Group items tagged

This is a crucial time for people to rethink how we meet our needs today to help to ensure a desirable future for following generations. Local government officials must play their part in reinventing our institutions to help communities and residents stay healthy and whole. This is because we have entered an era where human generated pressures on the natural world are unprecedented and threaten our current way of life. A few examples include depletion of non-renewable resources - 65% of U.S. oil is gone and the world is at or past peak oil; insufficient drinking water for two thirds of the world's population; consumption of land and loss of topsoil at unsustainable rates; projected loss of 90% of the world's fisheries by 2048; extinction of a distinct species of plant or animal, on average, every 20 minutes (qualifying the present period as one of the six great periods of mass extinction in the history of Earth1); and the presence of 250 persistent toxic chemicals not known before 1945, many of which are now found in human tissues.

One of our country's most pressing goals is to build an economy that provides good jobs now-and that creates a strong foundation for enduring prosperity. To accelerate job growth for this and future generations, that foundation must be built with expanded housing and transportation choices, greater energy independence, and better protection for our clean air and water.

"To ensure equality, water must be considered a human right and not just a need, privilege or commodity." (Photo: Edwin Huffman / World Bank) What is called for is an international code for the public's access to a guaranteed supply of water as a basic human right.

I agree, water should be a human right and not a privilege. Erika Usi

I think this non-profit is pretty cool. They have drastically improved the lives of African women who used to risk their lives and waste many days looking for firewood or burning feces to cook, and so has the Aid For Africa, http://www.aidforafrica.org/member-charities/solar-cookers-international/ Solar cookers could also be built into the side of a home and used indoors! I am thinking of maybe getting or building one for my home to reduce our use of propane. We are mainly solar-powered but we have a gas range and a back up generator that run on propane and I really dislike that. This solar cooker could really help us out though there is a lot that it can't do. I still think it is interesting and worth looking into. Perhaps it is something that more of us could use.

John Jeavons has been doing this work for over 30 years. I studied with him In Northern California. I found it fascinating that he spoke at Google in Cali recently. Even though his method is not technology intensive it is science based and is feeding the world in many ways.

I studied with John many years ago. His book Backyard Homestead is one of the best books for back yard gardeners!!

"Our strategy to build economically competitive, environmentally sustainable, opportunity-rich communities that serve as the backbone for our long-term growth and prosperity…We need strategies that encourage smart development linked to quality public transportation, that bring our communities together. That's why we'll improve our Partnership for Sustainable Communities by working with HUD, EPA, and the Department of Transportation in making sure that when it comes to development, housing, energy, and transportation policy go hand in hand." --President Barack Obama, January 21, 2010

Is it possible for the sun to provide the only source of power for a complete water purification system in a portable bag? Until now we would not give the idea much thought. But why not? We make "sun tea" where you put tea bags in a container of water and place the container outside in the sun to naturally brew the tea.

Ultimate Green Buildings

Great website. Thanks for sharing!

Biotecture at its best! Green Buildings which can be constructed in any part of the world and designed to meet and exceed existing building codes. Earthships provide electricity, potable water, contained sewage treatment and sustainable food production for every building.

Americans are familiar with with utilizing solar energy to heat water filled tubes for domestic hot water. Spain has laid claim to the world's first molten salt solar energy plant. Nearly 3,000 mirrors track the Sun, reflecting its rays at a centralized tower. Said tower raises salt, an already bountiful resource in Spain, to a temperature high enough to melt it. Amazingly, salt withholds its temperature rather well, emitting heat for nearly 15 hours past liquefaction. This heat is utilized for energy production.

A consumers guide from MSN's Real Estate webpage. Options for home use in mind, MSN offers three categories of best in show. Most efficient, most innovative, and best bang for the buck have examples of photovoltaic solar panels.

Too many Bills have been put forward by too many states to ban or label GE or GMO products, seeds, plants or animals. Why is our government not representing the people and supporting big businesses like Monsanto? I helped write the referendum in Mendocino County banning GMO crops from being grown but Monsanto is winning across our country. Research this topic, it is vital for our sustainability ! Salmon is now the next target!

Hitchcock Center at Hampshire College opened the first "living building" in New England. Some of the requirements to meet the living building standards include: net zero energy & water, use of locally-sourced and non-toxic materials, and other green criteria. This site is perfect for teachers, environmentalists, and anyone who follows the "Green Movement". In depth information links are available on the bottom of this site.

Planet Natural is the store for people seeking environmentally safe, effective products and solutions for their home and gardens. There is also tons of information regarding how to compost, what insects are good for gardens, etc.

This is a wonderful resource for researching consumer products. If you want to know the safest sunscreen, shampoo, toothpaste, make-up, etc. Take a peek at the cosmetics guide. They also have links to pesticides in produce and GMO's. I link the cosmetic guide to my phone so that when I am shopping for safe products for my family, I can pull up a product's rating while I am at the store.

Skitch is a simple interface tool that you can download and use for Free. It acts as a screen capture tool that pops up like a window. But there's more! You can paint, add text, draw shapes and save the file type from everything from a TIFF to a GIF. Really useful for creating site plans, where I need an overhead photo of the site and can add in the locations of all the electrical points of interest for the utility to review. Get your point across with fewer words using annotation, shapes and sketches, so that your ideas become reality faster.

I utilized this program in my design work at Northeast Solar. What I really like about this application is 1. It's free and 2. You can share you Templates with the world. Oh, and 3. You have access to all the Free Templates from the World! Some great person shared a template (Template = a design package including tools, data, configurations, that you can utilize in the sketch up world) that I can use in unison with Google Earth, to design, plan, measure, size, and then show, what Solar electric (PV) opportunity they have for their building. It was really useful. SketchUp is 3D modeling software that's easy to learn and incredibly fun to use. Download SketchUp today for free and get started drawing in 3D.

Here is an article on trench composting I thought the group might enjoy. My wife and I have reduced our waste to about one small kitchen bag a week by composting our kitchen scraps.

Hi. That is a great idea. Saves the plant from drying out. I will do that for my garden. Funny I was reading about Africa a remote area where this happen. A university sent someone out here to help solve a issue for these people to have some kind of heat source like gas. Long story short you take all the food scraps throw them into a blender and dump in in a 50 gallon drum. Does this for a bout a week. Have another 50 gallon drum ready empty. This guy ran a gas line off the barrels into the house. It produce enough methane to cook and heat the house as long you keep dumping scraps into the barrel.