “Roundup Ready” sugar beets in their food products. The Current Occupant recently deregulated these genetically engineered sugar beets. The “Roundup Ready Beet” is designed to withstand heavy application of Roundup, Monsanto’s herbicide. Why is this a problem?
* Herbicide-resistant weeds are on the rise, science cannot stay ahead of their evolution so big ag businesses like Monsanto respond by creating more toxic poisons to pour into our soils and groundwater.
* This means more herbicides in our food. And pesticides. Which means more toxic food.
* Sugar beets are wind-pollinated and the biotech sugar beets will cross-pollinate and contaminate any beets.
* Cross-pollination hurts organic farmers and consumers.
* Genetic pollution has an unknown effect on soil, food webs and biodiversity.
Who else is angry at Monsanto and the Bush Adminstration over this issue? Oregon’s Willamette Valley, for one.
And who else besides Enivro-Girl is mad at Kellogg Corporation? Shareholders–for putting its reputation and company at risk for agreeing to use genetically engineered sugar. Consumers consistently say they do not want to eat gene-altered foods, in fact backlash against them is growing. By agreeing to use GE products, Kellogg’s becomes a target and at what cost? Kellogg’s European and operations are phasing out GE foods due to consumer pressure and other food companies, including Heinz, Gerber, Frito Lay and Whole Foods have pledged to remove GE ingredients.
Kellogg’s claims that US consumers do not care if their food contains GE food or not.
Let them know what YOU think by by contacting Kellogg’s at 800-962-1413 OR at their website.
HERE is a complete list of all Kellogg’s products if you care to join the boycott.
Meanwhile, take heart–candy companies like Hershey’s are urging farmers NOT to plant GE sugar beets because of consumer resistance. Yay chocolate!
Izzit Green?
A month or so ago Recycla and Enviro-Girl got an email inviting them to check out izzitgreen.com. Whazzit? After a rousing game of Rock-Paper-Scissors some negotiating about who would post what in the next few weeks, Enviro-Girl agreed to don her Super-Exploratory Goggles and enter the Cyber Zone of izzitGreen.
If you live in Massachusetts or if you are thinking about starting a “Green/Eco Network online,” check them out. It’s a cross between MySpace, Consumer Reports, and eco-blog — mostly specific to the Boston area, but enough product and service reviews to make it a useful stop for any Eco Warrior.
The site is bright, modern, full of information and still under construction in a few areas (but whose isn’t?). Over 700 folks have signed on to be part of the IzzitGreen network and the big questions behind IzzitGreen are:
Is it green?
What comes out?
How’s it run?
What do they care about?
From day cares to day spas, from pizza to books, IzzitGreen is THE website that rates and reviews any Boston-area business, encouraging people to post their favorites. By listing the Good and the Green, they hope to direct people to those places. And by asking “is it good”" and “is it green?” IzzitGreen is a little business online making the environment their big business. (And they have the cutest little mascot guy.)
Go, Eco-Warriors, check them out — and if you know of other similar sites for networking Eco-Warriors and reviewing local products and services, let the Eco-Women know!
Posted in websites & blogs
Tagged Add new tag, green networks, green websites, IzzitGreen
