Home Depot Recycles CFLs

Good news for users of compact fluorescent bulbs--all Home Depot locations will now offer recycling services, according to the New York Times. (See excerpt below.)

Home Depot, the nation’s second-largest retailer, will announce on Tuesday that it will take back old compact fluorescents in all 1,973 of its stores in the United States, creating the nation’s most widespread recycling program for the bulbs.
“We kept hearing from the community that there was a little bit of concern about mercury in the C.F.L.’s,” said Ron Jarvis, Home Depot’s senior vice president for environmental innovation, using the industry abbreviation for the bulbs. “And if the C.F.L.’s were in their house, how could they dispose of them?”
Until now, consumers had to seek out local hazardous waste programs or smaller retail chains willing to collect the bulbs for recycling, like Ikea and True Value. Some consumers have waited for retailers like Wal-Mart to have a designated recycling day. Others bought kits to mail the bulbs to a recycling facility.
The Environmental Protection Agency has been looking into putting bulb drop-off boxes at post offices, said Jim Berlow, director of the agency’s hazardous waste minimization and management division.
But those plans are not final, and across most of the country, recycling the bulbs has been inconvenient at best. Industry professionals estimate that the recycling rate is around 2 percent.

Interfaith Power and Light is a religious response to global warming with chapters in 26 states and Greater Washington, D.C. Find a link to your local chapter at http://www.theregenerationproject.org/State.Check out the National IPL Blog. Find discounts on energy saving products at http://www.shopipl.org/

Stamford (CT) goes green

Mayor Dan Malloy of Stamford (CT) rolls out Stamford's "Cool and Green" plan in the Stamford Times (see excerpt below.)

Stamford was one of ten municipalities selected by ICLEI –Local Governments for Sustainability as part of the New England Cities Project. The City was selected based on its successful emission reductions projects and ongoing energy savings initiatives. As a part of the "Stamford Cool and Green 2020," the City will substantially expand its climate saving efforts, which will ultimately make Stamford the leading environmental steward in Connecticut.
There are millions of cars, boilers, and light bulbs contributing to our climate's greenhouse gas emissions. As individuals we contribute to these emissions daily, but as a community our carbon footprint becomes significant as the size and scope of our City continues to change. If each of us were to make minor changes in the way we operate daily, the positive impact on the environment would be remarkable. We ask that as you review the following tenets of the "2020" plan that you think of ways big and small that you can help preserve our climate.
Energy efficiency
* An Energy Improvement District initially contained within the downtown and South End of Stamford, with the potential for expansion, will be managed by a five member Board. The Board will create a business plan, which will promote the development of combined heat and power generation and renewable power within the District for the purpose of improved power quality and reliability, improvement in economic attractiveness and competitive advantage, and improved energy efficiency. A feasibility study is currently underway for the installation of a co-generation plant at the Government Center.
* Stamford has received $2 million in Clean Renewable Energy Bonds for two large solar systems currently in design for Rippowam Middle School (144 kilowatts) and our Highway Department Facility (101 kilowatts).
* A challenge was issued to City residents to replace traditional light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs (CFLs). If each citizen replaced just one traditional light bulb with a CFL bulb, the combined actions would prevent 99,342,027 lbs. of greenhouse gas emissions, an air pollution reduction equivalent of removing 8,658 cars from the road. To promote this initiative, the City plans to supply 5,000 free bulbs to its residents.
* In order to encourage the purchase of hybrid cars, we proposed an ordinance to the Board of Representatives to reduce the assessed value of a hybrid vehicle by $2,000. This will result in a $68 reduction in car tax.
Renewable Energy
* Everyone with an electric bill can opt to sign up for clean energy. The additional money paid into the CTCleanEnergyOptions program supports electricity generated by alternative energy sources, including wind and landfill gas. For every 100 residents who sign up, the City will receive a solar clean energy system. A challenge was issued to the residents of Stamford to enroll in the program, with the goal of making Stamford number one in the State for enrollment and thereby the Cleanest & Greenest energy city in Connecticut.
Solid Waste/Recycling
* During the last fiscal year, the City recycled approximately 8 percent of its solid waste. The City is currently reorganizing the recycling program and evaluating different technologies in pursuit of our goal to recycle 40 percent of our solid waste by 2010. The improvements will include incentives for citizens to fully participate in our recycling program, recycling of plastics numbered 3-7 by 2009, more frequent electronics recycling, and broadening our composting system. We are also looking into the use of "waste oil heaters" in our City garages, which utilizes the oil used to maintain City vehicles as the fuel for heating the building.
Green Procurement
* The City is developing a list of the "top 10" green items or services that are routinely purchased by the City, or that represent a significant cost savings. The policy will ensure that the green items chosen are purchased. General areas for consideration are cleaners, computers, vehicle fleets, office electronics, and paint.
* The City will make every effort to purchase and use the lowest emission vehicle or equipment item possible, while taking into account the vehicle's life-cycle costs and the ability to support City operations and services. The overall goal will be to convert 20 percent of the existing fleet to hybrid, alternative fuels, or high fuel efficiency vehicles within five years.
We are building on the successes we have already achieved in CO2 and cost savings. The City has completed an impressive list of energy efficiency and renewable energy projects, most notably the energy performance improvements in our City facilities. For instance, we have saved $2,413,950 in cumulative utility energy costs from 50 energy efficiency projects completed since 1998. The recent establishment of a community-wide Sustainable Stamford Task Force will help to achieve these critical goals.

Interfaith Power and Light is a religious response to global warming with chapters in 25 states and Greater Washington, D.C. Find a link to your local chapter at http://www.theregenerationproject.org/State.Find discounts on energy saving products at http://www.shopipl.org/

Pop Wars: Cans vs. Bottles

What is better for the environment, soft drinks in bottles or cans? Salon has the facts in this article (excerpt below):

The amount of petroleum used in making the 50-gram (g) and 2-liter bottle is around 325 g, and the resulting greenhouse gas emissions from its manufacture are around 825 g. An aluminum can made from virgin materials results in the emissions of 280 g of carbon dioxide. Does this mean that the can is better? Well, keep in mind that the bottle holds more beverage, so we need to take that into account. You would need to buy 5.6 cans, almost a full six-pack, to equal the volume of the bottle. The 5.6 cans would be responsible for 1,568 g of carbon dioxide emissions. So it looks like the 2-liter bottle results in about half of the greenhouse gas emissions of the equivalent amount of cans. Is this the end of the story? What about transportation emissions?
Let's assume that both beverage containers are filled in the same facility and shipped to the store with the same truck. The bottle weighs 2.05 kg when full (2 liters plus 50 g) and the 5.6 cans weigh 2.084 kg (2 liters plus 84 g). This means that the cans require slightly more fuel to transport than the bottles. That's two strikes against cans. How about a third strike? Soda bottles often find a second life in my favorite winter garments, as some clothing brands manufacture fleece in part from recycled plastic, which is melted into pellets and extruded into fine fibers. Try doing that with aluminum.

Interfaith Power and Light is a religious response to global warming with chapters in 25 states and Greater Washington, D.C. Find a link to your local chapter at http://www.theregenerationproject.org/State.

Find discounts on energy saving products at http://www.shopipl.org/

The Case Against Bottled Water

An article in Salon (excerpted here) does a great job of explaining what's so bad about bottled water.

First, the manufacturing of plastic bottles, which are often made from nonrecycled virgin material, requires vast quantities of petroleum, and only 12 percent of this material is recovered for recycling. The total mass of an empty 1-liter bottle is around 25 grams (this varies from brand to brand) and it is made from PET (polyethylene terephthalate). One kilogram (1 kg = 2.2046 lbs.) of this type of plastic requires around 6.5 kilograms of oil, uses 294 kilograms of water (this includes power plant cooling water), and results in 3.7 kilograms of greenhouse gas emissions. Based on my calculations, an empty 1-liter bottle requires over 7 liters of water in its manufacturing process, uses 162 grams of oil, and results in over 100 grams of greenhouse gas emissions. (That's about 10 balloons full of carbon dioxide, or how much an average car emits over half a kilometer or one-third of a mile.)
Next, the distribution of bottled water, often by container ship from the other side of the planet (Fiji, Evian, San Pellegrino), is fuel intensive and results in greenhouse gas and sulfur dioxide emissions. Transportation emissions are measured in grams of greenhouse gases (in carbon-dioxide-equivalent units) per metric ton per kilometer. Shipping by container ship emits about 17 grams of carbon dioxide per ton km, while trains release 56 grams per ton km, trucks spew 102 grams per ton km, and jet aircraft belch 570 grams per ton km. So the important factors in transportation emissions are weight, distance and transportation mode. Since we can't alter the weight of bottled water and companies will automatically select the most efficient and cost-effective means of transport, we are left to control the distance component through our consumer choices.
Sales of bottled waters are driven by marketing that creates a perception of luxury, quality and novelty. After all, every brand tastes like, well, water. But you are paying a huge premium to be seen around town with that cool square Fiji bottle or distinctly green Perrier bottle. When you add the cost of packaging and marketing to transportation, not to mention the water makers' huge profits, you are paying two to five times more for a bottle of water than you do for the equivalent amount of gasoline. When compared with the price of tap water, bottled water costs up to 50,000 percent more (and many brands get their water from municipal water supplies).
Bottled water also represents a major ethical dilemma, given that millions of people around the world lack access to clean and safe drinking water.

Interfaith Power and Light is a religious response to global warming with chapters in 25 states and Greater Washington, D.C. Find a link to your local chapter at http://www.theregenerationproject.org/State.Find discounts on energy saving products at http://www.shopipl.org/

Shopping Bag Chic

The New York Times has an article about how Whole Foods is trying to make re-usable grocery bags chic by employing a famous bag designer and announcing limited runs of the bags. Several cities in Northeastern states served by this blog (including Boston, New York, Baltimore and Annapolis) are considering banning plastic grocery bags. Read an excerpt of the story below:

At 8 this morning, 15 Whole Foods stores in the New York area were to start selling $15 cotton bags by Anya Hindmarch, a London designer better known for bags that range to $1,500 and beyond. The bags, which read “I’m not a plastic bag,” are intended to be used and reused for groceries, in place of plastic. Whole Foods is selling 20,000, first come first served, limit three to a customer while supplies last. If offerings of the bag in other cities are any guide, the lines will be long.
A stampede of would-be purchasers in Taiwan in June sent 30 people to the hospital and required the riot police. A similar outpouring in Hong Kong caused no injuries, but the police closed down the shopping mall. “Apparently they are not used to queuing,” Ms. Hindmarch said last week from a hotel in Tokyo, where she had just finished the latest offering of her bag. To avoid more riots, future events in Southeast Asia will take place on the Internet.
What started out as a small effort in London to reduce the number of biodegradable-resistant plastic bags that litter the landscape has become a wildly successful worldwide campaign. With 34 stores around the world and 20 more opening this year, Ms. Hindmarch knows that even if you can’t interest people in a cause on moral or ethical grounds you can reach them by making the cause fashionable.
“To create awareness you have to create scarcity by producing a limited edition,” she said. “I hate the idea of making the environment trendy, but you need to make it cool and then it becomes a habit.”
Even before Ms. Hindmarch’s canvas tote became the talk of London, enough people were talking about plastic shopping bags that they qualified as a cause célèbre. In recent years, governments around the world have considered bans on them, and stores have found new tactics for weaning customers from them.
Made from polyethylene, a petroleum product, the bags may take as long as 500 years to degrade. Meantime they hang from trees, catch on power lines, float on oceans and lakes and clog storm drains, killing birds, fish, turtles and sea mammals unfortunate enough to ingest them or become entangled in them.
Americans throw away 100 billion plastic bags a year, recycling less than 1 percent of them, according to the Worldwatch Institute, an environmental research and advocacy group in Washington.
San Francisco is the first American city to ban the nonbiodegradable bags. Later this year, first supermarkets and then large chain pharmacies there will have to offer biodegradable and compostable bags. The drawback is that they are much more expensive than the nonrecyclables.
Antibag bills are being considered in Boston; Baltimore; Annapolis, Md.; Portland, Ore.; and Santa Monica and Oakland, Calif.
New York City is in the early stages. As part of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s “green” campaign, the city sponsors public service announcements telling people to use cloth bags for grocery shopping and to reuse plastic bags.
City Councilman Michael E. McMahon, the chairman of the council’s sanitation and solid waste management committee, is from Staten Island, where he remembers the bags blowing all over from the Fresh Kills landfill, now closed. His committee is drafting a bill to require stores to take back plastic bags from customers. He hopes that in four or five years, people will be able to recycle them with their glass and paper.

Interfaith Power and Light is a religious response to global warming with chapters in 22 states and Greater Washington, D.C. Scroll down for links to the national organization and your local chapter.

Recycling Water

An article in the New York Times discusses a new movement designed to conserve water.

LAURA ALLEN’S modest gray house in the Oakland flatlands would give a building inspector nightmares. Jerry-built pipes protrude at odd angles from the back and sides of the nearly century-old house, running into a cascading series of bathtubs filled with gravel and cattails. White PVC pipe, buckets, milk crates and hoses are strewn about the lot. Inside, there is mysterious — and illegal — plumbing in every room.
Ms. Allen, 30, is one of the Greywater Guerrillas, a team focused on promoting and installing clandestine plumbing systems that recycle gray water — the effluent of sinks, showers and washing machines — to flush toilets or irrigate gardens.
To her, this house is as much an emblem of her belief system as a home. Although gray water use is legal in California, systems that conform to the state’s complicated code tend to be very expensive, and Ms. Allen and her fellow guerrilla, Cleo Woelfle-Erskine, are out to persuade the world that water recycling can be a simple and affordable option, as well as being a morally essential one.
They are part of a larger movement centered in the West — especially in arid regions like Arizona, New Mexico and Southern California — that includes both groups that operate within the law and ones that skirt it. The goal is the reuse of home gray water as a way to live within the region’s ecological means. Using their own experience and contributions from others, they have just published a do-it-yourself guide to gray water systems that is also a manifesto for the movement, “Dam Nation: Dispatches From the Water Underground.”

IREJN is Connecticut's Interfaith Power and Light. Visit us at www.irejn.org.

Green Parties

The Hartford Courant offers tips and suggestions for eco-friendly entertaining in this article:

Greening your next party doesn't mean giving up electricity or preaching to your guests. "It could be just purchasing locally grown food or using a caterer who uses local food," said Paul McRandle, deputy editor of The Green Guide, a newsletter devoted to environmental lifestyles. "You don't have to make a big deal out of it."Experts offer these tips for greener home entertaining:Invitations: Paper-free invitations like those offered at evite.com are greenest. However, there are special occasions for which the cyber card just doesn't cut it. In that case, look for recycled paper. "You can't tell the difference and it's a better choice," said Feldman. "If it's a baby shower, look for flower seeds embedded in the paper. Print at the bottom, 'After you read this, please plant. This sheet of paper will sprout wildflowers."' She recommends printing your own invitations on Plantable Papers by Bloom (www.plantablepaper.com). If you are having the invitations printed professionally, ask for vegetable-based ink, advises The Green Guide's McRandle. Many standard inks are petroleum derivatives.Flowers: Shop local at the farmers' market, if possible. Amy Stewart, author of "Flower Confidential: The Good, the Bad and the Beautiful in the Business of Flowers" (Algonquin Books, $23.95) says 78 percent of the flowers sold in the United States are imported and often grown with harmful pesticides or on farms with poor labor practices. She advises looking for flowers with VeriFlora certification, a new eco-label certifying flowers are grown environmentally. Ask for them from your florist or buy them online at www.organicbouquet.com.Candlelight: Go with soy based or beeswax candles. Feldman says soy, "are nontoxic, clean burning and they don't pollute. They're easy to get and not more expensive. It's a no brainer." Soy candles are widely available in home stores, online and at specialty grocers such as Whole Foods. Aroma Naturals offers a line of soy- and vegetable-oil candles scented with plant oils (www.aromanaturals.com). Beeswax candles, such as those from Candle Bee Farms (www.candlebeefarm.com) may be slightly more expensive than petroleum-based paraffin candles. Danielle Venokur, owner of dvGreen, a sustainable party planning service in New York, recommends battery-operated LED "candles" that flicker for thousands of hours within glass votives.Plates: If you can't use regular plates, look for eco-friendly paper plate replacements such as those made with corn, sugar cane or soy that are biodegradable. Earthshell makes biodegradable, disposable plates and bowls from potatoes, corn and limestone and is available at major retailers such as Target and Wal-Mart (www.earthshell.com). Simply Biodegradable sells sugar cane-based plates and cornstarch utensils (www.simplybiodegradable.com). Clear Creek Compostables sells 90 percent sugar-cane pulp and 10 percent paper plates that can hold boiling water (www.clearcreekcomp.com).Napkins: If you can't use fabric napkins, look for recycled napkins. "With recycled materials look for a high percentage use of 'post-consumer materials,"' advises The Green Guide's McRandle. Those are papers that would otherwise be put in a landfill. Most producers that use a high ratio of recycled materials will indicate this on their packaging. Seventh Generation, for example, uses a minimum of 80 percent post-consumer recycled paper, including its napkins that are naturally brown or bleached white without harmful chlorine (www.seventhgeneration.com). If you have more time and want more impact, scour the thrift shops for vintage dresses and cut and hem them into unique cocktail napkins, says dvGreen's Venokur.Water: Look for bottled water that comes in biodegradable water bottles. BIOTA spring water in bottles made from corn was offered backstage at the Academy Awards (www.biotaspringwater.com).Wine: Serve local wine or, if unavailable, organic or biodynamic wines that don't use harmful chemicals during farming. New York wine expert Michael Green suggests several good and affordable biodynamic wines including Chateau Maris "Minervos" 2003 from France (about $10), Badger Mountain Syrah 2002 from Washington's Columbia Valley (about $13) and Frey Biodynamic Zinfandel from California (about $17).Glasses: "Where possible, use glassware, things that can be washed and reused," advises McRandle. "You can rent them from a catering service if you don't have them." Throwing a bridal shower for 20 champagne sippers? McRandle suggests buying the glass champagne flutes and then giving them to guests as gifts or donating them to charity.When greening your next party, choose one or two areas to go eco and build on the results. "Greening parties is a process," says New Leaf's Feldman. "Don't do it all at once. I'd rather have someone ease into it. Doing a little goes a long way."

IREJN is Connecticut's Interfaith Power and Light. Visit us at www.irejn.org.

Rockin' in the Green World

Rock bands are increasingly greening their tours, with the help of organizations like Reverb, a consulting firm, according to the New York Times.

The organization, based in Portland, Me., was founded in 2004 by Adam Gardner, a guitarist for the indie rock band Guster, and his wife, Lauren Sullivan, who worked for the Rainforest Action Network. Reverb charges acts a fee for its consulting services and is also sponsored by green companies and other fund-raisers.

A prominent for-profit organization in the field is MusicMatters, a marketing company in Minneapolis. It works with environment-minded clients, produces events and consults with artists like the Dave Matthews Band and Jack Johnson on a wide range of green touring practices, down to the use of nonpetroleum-based cosmetics onstage.
“We like to consider ourselves an eco-SWAT team,” said Mr. Gardner, 33, explaining Reverb’s approach. Indeed, under its stern eye, promoters are shamed into ditching Styrofoam coffee cups from catering spreads backstage, and crew members are instructed to collect partially spent nine-volt batteries from musicians’ distortion boxes and wireless microphones.

IREJN is Connecticut's Interfaith Power and Light. Visit us at www.irejn.org.

Dell: Plant a Tree, Dude

Dell Computers, the company who brought us the "Dell Dude," is pitching a new idea: asking consumers to donate $2 for every notebook computer purchase and $6 for every desktop PC. The money would be given to the Conservation Fund and the Carbonfund, two nonprofit groups that promote ways to reduce or offset carbon emissions, to buy and plant trees. Dell also challenged other PC vendors to provide free recycling of used computer equipment.

Dell currently offers free recycling of its computers.
Read more in the New York Times.

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I left my food scraps in San Francisco

That bottle of California Merlot you quaff at a San Francisco eatery may very well have been fertilized by food waste from a meal you ate at the same restaurant a few years ago. Since 1997, over 2000 San Francisco restaurants have joined a composting program that provides them with a discount on their trash hauling bill. These restaurants are getting a head start on complying with a legislative deadline. The city has mandated that 75 percent of its garbage must be recycled or composted by 2010. Read and listen to the story on NPR's Day to Day.

The worms turn

Plain old composting is so 20th century. Today's organic gardeners are increasingly turning to worm farms to recycle their food waste into black gold. Makes a unique gift. Check them out at http://worms.vinfo-help.com/

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Cradle-to-Grave Environmentalism

A new green burial movement is gaining momentum. Burial without metal caskets, vaults, or embalming has been practiced in Britain for a decade. Will this novel method of recycling catch on in the US? Listen to the NPR story here.

Is that your auto exhaust, or are you cooking fries?

Philly-based "Fry-O-Diesel" plans on recycling restaurant grease and turning it into useable fuel. They have perfected the technique and are now gearing up to produce a whole lot more fuel. Listen to the NPR story.