Al Gore is Kinda Cute

I’ve always been a fan of older men. Today I fell for another one, Mr. Al Gore. Al (I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if I called him by his first name) came to DC to give a presentation for the We Campaign. Greenette sent me an invitation, so I clicked through, got my free ticket and headed off to DAR Constitution Hall yesterday along with my 3,699 best friends.

Al’s presentation was truly inspirational (click here for the transcript). With his slight southern accent and relaxed presence, I felt like he was talking directly to me about all the things I CAN do (even though I was waaay in the back). It’s always nice to hear what we CAN do versus things that cannot be done. It was also nice that there was a limited amount of politicking in the presentation (though there were some slightly crazy protesters outside).

Al’s concept was that the US move to use of entirely carbon-free fuel and electricity (bye bye petrochemicals and coal!) within TEN years. His inspiration: JFK’s similarly ambitious dedication to putting a man on the moon in ten years (we did it in just over 8). His arguments for why this is possible were quite compelling: the US has vast renewable resources including sunlight, wind, and geothermal. All of which can be tapped at a relatively low cost, particularly when compared to skyrocketing economic and environmental costs for oil and coal. His arguments for why we HAVE to do it were equally compelling: environment, economy (hello job creation!), national security (no more borrowing money from China to pay Saudi Arabia).

The one thing missing was behavioral change: all this is good, but we need to think about our own personal choices. How do we reduce demand for fuel/electricity? How do we drive less? How do we plan better?

Overall, great presentation Al. I’ll be sure to let my hubby know he has some competition.

Lost...in...Spaaaaace

I was clicking through Planetizen's newsletter from last week and ran across an article I found worth sharing. The article, "Getting Stuffed" was featured in Macleans Magazine.


The focus of the article is on American's obsession with stuff...and our need to store it, particularly as it relates to the self-storage units. The author also relates the self-storage boom to the increase in housing foreclosures.


The article made me think about office practices (as well as personal junk storage, of course). In the effort to reduce real estate costs and make offices closer to paperless, many companies have turned to off-site archiving solutions. These are great solutions as some files absolutely need to be kept for legal or other reasons; however, there is not a need for regular access of these documents. Off-site storage allows these files to be stored in preferable environmental conditions, as well as in lower-cost real estate.


My question is, how much of the stuff we store in archives do we actually need to keep? The answer is, probably not as much as we thought when we were cleaning out our desks. Perhaps companies need to think about doing an annual "archive purge" in addition to the regular office clean up. This could benefit not just the company (lower storage costs), but also the environment (more paper into the recycling stream, fewer needs for new storage facilites, to name a few).


Companies also need to be more stringent in what employees are allowed to send to storage. At my office, as long as I fill out the forms, I can put pretty much whatever I want in my boxes. Yes, we do have archiving protocols, but not everyone knows them and those who do don't necessarily follow them. Since we don't archive THAT much stuff, there's also not significant cross-checking of what we're archiving. I'd guess lots of companies operate similarly.


How much have you thought about your archived files? What needs to be there? What should have been recycled? What did you need to keep for only a few years?

Are Carbon Offsets for Real?

Whenever I buy an airplane ticket or reevaluate my electric bill, I think about purchasing carbon offsets...but my dad's skepticism has worn off on me a bit. I wonder if the companies selling these are serious legitimate businesses, or just some guys with a snazzy website. Luckily for me (and you), there are now companies that certify carbon offsets.

One such agency is Carbon Concierge. The Carbon Concierge has established some provider evaluation criteria, including:

• Business and Project Transparency
• Offset Quality
• Project Location and Offset Traceability
• Industry Leadership
• Business Model and Program Services Ratio
• 3rd Party Evaluation
• Education
• Social Benefit

These criteria have helped the Carbon Concierge develop a list of preferred offset providers. At this time, they recommend the following:

• Climate Trust
• Native Energy
• Carbonfund

While this does not replace doing your own due dilligence, it's nice to know that there are groups out there verifying the legitimacy of offset providers.

Image source: Business Day

Japan's Zero Emission House

Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) has unveiled its “Zero-Emission House” in parallel with the Hokkaido Toyako G8 Summit that is currently taking place.

This prefabricated house exhibits robots that serve tea to guests, a washer that requires no water, an air conditioner that sends cool air towards people in a room rather than general empty space, and a wind-turbine generator and a photovoltaic system which produces about 15 kilowatts of energy a day.

The structure has great insulation, natural aeration to maintain dry conditions and is designed with the seismic technology, SHEQAS, to mitigate damage due to earthquakes.

The waterless washer is a three-in-one machine that uses high-powered air to wash clothes without water. The process known as "ozonation" uses about twice as much electricity as a regular wash, but only one-fifth the total energy of a comparable full wash and dry because it operates without a drying system.

Additionally, there is a solar-powered TV, a roof-top vegetation system comprised of a thin film of moss grown on tile plates attached to the roof of the house which can also be fitted and grown alongside solar panels.

Very cool.

Commuting at $4 a Gallon...

..is a real burden for many! While increasing gas prices and environmental considerations are encouraging many to get off the road, some companies are finding ways to help their employees with this goal.

Last week, the Seattle Times had an article, "Employers Going Beyond Requirements for Commute Alternatives," that discussed how some employers are giving additional incentives to employees to get off the road:

• Transit subsidy (T-Mobile)
• Shuttle service (Microsoft)
• Transportation counselors (Children's Hospital & Regional Medical Center)
• Telework (Entellium)
• Bonus for biking (Mithun architecture firm)
• Zipcar (Safeco)

What is your employer doing for you?

Image source: 808oasis

Pay as you Drive Insurance

Progressive Insurance is now offering "pay as you drive" or PAYD insurance. Progressive will put a little tag on your car and it knows how often you drive - which, in combination with your safe driving record - determines your premium. Here are some potential benefits from our friends at Wikipedia:

• Commercial benefits to the insurance company from better alignment of insurance with actual risk. Improved customer segmentation.


• Potential cost-savings for responsible customers.


• Social and environmental benefits from more responsible and less unnecessary driving.


• Due to the 24/7 aspects of vehicle location, it enhances security - both personal security and vehicle security. The GPS technology could be used to trace the vehicle whereabouts following an accident, breakdown or theft. [1]


• More choice for consumers on the type of car insurance available to buy.


• The same GPS technology can often be used to provide other (non insurance) benefits to consumers,e.g. satellite navigation [1]


• Social benefits from accessibility to affordable insurance for young drivers - rather than paying for irresponsible peers, with this type of insurance young drivers pay for how they drive.

What interests me about this is the potential companies have to encourage green behavior. Think about it. If you drive less, you not only save gas, but also your premium. For some, this may be enough incentive to get them to bike or walk to work one day a week. It may also encourage parents (paying those big premiums) to encourage their children to drive less. If this product is successful, Progressive will win kudos for setting a new standard for risk mitigation in their industry and for changing their customer's behavior. Wow, that's pretty powerful.

So what other behavior changing ideas are out there?

Image from BBC News

State of Utah Moving to 4-Day Work Week

I had the great pleasure of meeting Governor Jon Hunstman (R) from Utah today. An inspiring man on many fronts (he speaks fluent Mandarin and adopted two abandoned babies from China and India for a start), but I was particulaly inspired by his credible commitment to the environment. One of his most recent initiatives is to transition all state employees to a 4-day work week (4 ten-hour days with Fridays off). This will start full time in July and his team will be measuring the economic and environmental results at the 1-year mark. There are many logistics to work out (daycare for employees, etc.), but the benefits he sees are numerous:

1. With this one chnage, state government buildings in Utah will reduce energy consumption by 20%.
2. The state will be more likely to recruit smart, young people looking for work-life balance jobs.
3. They are more likely to retain staff - it's a perceived "bonus" by most to have three day weekends all year.
4. They will be able to provide better service to their constituants (they are open earlier and later Mon-Thurs, so better able to support working moms and dads).

If roughly 17,000 employees across an entire state can take on alternative work hours, how hard can it really be?

For more info: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25518225/

The future for coal power stations: renewable energy production?

Battersea Power Station in London was decommissioned a quarter of a century ago. It was the first in a series of large coal-fired electrical generating facilities set up in England. For those of you who are not familiar with London, Battersea is very centrally located, just across the River Thames from Kensington & Chelsea. The first part of the structure was built in 1939, but since the early 1980s the site has remained largely unused, with numerous failed redevelopment plans from successive site owners.

The building is the largest brick building in Europe and is notable for its original and lavish Sir Giles Gilbert Scott Art Deco fittings and decor. In fact, the building is Grade II* listed but the condition has been described as "very bad" by English Heritage. The site has been owned by Real Estate Opportunities (REO) since November 2006, after they purchased it for £400 million.

REO have made waves in the UK press this week by announcing their plans for the future of the Power Station as... a Power Station! But the difference is, this it will generate electricity from renewable sources rather than coal. It will once again be used to produce power with a new combined cooling, heat and power plant, but this time using biofuels, waste and other renewable energy sources. Two of the existing Power Station’s chimneys will be reused as flues for this new Energy Centre.

The site will also be developed to incorporate 8 million square feet of hotel, office, residential and retail accommodation. REO propose that alongside the existing Power Station there will be a new building, designed by Rafael Viñoly, which will be the cleanest and greenest building in London. A 300 metre high Chimney and Eco-Dome will dramatically reduce carbon emissions of the 38 acre £4 billion development. Additionally, the largest solar driven natural ventilation system ever conceived will eliminate the need for air conditioning for the commercial and ground floor retail accommodation.

The Chimney will also house apartments with panoramic views over London. The Battersea Power Station development will be home to around 7,000 people and up to 20,000 new jobs will be created. More than 3,200 homes will be built on the site and 2,500 jobs will be created during the construction phase.

The Chimney will draw air up through a campus of individual office buildings which will be covered by a transparent Eco-Dome, made of material similar to that used at the Eden Project in Cornwall. Up to 3,000 cubic metres per second of air will be drawn through the system on a sunny day, reducing energy demand in the buildings by 67%.

REO is planning to spend £150 million on saving and repairing Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s Power Station, with the key historic spaces retained and open to the public. It will be the single largest development site in central London. It is planned that construction work will start in 2012 and the development will be completed by 2020 – depending on the speed of the planning process.

My Company's Carbon Footprint

The firm I work for has just completed measuring it's carbon footprint for 2007. The results? Most of our impact is our travel. Our employees are using alternative travel when we can, we're greening the buildings we occupy, but the real impact of our carbon footprint is the air miles our 2,500 people spend traveling across the country and the world. Alternatives to this? We're starting to use Polyvision Thunder rooms and Cisco's Telepresence systems where we can. We're also taking the train rather than flying. Even still, there are major cultural shifts that will need to happen before we change our "need" to meet face to face with our clients. We're not saying no when we're asked to fly across the country for fear of losing the job. We're a global company and we pride ourselves in our ability to be anywhere we are needed. But is that the right answer? Here are some 'win-win' negotiation tactics for minimizing all those trips with your client:

1. $4.50 / gallon is driving our travel expenses sky high. Perhaps we consider saving our face to face meetings for key meetings only. Would you be willing to try new technologies in this project and work virtually for some meetings?
2. What if I take the time I spend on the road and use it towards working on your project?
3. The environment is very important to our company and we've committed to reducing our carbon footprint. Would you be willing to partner with us in this effort and reduce the number of trips we all take in this project?

Garbage Gasification

Ok, I'll admit it, I am secretly a 12-year old boy. I was drawn to this article because of the word "gasification." Immature, yes, but also useful - due to my slightly warped sense of humor, I learned about a cool new technology: "The Prophet of Garbage" (found in Popular Science magazine) disusses an invention about the size of a two-car garage that basically vaporizes trash of all sorts to create energy.

According to the magazine, here's how it works:

Startech´s trash converter uses superheated plasma-an electrically conductive mass of charged particles (ions and electrons) generated from ordinary air-to reduce garbage to its molecular components. First the trash is fed into an auger that shreds it into small pieces. Then the mulch is delivered into the plasma chamber, where the superheated plasma converts it into two by-products. One is a syngas composed mostly of hydrogen and carbon monoxide, which is fed into the adjacent Starcell system to be converted into fuel. The other is molten glass that can be sold for use in household tiles or road asphalt.

Pretty cool technology!

Livestock in the City?

Someone sent me this adorable picture of a boxer dog and a goat kid a while back. Since I'm a boxer mom, I've been trying to talk my hubby into getting our boxer his own goat. Needless to say, it is not going so well.

That is, until I read this article: "Herhold: Sheep, goats get down to grass tacks." It turns out that some people are looking to livestock as the landscapers of the sustainable future. GREAT idea. Not only do they cut grass, but they fertilize it too!

I remember my grandmother letting the sheep loose on her farm to take care of the yard...but apparently this is less unusual than I'd expected. Here are a couple of other sources:

• Sheep Replace Lawnmowers in Italy
• Sheep Replace Lawnmower Crews
• Sheep as Lawnmowers
• Discussion on sheep vs goats
• What's More Annoying than a 100-decibel yodel

Unfortunately for me, grass mowing is MY job, not the boxer's dad's job...so he sees no benefit to goats in my house. Maybe I can talk my boss or some of my clients into one for the office?

Time for a Hybrid?

With the price of gas crossing $4 a gallon (I paid $4.14 last time I filled up), lots of businesses and individuals are seriously considering trading in their fleets/cars for hybrid vehicles. Is it the right thing to do? This article in the Wall Street Journal argues that the answer is….maybe.

There are a number of reasons it’s a “maybe” – not the least of which is that a new car is a new car, and it’s wasteful to get something new manufactured when something old will do. Some of the other arguments include:

• It depends on how many miles per year you drive (the average American is 15,000 per car per year)
• Priuses cost $22K (that’s for the low-end model)
• You’re not going to get much money back for your trade-in, especially if it’s a guzzler
• Other small cars get pretty good mileage too…especially compared to your SUV!

All this said, I have a Prius and I love it. Not just for the gas, although that’s a big plus since when I calculated out the cost of getting a Prius vs. a similar-sized car, I was calculating gas at $2.50 a gallon. At $4+, I'm doing much better than I expected. The car is roomy, easy to drive, kinda cute, and my dog likes that it has a big back seat all for him. Of course, it does have a big old blind spot, but I’ve figured out how to work that out. For me, it was the right choice...but is it the right choice for everyone?

Beautiful but Disturbing: Waste Art

Image above depicts 11,000 jet trails, equal to the number of commercial flights in the US every eight hours.

A colleague sent me to Chris Jordan's website, "Running the Numbers: An American Self-Portrait." This site uses photography to show a specific number of something (such as number of plastic bottles used in the US every five minutes). The photography is beautiful, but the statistics it portrays are incredibly disturbing. Take a look and be astounded!

Shredding is FUN

Last night I was cleaning out my desk at home and shredding receipts and junk mail. As I was doing this I thought back to a factoid one of my friends had spewed out at a recent event (she’s studying for the LEED exam): by turning down ATM receipts, we can save enough paper to circle the equator 15 times (source: Serve to Preserve)

This got me thinking about where else we can cut paper out of our lives. I did a bit of research and these are a couple of the cool ways people are reducing receipts:

• Receipt choice – many retailers offer you the choice of whether you get a receipt or not. If you don’t need it (thank you credit/debit card bill), don’t take it.
• Double-sided receipts – Sainsburys is a European retailer who offers double-sided receipts
• Online receipts – allEtronic is now offering a service whereby you can get your receipts from participating retailers such as Best Buy and Target online
• E-mail receipts – While most online vendors already offer this, some bricks & mortar vendors are looking into it as well (Starwood hotels, Apple, National Car Rental)
• Shorter receipts – some retailers are reducing the length of their receipts to improve efficiency, cut costs, and respond to consumer concerns

Image Source: Money Walks

The Inconvenient Truth of Being Green

Wired Magazine recently published an article called Inconvenient Truths: Get Ready to Rethink What It Means to Be Green. They suggested that being green doesn't always mean what we think it should.

A couple of their protested "heresies":

1) If a new Prius were placed head-to-head with a used car, would the Prius win? Don't bet on it. Making a Prius consumes 113 million BTUs, according to sustainability engineer Pablo Päster. A single gallon of gas contains about 113,000 Btus, so Toyota's green wonder guzzles the equivalent of 1,000 gallons before it clocks its first mile. A used car, on the other hand, starts with a significant advantage: The first owner has already paid off its carbon debt. Buy a decade-old Toyota Tercel, which gets a respectable 35 mpg, and the Prius will have to drive 100,000 miles to catch up.

2) Cut down old trees. Over its lifetime, a tree shifts from being a vacuum cleaner for atmospheric carbon to an emitter. A tree absorbs roughly 1,500 pounds of CO2 in its first 55 years. After that, its growth slows, and it takes in less carbon. Left untouched, it ultimately rots or burns and all that CO2 gets released.

Makes you think, doesn't it? It's this kind of critical thinking that we're going to need to apply as we act as individuals to save the globe. We need people willing to state what may seem controversial or counter-intuitive. Our problems can't be solved with a majic product or service, but long term, consistent thinking about our actions.

My own heresy? I work for an architectural firm but think we need to build less. We'll have to in order to meet the goals federal, state and local governments have already or will soon set. We need to use what we've got which means living and working more frugally when it comes to space.

The Expense Report

Many of us work in fields where once in a while we have to spend our own money for a business expense. Generally, this is not a big deal, but it does require some effort to submit an expense report – both personal effort and sustainable impact. Here are a couple of thoughts about how to green the process:

1. Direct deposit. Rather than sending a check, companies should be able to directly deposit reimbursements into your account.
2. Receipt requirement. I understand why receipts are required (fraud, etc); however, it is “greener” to not get a receipt at all (think ATM, gas pump, etc). Many transactions are made by credit card or bank card and are tracked by the issuing financial institution. I know in my personal life I try to avoid getting receipts because it means I’ll have to shred them later (annoyance factor trumps green factor, but end result is the same). If companies could accept credit card statements in lieu of receipts, this could help reduce the amount of wasted paper (and for those of us that occasionally lose receipts when travelling, could help cut employees losses).
3. Receipt submission. Employees should be encouraged to tape their receipts to the backs of used paper, rather than printing out a special “receipt page.”
4. Paperless submission. Some companies already do this, some do not, and some (like mine) are in the process of converting. We currently have to type up our reports, print them out, tape our receipts to a blank sheet of paper (recycled back sides are ok) and ship them overnight to accounting. They are then scanned and reviewed virtually. More sustainable measures would be:

• Bundling expense reports weekly/bi-weekly – results in fewer packages shipped.
• Scanning and sending directly to accounting from our multi-function printers – eliminates need for overnight shipping.
• Online submission – no printing required.

Any other ideas on how to green your expense report submission process?

Image Source: http://www.gembapantarei.com

UK considers personal carbon credits

The a committee of UK Members of Parliament have said that the government should go ahead with a system of personal "carbon credits" to meet emissions targets.

Under such a scheme people would be given an annual carbon limit for fuel and energy use - which they could exceed by buying credits from those who use less.

The Committee said the scheme would be more effective than taxes for cutting carbon emissions. The Committee chairman Tim Yeo said that "green" taxes, such as a petrol tax, cost poor people more because everyone - "billionaires and paupers" - paid the same amount.

Yeo said: "Under the personal carbon trading, someone who perhaps doesn't have an enormous house or swimming pool, someone who doesn't take several holidays in the Caribbean every year, will actually get a cash benefit if they keep a low carbon footprint."

Unfortunately the UK government are not funding any more research into personal carbon credits as Ministers said there were practical drawbacks to the proposal. For these drawbacks see the BBC article here.

Sustainable Mail

I came across this organization and thought it was something to share, because I know everyone is as annoyed as I am with Junk Mail..

http://www.41pounds.org/ stops your junk mail and catalogs — protecting the environment. Junk mail wastes an incredible amount of natural resources and contributes to global warming.

Time — No credit card offers to shred or unwanted catalogs.

Trees — Keep 100+ million trees in forests, cooling the planet.

Water — Protect 28 billion gallons of clean water.

Climate — Junk mail produces more C02 than 2.8 million cars.

Planet — We donate to your favorite charity when you sign up.

Go Check it Out..

Climate Counts is Cool

I heard about this tool from a fellow tree-hugger: Climate Counts is a nonprofit organization that ranks companies based on their environmental track record. It’s a very cool site – I’ve been playing around on it this morning and found out that some of my favorite companies are doing really well and others could use some improvement.

For more information, check out their press release:

Climate Counting More with Consumer Companies
84% of Companies Show Improvement in 2nd Climate Counts Company Scorecard
Transparency is Critical to Consumers
(May 7th, 2008) Climate Counts' second annual Company Scorecard shows scored companies making climate improvements across most industry sectors. 84 percent of the scored companies —among them some of the world's largest -- made improvements in their efforts to reduce greenhouse gases and to make information about those actions actions easily accessible to consumers. The Scorecard, first released in June 2007, scores 56 major corporations in well-known consumer sectors – from apparel to electronics to fast food – on their commitment to reversing climate change.

"Business is being pushed by consumers to do their part to solve the climate crisis," said Gary Hirshberg, chair of Climate Counts and CEO of organic yogurt maker Stonyfield Farm. "The Scorecard allows consumers to make good climate decisions in their everyday purchases,and it's having an impact."

Google, Anheuser-Busch and Levi Strauss had the largest score improvement among those scores, each jumping over 20 points. Improvement was broad however, with the average company score improving 22 percent over last year. Nike passed last year's high scorer, Canon, to as the top scored company.
"Company transparency is critical to allowing consumers to make good decisions," said Wood Turner, Project Director. "The time for companies to just say 'trust us, we're good on climate' has passed, consumers want to see the proof behind the green claims. They want to know it's not just marketing talk, but real substantive action."

It wasn't all good climate news. Five companies scored one or zero points: Jones Apparel Group; and four companies from the Food Services sector, Burger King, Darden Restaurants (which owns popular restaurants Red Lobster and Olive Garden), Yum! Brands (parent to Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and KFC) and Wendy's. The Food Services sector has the lowest average (11.5 out of 100) of any of the eight sectors measured with smallest overall improvement. There were a total of ten companies – down from 18 last year – scoring in the lowest tier of companies, or under 12 points overall.

"We're excited by the level of interest in the Scorecard by both consumers and business," said Turner. "In order to expand our reach and applicability, we'll be expanding the number of companies we monitor later this year."

The companies were scored on a scale from one to 100, based on 22 criteria that fall within four benchmarks: whether they measure their carbon footprint; what efforts they have made to reduce their own climate impact; whether they support or oppose global-warming legislation; and what they disclose to the public about their work to address climate change. Consumers can review all the company scores and download a pocket-sized shopping guide at http://www.climatecounts.org/. Consumers will also be able to look up companies' rankings by texting "cc company name" (for example, "cc Nike") to 30644 from their cell phones so they can make climate-friendly consumer decisions while they shop. An expansion of Climate Counts' mobile phone activism program is planned for later this summer.

Give Yourself a Lift

Many of you may live or work in a building that has an elevator…or at least you’ve ridden in one at least once in your lifetime. This is particularly true if you live in a dense urban environment….which is great – yay density! That said, as you might suspect, elevators take energy to function, thereby increasing a building’s carbon footprint.

Many elevator manufacturers are developing energy efficient elevators and technologies to retrofit existing elevators. Instead of even attempting to pretend I am an elevator expert, here are a few links to articles about “green” elevators:

• Green Building Insider
• Archi-Tech
• Buildings.com
• McGraw Hill Construction

In the case that your building has an older energy hog elevator (or even if it has a new, energy-efficient model), here are a few things you can do to help reduce its impact:

• Group your trips – instead of going up and down multiple times per day, try to consolidate your trips into just a few (get coffee and go to the bank on the same trip) – it will save both time and energy.
• Hold the door for the person running toward you – it will only cost you a few seconds, make that person very happy, and may save an elevator trip.
• Take the stairs – it's good for your glutes as well as the environment.

Image source: Flickr