Set sprinklers to water the lawn or garden only - not the street or sidewalk.
Use the microwave to cook small meals. (It uses less power than an oven.)
Purchase "Green Power" for your home's electricity. (Contact your power supplier to see where and if it is available.)
Scrape, rather than rinse, dishes before loading into the dishwasher; wash only full loads.
Cut back on air conditioning and heating use if you can.
Turn off appliances and lights when you leave the room.
By Harriet Blake
What started out as a practical way to keep food from sticking to pans and paper, may not be so great for our health. PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, is a synthetic (man-made) chemical that is used to coat Teflon cookware as well as the packaging of many fast-food products, including pizza [...]
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By Harriet Blake
Mainstream, affordable solar power is not just pie (or energy) in the sky. So say MIT researchers who have devised a process to store solar energy for use when the sun doesn’t shine.
Photo: Donna Coveney
MIT professor Dan Nocera
Massachusetts Institute of Technology energy professor Dan Nocera and post-doctoral fellow Matthew Kanan have found a [...]
Tags: Energy & Water · Green Enthusiasts & Researchers · Headlines · Uncategorized
By John DeFore
Over the last few years, moviegoers may have come to expect that any documentary pairing scientists and ice caps will be a scare-fest or a sermon — a big-screen effort to hammer home the urgent need to take action countering climate change.
Not so with Encounters at the End of the World, a film [...]
Tags: Books & Movies · Briefs · GET INFORMED · Uncategorized
By Catherine Girardeau
Eleven-year-old Colin Carlson of Coventry, Conn., took his cue from the penguins. The recent winner of the sixth annual Action for Nature International Young Eco-Hero Awards in the 8-to-13 age group was nine when he visited the Galapagos Islands as a member of the National Geographic Kids Expedition Team.
“I was snorkeling near a [...]
Tags: Cities & States · Green Them · Headlines · Healthy Ways · Model People · Model Projects · Uncategorized
By Paula Minahan
Swimming pools are a big draw in summer, but when it comes to energy consumption, they can be a big drain. Award-winning green architect Peter Pfeiffer shared his own experience on how to reduce “pain at the pump”:
Here’s a great story about building my own home. We installed solar panels on the [...]
Tags: Cut Consumption · Energy & Water · Home Improvements · Uncategorized
By John DeFore
In the future, employing solar energy won’t necessarily mean mounting big black panels on your roof or buying from a utility with a solar farm. It might just mean pulling the curtains shut for a while.
Tags: Briefs · Dress, Decor & Beauty · Energy & Water · Uncategorized
By Nima Kapadia
Creating an alternative to the conventional, gasoline-powered lawn mower is “work of art” that has gotten the Neuton recognition at museums this summer.
Tags: Briefs · Greener Businesses · Lawn Maintenance · Media & Entertainment · Uncategorized
By John DeFore
Big American retailers like Wal-Mart and Home Depot have been embracing compact fluorescent light bulbs for a while now, but some customers who read the fine print have been peeved that, since they contain mercury, the twisty little energy-saving bulbs are easier to buy than to dispose of properly. This week, Home [...]
[Read more →]Tags: Briefs · Recycle & Reuse · Uncategorized
By John DeFore
Quick question: Jack trades in his 15 mpg truck for a car getting 25 mpg, while Jill upgrades her 25 mpg sedan for a 35 mpg compact. Assuming they drive the same amount, who’s going to save the most money over the coming year? (Ignore for the moment that Jill’s commute has [...]
[Read more →]Tags: Briefs · Cars · Uncategorized
By Julie Bonnin
We know, grocery shopping has gotten complicated. But the evidence for one supermarket choice is becoming increasingly clear – milk from grass-fed cows has more health benefits than other kinds of milk.
Tags: Briefs · Food · Uncategorized
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In the race for top carbon emissions polluter, the United States is still Number One, but China is sprinting forward and could soon edge into the lead. The current Olympics host nation accounted for a “staggering 57 percent of the growth of emissions” worldwide this century, and will likely surpass the U.S. as the single biggest belcher of fossil fuel emissions sometime this year, according to the Worldwatch Institute.
The standings right now: The U.S. currently contributes 19.5 percent of global fossil fuel emissions compared with China’s 18.3 percent. [Read more →]
British Petroleum (BP) has announced plans to bring cellulosic ethanol to market in the U.S., through a 
partnership with bio-fuel developer Verenium, a company that makes biofuels from rice straw, sugarcane stalks, switchgrass and wood chips. The partnership could help speed the availability of lower cost, more environmentally friendly biofuels, according to an announcement by both companies this week. [Read more →]
By Tom Kessler
Almost 90 percent of the car shoppers who visit Kelley Blue Book’s Web site say they are concerned about the future of our environment, company research shows. Among survey respondents, 80 percent agreed that individuals should make lifestyle changes to help reduce CO2 emissions. And 75 percent of KBB shoppers reported that they have made changes to further the betterment of the environment. The most frequent lifestyle changes cited were:
