You Can Be Eco Friendly

Why Won't The 100 MPG Vehicle Be Built?

2012-02-03T19:39:00.000-08:00

One Billion Dollars To Develop A 100 MPG Vehicle
Wow, that's a lot of money so I'm sure the big three will get right on developing 100 mpg vehicles. Or will they? The reasons why it might not happen. It really sounds good like a new X Prize for Fuel Efficiency. The last one was for ten million dollars and the vehicles that came out of it were not really something you could go down to your dealership and purchase.

The Reason These Vehicles Might Not Be Built

The cars could not be electric
The cars could not be Hybrid
The cars must be built in America by and American Incorporated Company
They must be mid size
The auto maker must sell 60,000 units to win the prize of one billion dollars

Why Is Dan Lungren Putting Forth This Bill
The bill is called the Excellence in Energy Efficiency Act known as HR 3872 which is the republican counterpoint to the democrats support for electric vehicles and hybrid technologies. I believe that this is an attempt to appear to be supporting some type of energy efficiency without really accomplishing anything significant. Now a 100 mpg car that sold sixty thousand units would be significant, I would love to see it and I would love to own one. I simply don't think that one billion dollars is enough to bring that vehicle to market successfully. I believe that we will get to one hundred mpg a lot faster through hybrid technology than simply gas technology? What do you think? Let me know in the comments? How much would you be willing to pay for a vehicle that gets 100 mpg?

New LED's For The City of Monterey Ca

2012-01-21T09:29:00.001-08:00

City of Monterey Ca Replacing Sodium Lights With LED's
Back in the 80's the new thing in energy efficiency was high pressure sodium lights for cities and municipalities looking to save money on a yearly electric bill that could run thousands of dollars depending on the number of lights they were running. Now for the City of Monterey Ca they are replacing those old school high pressure sodium lights with much higher efficiency LED lighting. This will be for all the street lights and the lights in the tunnels around Monterey. The city plans to change out about 1900 lights and fixtures because the new LED's won't go into the old fixtures. In the end this comes at a large cost, this project is costing about $900,000.00 which is pretty much about what a nice ocean view cottage runs in Monterey. But the upside is the change over to the high efficiency lights will save the City of Monterey about $100,000 a year annually. Now that's real money. So the loan they city gets to pay for the project will be paid back in about nine years and after that it's $100,000.00 in savings. The City of Monterey is going green to save some green. I'm sure with this experience and if it works out for them and the savings come they will be looking at other ways to go green and save money in city coffers during these times of spending cuts.
Antigua Style Street Lighting,
a photo by Rudy A. Girón on Flickr.

Sanyo Eneloop Rechargeable Batteries

2012-01-15T15:16:00.000-08:00

Sanyo Eneloop Rechargeable Batteries
The last post I wrote on battery chargers being regulated got me thinking about all the throwaway batteries we all use in our day to day lives. How many do you use? If you just think of the ones in your T.V. remotes and your alarm clocks and handheld games and computer mouse and keyboard that comes to a lot of batteries. mostly double A and Triple A. With a few 9 volts and D and C thrown in for good measure. The Sanyo Eneloop system is a way to get out of the go to Costco and buy the huge pack of batteries and use them until they are gone and then replace them. How do you recycle batteries again. I tell you I have to look at the website every time and I should have this down by now. With the Sanyo Eneloop rechargeable system you can buy a starter kit that comes with a charger and several different sizes of batteries. Then you can use them as they go dead you simply replace them in the charger and take out a new one. The batteries can be recharges as many as 1500 times before they need to be recycled that's a pretty good deal to me. Now this system is not cheap. But you are not buying a cheap throwaway item you are buying something that you will use over and over again. Then if the starter kit does not have enough batteries to supply all the things you need it for you can buy extra batteries that come all ready charged and they fit your charger when they run out as well. So I think this is a very good way to throw away a lot less hazardous material because how many people are out there recycling batteries. It's not as easy as putting it in the green bin every Friday morning with the cans and bottles for the truck to pick up. So until they make recycling batteries as easy as that this is a way around that. The only downside is the expense.

Your Charger Is Going Green

2012-01-13T18:36:00.000-08:00

Your iPad Charger Is Going Green
That's right your iPad charger is getting a greener makeover. Not just your iPad charger either every charger you have from your iPod to your cell phone from every brand to the Nintendo DS game system if you can get your kids to put them down long enough, to that rechargeable drill charger that's in the garage that he will never let you clean up. So basically everything that has a charging system will basically have that charger redesigned with a chip or switch inside so that when the drill, game system, phone, iPod, or iPad is charged the charger stops drawing power from the electrical grid. Go to your charger that's plugged into the wall now. The one with nothing plugged into it and feel how warm it is to the touch. That's all the power you are using when it's not charging your devices. I wonder how much that costs you. Now consider how many people are in the state of California who have rechargeable devices that are constantly plugged in but not charging. That's a lot of wasted power. This new law is coming down from The California Energy Commission starting in 2013. It will only be for consumer electronics like cell phones and things like that then in 2014 it will expand into chargers for businesses and then in 2015 expand again into industrial applications. Business groups say this will inevitibly cost consumers and consumer groups say that the savings will offset the costs and scientists say it's better for the environment. Hopefully we will all save a little energy and consumer groups will be right and we will save over the long haul.

Verizon $2 Fee To Pay Your Bill

2012-01-07T09:16:00.000-08:00

Verizon 2 Dollar Fee To Pay Your Bills Online
     Verizon came up with a fabulous plan hey let's charge people two dollars more per month to pay their bill online or over the phone. So the deal is this it's cheaper to get people to pay online then to send paper statements and pay for postage and all of the moving parts that go along with that. Think machines to open all the envelopes and if not machines then real people as opposed to just going into a bank account electronically. Not to mention that they have to buy the paper and the toner just to print the bill and send it out to you so you can pay it and then stick that bill either in your file cabinet forever or in your shredder. Nice waste of resources and money if you ask me.
Why Charge You To Pay Online
     Well, at some point they reaches a fairly large customer base probably the majority who does pay online so it's convenient and they don't need to file cabinet shredder etc. At that point Verizon is saying to themselves we have something here that everyone loves how to monetize it. Well, the customers will accept a 2 dollar charge for that convenience even though the convenience saves the company a ton of money.
Public Outcry
     The public outcry over the 2 dollar fee was swift and starting to look like it was going to cost Verizon some customers. I mean it was really looking bad kind of like the whole move your money day that hit the large banks after Bank of America was going to charge customers 5 dollars a month for using your debit card. I don't know what the final outcome of that fiasco was but let's just say that the Credit Unions had a green Christmas thanks to Bank of America's stupid move.
What to Do
     What can we do? Simple, just don't stand for charges like this on things that everyone does and actually makes costs to companies cheaper. That is a no brainer. I mean I can understand that fuel costs more so it costs more to deliver something but to charge for something that makes your business run cheaper is just stupid and counterproductive. These two example should show that it can actually hurt your bottom line as a company as well.
So when a company comes up with a bogus charge just to raise fees to raise fees that you disagree with set up a Facebook page and you will get some followers. Once you have your followers you will notice a core group then talk to this core group and come up with a plan of action. Like the move your money day. That was very simple very creative and everyone could do it and it hits the company swiftly and easily shows them the power of a small group of people who's idea resonates with a larger public that agrees with them. The Verizon case if it went too far could have been a thing like switch phone company day or something like that.

California Green CAV Decals Printed

2012-01-03T18:45:00.000-08:00

California Green CAV Decals Printed
California has printed up 40,000 Green decals for use by driver of CAV's and vehicles that meet California's Enhanced Technology Partial Zero Emission Vehicle Rules wow that was a mouthful. Most of these vehicles have not even been produced yet. In fact I believe the only one that has been commercially produced is the Nissan Leaf. The other model car that will be available to get this green sticker is the Toyota Prius Plug in model. A couple other features of this is that you will be getting a $2500.00 rebate from the state as well as this is a big one for a lot of people. Another plus for a lot of people is you get to ride in the carpool lane by yourself. These stickers and the rebates go away as soon as the forty thousand are gone, it's a way to get people to buy this new greener technology. So I am all for it. What do you think? Will you be one of the ones out there sporting a green sticker? Let me know in the comments what you think of this deal or are you still driving your original Prius and are going to drive it till the wheels fall off?

Get The Eco Fan

2012-01-02T14:56:00.000-08:00

Get The Eco Fan
The Eco Fan is a pretty unique little fan. It is a fan that you place on top of a wood stove or pellet stove. Then Eco Fan uses heat conductive technology to produce a small amount of electricity to power a fan. What the Eco Fan requires to work? Well it must be placed onto a hot surface more than 150 degrees F. So either a wood burning stove or pellet stove, they also make an Eco Fan for gas stoves. The Eco Fan must also be placed near the back of the stove or to the side so it can get some cool air at the back otherwise the it won't get the cold air that it needs. Because it needs both Hot at the base and Cool air at the top in order to create the right conditions to produce electricity to power the Eco Fan.
I first saw this fan in action at my nephews house when I went to see thier new baby and I just couldn't get over how simple and easy it was. It just sits on their wood stove top and when they build a fire next thing you know the fan blade starts turning as if by magic. So I have to know how it works of course so he explains the whole thing to me. It is a pretty amazing little fan. Not to mention ti blows the heat from the wood stove all around the room. So it really helps to conserve energy. I will be getting one of these soon.

Go Green With Kindle

2011-11-26T12:56:00.000-08:00

So does buying a Kindle Fire or E Reader let you live a greener life? After giving it much thought i think that is the case. I was a hard convert to the whole Kindle phenomenon myself. I am one of those people that loves the printed word in a paperback book that I got from a friend or bought from amazon or what ever. However when I borrowed a Kindle and saw how easy it was to buy books I started wondering how green this whole Kindle thing is. Just the fact that there wasnt' someone cutting down a tree then making paper with the pulp then actually printing words on that paper and binding it together and putting the whole contraption in a warehouse until I ordered it. Then after I ordered it putting it in the mail and delivering it too many by plane train and automobile so I could a few days later go out and see the man in the brown truck drop a box on my porch for a few dollars of shipping, this is much greener. Because if I ordered it that way I would then have to take that packaging and then throw it away or recycle it and start that whole process over then when I was done with the book I would have to find someone who wanted to read it to give it too. Or I would donate it to the library or somewhere else. Now with the Kindle I buy the book there is no paper and it's delivered electronically no printing no delivery cost no mail cost nothing just simple transactions. I'm pretty happy with it overall what do you all think? Do you see this as a green product or not? Am I just kidding myself?

Best Buy To Test Market Home Energy Products

2011-11-05T11:02:00.000-07:00

Best Buy To Market Home Energy Products
Best Buy announced that they will test market home energy products in three select stores in the near future. The stores for the pilot projects will be San Carlos Ca. Chicago Ill. and Houston Texas and if these stores are able to show customer interest and sales then the program will be expanded to other markets. I think this is a really great thing that Best Buy is doing. Mind you they are not doing it out of the kindness of their heart but to make a dollar and their is nothing wrong with that either.
What I think is great about this is the fact that such a large retailer with almost a cult following is testing out energy efficiency products. Not only will they be selling them but think about the last time you went to Best Buy say to buy a wireless modem someone was there to help you out and if you wanted to pay a little extra they would come to your house and set up your whole wireless network for you. I believe if this sales push goes national of these types of products and the support of how to use them and setting them up and installing them is their, then the energy savings and money savings will be automatic. So hopefully this push by Best Buy is successful.

Make Your Own Solar Panels

2011-10-15T14:40:00.000-07:00

Make Your Own Solar Panels
So your thinking about solar energy for your home and who isn't these days with the cost of electricity. Which is only going up year after year. Now you can go to one of the local solar provider installers in your area and get a quote probably in the neighborhood of 20-30,000.00 or more depending on your site and how much electricity you want to produce.
However if you are somewhat handy you can build your own panels for only a fraction of the cost. Simply using tools that you all ready have and construction materials you can get at your local home improvement store. So, if you want to see how you can make your own solar panels click the link. Then get to work and before you know it you will have a solar home. Let us know your results and send us some pictures of the final products here at You Can Be Eco Friendly

Keep That iPhone 4 and Save Some Green

2011-10-13T18:22:00.000-07:00

Keep That iPhone 4 and Save Some Green
The iPhone 4S is coming out this week and a lot of people have all ready signed up and will be lined up at the Apple Store to get theirs. It's our generations version of lining up for concert tickets I suppose. However you can save a little money by skipping every other generation of new phone model. Seriously remember when you were just tearing the packaging off of your new iPhone 4? How long ago was that? Not too long really if you think about it so you could save yourself some serious money not to mention space in the landfill and gas in your car etc. Just by skipping every other generation of new phone. Be it the iPhone or whatever phone you happen to like it works the same. Skip phone generations and you save a lot of money and a lot of packaging that just ends up somewhere in a landfill. These are some easy ways that you can be eco friendly.

Help Save Landreth Seed Company Heirloom Seeds at Risk

2011-09-04T20:25:00.000-07:00

D. Landreth Seed Company, an American company that has been around since 1784. 1784 Now think of your American History here the country was founded in 1776. So this company has been around for the entire time the United States has been around. What does D. Landreth Seed Company do? Well, they sell heirloom seeds. You know the kind that companies haven't patented the genes on so they grow bigger faster stronger etc. Just good old fashioned fruits and vegetables. Well it seems with the downturn in the economy that no one is ordering seeds or catalogs as often as they used too. So if you are interested in joining the fight to save this seed heirloom seed company. You can go to the hash tag on twitter #SaveLandreth or to the website to buy seeds or maybe a catalog at Landreth Seeds. I know some of you out there are gardeners or know someone who is. So if you are interested then please take this opportunity to show them your support.

Costume Exchange to Green Your Halloween

2011-09-03T11:59:00.000-07:00

Costume Exchange to Green Your Halloween
Your kids need a Halloween costume the scarier the better right. Or maybe not maybe just a cute bumble bee for your little one. But wait they have 4 Halloween costumes in their closet all ready. That occasionally they take out and play dress up. But, those don't fit the arms and legs are too small. Well, guess what so does every other kid in America. So mom's and dad's instead of buying new Halloween costumes why don't you get together with your friends and have a Halloween costume exchange.
Halloween Costume Exchange
What you do is meet at someones house with all your friends each family brings all their accumulation of Halloween costumes and then let the kids choose new to them costumes from the pile of their friends old costumes. Believe me they will be happy to have last years incredible hulk or princess and you will be happy to save $30.00 on a new costume. What do you all think of this idea? Try it out and let me know how it goes in the comment section. Hopefully you end up buying a lot fewer costumes this year.

Eco Garden Girls At West End Celebration

2011-08-28T08:33:00.000-07:00

Eco Garden Girls At The West End Celebration
Yesterday I attended the West End Celebration in Sand City Ca. One of the booths I stopped at was the Eco Garden Girls their product is simple yet unique and very green. You can check out their products at Eco Garden Girls on Facebook They work in an office that gets a lot of Styrofoam boxes in the mail. They were tired of throwing these boxes away, which are the size of those small ice chests, so they found a way to reuse them. They paint them on the outside fill the bottom with broken Styrofoam and the rest with dirt. Then they paint beautiful scenes on the front mostly fish or different designs and plant plants inside. So, you end up with a very unique beautiful planter that is made from a recycled product. The West End Celebration is a really great event where all the local artists open up their studio spaces and you get to see their finished products as well as the ones that or works in progress. I like seeing that whole process and they get a chance to explain it to you as only they can. Another thing the West End Celebration is known for is being green. They have a green philosophy about everything from people at the recycling / trash containers helping you decide what is reclyclable and what's trash to all the products they displayed from the many green companies around the area and the state. Along with the artists and green products they have 12 different live bands over 3 days and good food and beer or wine to go with. Today is your last chance to check it out until next year. Have fun.

Recycling Everything or As Much As You Can

2011-08-22T15:29:00.000-07:00

What Do You Recycle
What do you recycle? That's pretty simple right. We all recycle cans, bottles, and paper right? We should be anyway. But what else do you recycle? Most things are recyclable. From the computer monitor your looking at to the batteries in the keyboard your using right now it's all recyclable. Heck, even your cell phone. I know you have a few old ones laying around. However when we are done using these items there is not a truck that comes around and picks them up on the curb every weekend. So how do you recycle them? That's easy, What you need to do to recycle your E-Waste is save it until you go to a place where it's collected for recycling. The best way to do this is in a small Tupperware container say under your sink. When those batteries are dead throw em in. When that cell phone gets old and you want the new fangled model throw it in. So, the next time you go to your electronics retailer like Best Buy or Fry's they have a bin where you can drop all this stuff in. Not as good as a truck that picks it up weekly with the yard waste but good enough. Oh yeah don't forget that computer monitor taking up space in the garage. So tell me in the comments, what do you recycle?

Bike Commuting When You Can't Bike Commute

2011-08-15T20:03:00.000-07:00

Bike Commuting is the new thing and it helps the environment and the shape of our bodies but let's face it some people out there in America are facing 45 plus minute commutes. So how do you get past the idea of a 45 plus minute commute by car on your bike. Well, here's how if you live in a high traffic place the bike may actually be faster so the 45 minutes may cut it down to like only 30 minutes. What's that you say I can commute faster by bike than car? Yes, it can be done if you live in a high traffic city it can be done. Now the other extreme to that is you travel 45 minutes and it's all highway 65 miles an hour. There is no way you are going to be able to cut your commute by cycling to work and back. This is also for the person who just has that job where you can't just be sweaty for the day or your boss just isn't up with the times and doesn't have a shower installed at work yet. We will have to work on that. So for whatever reason you cannot commute on your bike so here is a plan for you. So what are you to do. Simple you don't bicycle commute. You simply look at a google map and draw a 5 mile radius around your house and simply ride your bike to anything you have to do in that circle. It really makes it pretty simple. You get to save a lot on gas and you get to stay in a lot better shape without going to the gym. Basically you skip the bicycle commute but every other trip becomes a bicycle trip. Pretty simple really. It will kind of make you consider do you really need to go clear across town for that item or can you get it closer to home. I think this is a great idea. What do you all think about it?

G Diapers The Future of Diapers

2011-08-13T19:27:00.000-07:00

G Diapers

G Diapers are a new and unique product in the diaper industry not quite a disposable but not quite a cloth diaper either. That has always been the question to parents right after is it going to be a girl or a boy?

Are you going to use cloth diapers or are you going to use disposable basically is are you going to be going to the extra trouble the not send all that extra waste to the landfill by using a cloth diaper. Then there is the thought of well the extra expense and water use of washing the cloth diapers is it really that much better? What is a parent to do you are kind of stuck either way. Now comes the G Diaper. It gives you the best of both worlds. Basically the G Diaper comes as a two part diaper the inner liner and the outer detachable cover. The inner liner is made of paper just like your normal disposable diaper and it's made to be thrown in the toilet and flushed into the sewer so you have no hazardous waste in the landfills. Then you have the outer plastic cover that comes in many colors and designs. The outer cover gets reused over and over and you simply buy G Diaper refills for the inner liners as you need them. I believe this G Diaper and the G Diaper refill system will make a significant impact on the amount of landfill space devoted to soiled disposable diapers. Not to mention the amount of water and the expense of having a diaper cleaning and delivery service. What do you think?

Vac From The Sea

2011-08-06T14:54:00.000-07:00

Electrolux Vac From The Sea
     Recently when The Electrolux vacuum company was having trouble sourcing recycled plastic at a good price in the marketplace they came up with an interesting and useful idea. Remember that big plastic wasteland the size of Texas floating in the ocean it's known as The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Well what if they took a boat out there and picked enough plastic up to make their vacuums. They would save all that money on buying plastic they would pull a bunch of trash out of the ocean and they would get PR literally by the boatload so to speak. So they get to go from this company that's a large user of plastic to someone who at least on the surface looks green. That's worth a lot in today's marketplace.
     So, what if this idea spread to other users of plastic that instead of making more we just sourced it out of the ocean. Now do I think we could get rid of the garbage patch. I don't know I almost think it could be self sustaining resource unfortunately as we use more plastic more goes into the ocean and we take it out to produce more things. Then those things go into the oceans in a cycle. Terrible thought isnt' it.
     This could start a whole new industry. Instead of Electrolux going into the ocean and picking up plastic or whatever company decided to do this next, there would actually be an industry that got built around best practices and the most efficient uses of technology and ships and crews. Then the price of getting this plastic would drop substantially and more of it would be used. Because who knows it might have cost Electrolux more to get the plastic then it was worth on the market but it was worth it from the PR side of things. So what company will be next. Who can you think of that uses large amounts of plastic that would love to have a cheaper supply and could use a dose of PR.
     Think of all this plastic as oil. Because when you break it all down it's oil. That's what we use to make plastic. We don't want it in the Ocean. It would be nice if it was in a fuel efficient vehicle but it's in the ocean instead we need to find a way to get it out. I think this is the beginning of a way and a reason. It just has to be economically viable to work.
     Can't you see the Craigslist add now? Large amount of recycled plastic you pick up.

Cyclist Friendly Vilnious Mayor Crushes Car With Tank To Clear Bike Lane

2011-08-02T18:48:00.000-07:00

Vilnious Mayor Zuokas has spent his time in office promoting cycling and other forms of alternative transportation. He has installed miles of bike lanes throughout the city only to see the citizens use them as parking lots. So he took matters into his own hands and crushed one of the cars with a tank. Then he posted the video on You Tube for all to see. I guess that is a warning to future bike lane parkers. Just give me a ticket please. How do you explain that one to the wife. Umm the car got crushed by a tank while I was at the store. Good luck with that.

What Does Eco Friendly Mean To You?

2011-07-31T06:32:00.000-07:00

What does Eco friendly mean to you? That's a good question and everyone has a different answer. Does it mean that you never use plastic bags and are always the carpool mom. Or does it mean that you always ride your bike. You don't own a car and wouldn't consider it. Those are two opposites and they are pretty far apart. Those too you's probably wouldn't hang out together over coffee. But, who knows your a nice person so maybe the two you's would. But the point of this is going Eco friendly can mean one thing to me and another to you and it's about doing what you can while still living your life. Because let's face it if you make it too hard then people won't do it. If they won't do it then they won't embrace it and get their friends to do it too. So whatever it means to you keep it up. Then try to get more people to do it. If you can't do that then just support businesses who are Eco friendly. It can be so many different things. Whether you recycle, reduce the stuff you buy or the packaging it comes in. Make sure the trash actually goes in the trash can and not on the curb to be blown to who knows where then into our water. All of these are being Eco friendly.
Going Green takes many forms
Living Eco friendly or going green takes so many forms. So one person may look down on another because hey they always use the paper bags at the grocery store and never bring their own. But in reality the truth is that person who uses the paper bags may grow a lot of his or her own vegetables so they don't have to use as many bags or trips to the store in the car. So it all goes back to what is being Eco friendly to you that fits in your lifestyle and that is not too hard to do or to expensive. Because if any of those things happen to hard to expensive doesn't fit in your life, then you won't do it and neither will the rest of the country or world.