| Reasons to buy local produce: fresher (doesn’t travel 1-2 weeks to get here); fewer/no preservatives or genetic modifications to extend freshness; save energy (local production takes 3-17% less oil); less packaging; support our local farmers and economy. |
A teenager from Ireland may have found a way to rescue our oceans from the growing plastic pollution problem.
A walk on the beach led Fionn Ferreira to develop his project on microplastic extraction from water for the annual Google Science Fair. The project won the grand prize of $50,000 in educational funding at this year’s event.
The 18-year-old said that while he was out on that walk in his coastal hometown of Ballydehob, he ran across a stone with oil and plastic stuck to it — something he says he’s become more aware of in recent years.
Read the rest of this fascinating article at This Irish teenager may have a solution for a plastic-free ocean.
So many of us don’t give a thought to avoiding the use of and/or recycling of paper. Which was once part of a tree. Here’s why I care:
According to the Univ. of Indiana, each ton (2000 pounds) of recycled paper can save 17 trees, 380 gallons of oil, three cubic yards of landfill space, 4000 kilowatts of energy, and 7000 gallons of water. This represents a 64% energy savings, a 58% water savings, and 60 pounds less of air pollution!
You’ve seen them, either in person or on TV–bursts of smoke and flame from oil and gas stacks. This process of “flaring” burns off wasted…wait for it…METHANE. Yes, they put hazardous, health-endangering methane into the air people breathe.
But doesn’t the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management oversee this to protect us? Yes and no. Soon possibly mainly no. Because that Department has proposed weakening what protections currently exist. Leaving the way open to more flaring, which means more methane into our air to poison it and increase the threat to life.
Read more about this and sign the petition to the Secretary of the Interior to urge him to oppose this proposal.
Car air fresheners are loaded with chemicals. Make your own. Attach a decorative piece of cloth to cardboard and cut into a pleasing shape or decorate it. Soak in any essential oil you like, and place in your car.
[For more easy, money-saving, earth-friendly tips, download a FREE copy of Green Riches: Help the Earth & Your Budget. Go to www.Smashwords.com/books/view/7000 or your favorite e-book seller and download to your computer or e-book device. Totally free, with no strings attached.]
Solar panels on the White House roof 35+ years ago? Yes, they were there. President Jimmy Carter installed them in June of 1979 at a cost of a mere $28,000 (a very small amount in the governmental budget). In addition to saving on utility bills, it was a symbol of our government’s attempt at getting our country away from depending so much on foreign oil.
President Ronald Reagan had the panels removed. He wanted to get rid of solar tax credits. Later, when it was suggested that they be put back up again, his press secretary Dale Petroskey said it would cost too much.
At least, though, in 2006 one panel found an appropriate home–at the Carter Library in Atlanta.
Happily, in 2013 President Obama had solar panels reinstalled.
No commentary from me…just a bit of sometimes-sunny American history.
Here’s a tasty way for you and the earth to chill out: Store refrigerated food in glass, which keeps the food colder longer. Use glass jars you would have discarded rather than oil-based plastic containers you’d buy. A bonus is that when those labels fall off you know what’s in the jar because you can see inside it.
[For more easy, money-saving, earth-friendly tips, download a FREE copy of Green Riches: Help the Earth & Your Budget. Go to www.Smashwords.com/books/view/7000, choose a format, and download to your computer or e-book device. Or download a free copy from your favorite e-book seller.]
Our ocean. It gives us beauty, fun, food, jobs, medicine, air, weather patterns, a place to think. In return, we give it pollution, beach erosion, and death to its inhabitants. But with our normal daily activities we can reverse this destructive human trend:
1) Lessen pollution by conserving water and guarding against oil and antifreeze running into the ocean. (The ocean gets more oil from car leaks than from large tanker spills.)
2) Avoid litter–cigarette butts tossed onto the street end up in the ocean, killing sea-life.
3) Ask questions before buying seafood. Was it farmed, thus depending on wild fish as its food source? Where was it farmed—inland, meaning that waste didn’t flow into the ocean? If wild, was it caught in such a way that didn’t also catch turtles, dolphins, and other life that was simply discarded? (For help, print a pocket guide from http://www.seafoodwatch.org/-/m/sfw/pdf/guides/mba-seafoodwatch-west-coast-guide.pdf?la=en.)
It’s not too late—yet—to start taking better care of our wonderful, watery friend.
My husband, who served two tours as a submarine sailor, fondly talks about his experiences with dolphins at sea: escorting the sub back into port and playfully doing jumps across the sub’s bow. We read stories about dolphins saving human lives, protecting them and leading people out of danger. I often wonder if these peaceful animals don’t have an ocean-full of lessons to teach us humans.
But we’re putting dolphins, whales, and fish in danger so we can easily search for new gas and oil deposits in the Atlantic. We blast areas with super-noisy air guns to get at deposits that are estimated to yield far less (some say nine times) than reserves off the coast of Alaska. These seismic blasts, 100,000 times more intense than a jet engine, can cause death and injury to those creatures. Meanwhile, the Navy’s use of sonar and explosives may, according to their own estimates, kill more than 200 marine mammals a year.
What the &%@#! are we doing?! Surely the great minds in government and science can find a better, non-harmful, less selfish way to co-exist on our planet.
Watch the Jodi Arias trial if you want; I’m keeping an eye on the BP Oil Spill (Gulf of Mexico) trial that started yesterday, almost three years after the incident. Will BP settle, which is the usual route, or go on with the trial? Will they win (probably not) or pay out a shipload of bucks? Will they mend their corporate ways?
I’ve read several articles on the topic. One that brought the situation into focus for me is by “Treehugger,” who does a blog on business and corporate responsibility. Click on http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/bp-oil-spill-trial-starts-today.html and check it out for yourself.