The Good Human

How To Seal Air Leaks In Your Home And Save Energy

Guest Author — Wed, 16 May 2012 13:30:23 +0000

Air leaks in your home can drastically increase energy consumption. Sealing air leaks is therefore one of the first things you should think of if you want to lower the carbon footprint of your home. A professional energy audit is the gold standard when it comes to dealing with air leaks, but by following this article you can detect and seal the most obvious leaks – the same air leaks that leaves the largest footprints in your energy bills.

Depressurizing

To be able to detect and seal air leaks in your home, you house needs to be depressurized. This is best done on a windy and cold day, but don’t necessarily need those weather conditions to work. Follow the following simple procedure to do this:

Switch off furnaces, ovens, air-conditioners, or similar devices.
Make sure that every window and door in your house is completely closed.
The last step is to provide some airflow outwards from the home by using either an exhaust fan or a dryer. If this is not possible, use a large fan in an open window to push air from the house and out this window that will create suction.

The point of these steps is to either generate an airflow out or in from the house. Since the windows and doors are closed the air has go to through leaks, which we can detect using one of the methods below:

Detecting Air Leaks

There are several ways that can be used to find air leaks, but I would recommend using the incense stick method. This is the most reliable way and this is usually how professional energy auditors assess air leakage also.

When you hold the incense stick close to a place where you suspect an air leak, the smoking coming of the top of the incense stick will either be sucked into the leak or pushed away from it (depending on if you push air into or outwards from the house).

These are some of the most typical places you should check for air leaks:

Around the moldings of windows and door
Holes that are used for any type of wiring, plumbing or gas pipes.
Places where wood and brick meet.

Sealing the Leaks – Weatherstripping and Caulking

Now that you have walked around in your home, looked for air leaks on both the inside and outside, carefully noted them, it’s time to seal the air leaks. Weatherstripping is a technique that is used to seal air leaks that is great for most doors and windows, or other places where there is some form of opening/closing.

Caulking refers to a method that should be used seal cracks and gaps around framework of windows and doors, baseboards, or seal joints in certain types of piping. Silicon is often used.

If you are unsure on how to seal air leaks, drop by a retailer store that sells weatherstripping and caulking equipment and ask them for advice for the particular air leaks you want to seal. Not only will sealing the leaks reduce your energy costs, but also help sheltering your home from outside noise, bugs, dusts and moisture.

The cost of following the above guide to detecting and sealing air leaks (including the incense stick, weatherstripping and caulking material that needs to be bought) is minimal compared to what you can potentially save in the long term. That being said, if you can afford a professional energy audit and have them seal the leaks they find, the long-term gains can be even greater.

Guest article by Mathias, founder of EnergyInformative.org, a site where you can learn more about saving money by increasing energy efficiency in your house, as well as solar, wind and geothermal power. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons

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LEED: The Infographic

David Quilty — Wed, 16 May 2012 00:02:03 +0000

LEED: The Infographic takes a look at LEED Certification which provides third-party certification of the environmental health of homes and buildings. LEED was created by the U.S. Green Building Council in 1998 and it provides a verification for both builders and building owners that their projects meet certain levels of sustainability standards decided on by LEED committees. Take a look:

The Bauhaus – more at ArchDaily.com

The Walmartization of America

David Quilty — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:30:56 +0000

“But it’s so cheap!” That’s the rationalization used by millions of consumers for spending a good chunk of their time wandering aimlessly around the lifeless aisles full of plastic goods at the country’s largest retailer, Walmart.

Whether for food (yuck), bathroom towels, clothing, or lawn ornaments, Walmart is the giant catchall for cheaply made products shipped from around the world and sold to American shoppers. When price is the bottom line, you can’t expect to get quality; instead, you get what you pay for. And what you are paying for is sweatshop labor, underage factory workers, poor treatment of product manufacturers, toxic materials, and a general lack of concern about anything other than massive profits.

Shoppers can pretend there is nothing bad behind the blue and yellow shiny-faced facade that Walmart has so carefully constructed, yet it’s what they don’t see in the well-stocked megastores that should frighten them. Earlier this year, The New York Times reported that Walmart was involved in bribery and a coverup in Mexico regarding the construction and operation of their stores. And that’s only the most recent story; there has been no shortage of negative news coming out about Walmart over the years. A small sampling, if you will:

Furniture sold at Walmart was made from wood illegally logged in protected habitats. They promised to stop selling products using the wood, but not until 2013.
In 2009, Walmart settled with the federal government on charges that it broke child labor laws.
The company is staunchly anti-union, leaving workers unprotected sometimes helpless.
Having Walmart in your neighborhood isn’t a good thing. According to Business News Daily, “research shows that the negative impact is due to the use of the Walmart business model. A new ‘generic’ grocery store does not equal economic harm, but a new Walmart does.”
Employees are only offered part-time hours so that the company can avoid paying benefits to them.
One of their Supercenter stores uses the same amount of energy as 1,095 U.S. homes do in just one day.
Employees that do get more than part-time hours are encouraged to get publicly-funded healthcare because it saves Walmart money. In Massachusetts, this cost taxpayers nearly $9 million in 2009.
In 2010, Walmart paid $27.6 million to settle charges in California that it violated environmental laws in the storing and disposing of hazardous materials.
They once sued an employee who was hit by a truck and suffered severe brain damage; they wanted the money she spent on her healthcare back from her, even though she had paid for company insurance.
The company avoids avoids an estimated $300 million a year in state corporate income tax payments by deducting rent payments made to itself.

What Can You Do To Help Stop The Walmartization of America?

Shop elsewhere. Spend your money locally, if you can, and if not shop at other retailers. Where you spend your money does count.
Watch the documentary Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices. It’s available on Netflix.
Buy solid goods that will last a long time instead of the cheap, poorly-made ones sold at Walmart.
Think with your heart and your wallet. Realize that behind the scenes, there are real live humans being taken advantage of.
Buy American made if you can.
Cheap = bad. There is no reason why we should be comfortable paying $.99 for a hamburger at McDonald’s nor paying $3 for a cotton t-shirt at Walmart. The labor alone in these products should be worth more than that, so who is getting the shaft in exchange for the cheap prices? That’s right – the laborers.

There are many things in life more important than money, two of them being the welfare of our fellow humans and the health of our environment. Is saving a few dollars worth hurting another person? Worth harming the environment? Too often, the rationale behind shopping at Walmart is a need to save money; yet some of those same people using that rationale pay for 200 cable channels on TV and drink $4 specialty coffee drinks at Starbucks. Where is the need to save money when it comes to those things?

I don’t want my money to go towards taking advantage of other people or contributing to environmental degradation when I can help it. Avoiding Walmart is a simple way for me to try to do this. Many other companies exhibit the same types of behavior, of course, but Walmart’s overall footprint is so big that they have a massive influence on everything – and I don’t want any part of it.

Walmart’s slogan is “Save Money, Live Better” but from where I stand, there are many people worse off because of their corporate ethos. There’s no yellow smiley face for them. Make a difference; take a stand and do your shopping elsewhere.

Image Credit: Walmart Movie

The Fair Trade Your Supermarket Campaign

David Quilty — Sun, 13 May 2012 13:30:17 +0000

Q: What is the Fair Trade Your Supermarket campaign?

A project of the non-profit Green America, the “Fair Trade Your Supermarket” campaign aims to empower consumers to advocate for more Fair Trade products on store shelves at their local supermarkets. Fair trade is a system of exchange that honors producers, communities and the environment by ensuring that farmers and artisans throughout the developing world are paid fair prices for their work and have direct involvement in the marketplace. The goal of the wider Fair Trade movement, according to Green America, is to build real and lasting relationships between producers in developing countries and businesses and consumers around the world.

And that’s where your neighborhood grocer comes in. “While the Fair Trade movement is gaining steam nationwide, most of our supermarkets still carry few–if any–Fair Trade products on their shelves,” reports Green America. “Together, we can put Fair Trade products within reach for millions of Americans.”

And just how does Green America expect us to do this? “First, take stock of Fair Trade products in your supermarket—look for coffee, tea, chocolate, rice, sugar, honey, wine, fresh fruit, and olive oil.” Scan the relevant aisles for third-party certifier Fair Trade USA’s distinctive black-and-white “Fair Trade Certified” label, which is only attached to imported goods where the producers receive fair prices for their products and where strict socio-economic and environmental criteria are met during production. Alternatively, look for the logos of other third-party certifiers such as “Fair for Life” or “Fair Trade Federation” on product labels if you think fair trade versions may be available in a given product line.

“Then, you can encourage the store to stock more Fair Trade products by talking to the store manager as a loyal customer,” adds Green America. They suggest using comment cards, which can be key to getting a store with no Fair Trade items to start carrying them. “Every time you go grocery shopping, drop a comment card in the box asking your manager to stock Fair Trade items.” Of course, talking to a store manager about the fair trade your supermarket campaign may be even more effective, especially if you are armed with a pile of your receipts from the store from the previous month or two to show how much spending power you alone would be able to allocate toward Fair Trade versions of the items you are buying there.

Another creative way to spread the Fair Trade gospel would be by volunteering to hand out free samples of Fair Trade products that the store already sells in order to raise awareness and build consumer demand. “Stores sell more of a product when a sampling table is set out, and if you, your friends and family are working the table, the labor is free for the store too.”

But why stop with your local market? If there is a chain supermarket outlet in your area, take it to the top by writing an e-mail, letter or postcard to corporate headquarters informing them of your desire to buy Fair Trade items in all of their stores. Check out the Fair Trade Your Supermarket website (link below) for more tips on how to make your next shopping trip fairer to the planet and its people.

CONTACTS: Fair Trade Your Supermarket; Green America; Fair Trade USA.

EarthTalk is written and edited by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss and is a registered trademark of E The Environmental Magazine (www.emagazine.com). Send questions to: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Subscribe: www.emagazine.com/subscribe; Free Trial Issue: www.emagazine.com/trial.

Green News For The Weekend Volume 261

David Quilty — Fri, 11 May 2012 13:30:50 +0000

A collection of green news from the past week..

Obama, on marriage between same-sex partners: “I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.” Thank you President Obama. It’s about time we as a nation step into the 21st century and evolve.

New billboards designed by the Heartland Institute compare climate scientists to the Unabomber, and other mass murderers. Climate scientists and other writers respond.

The politics of our current food system have effectively marginalized millions of workers. On one hand, struggling small and mid-sized farms face elimination. On the other hand, labor rights for the people that grow, sell, cook and serve our food are often abused and ignored. According to Joann Lo, Executive Director of the Food Chain Workers Alliance, 7 out of 10 worst paying jobs in the U.S. are within the food industry. To complicate matters, food justice for these workers is often tied to immigration issues.

Potty humor just got prehistoric. A new study suggests that dinosaurs may have helped keep an already overheated world warmer with their flatulence and burps 200 million years ago.

Small island nations are often painted as the victims when it comes to climate change, and for good reason. They’re the most vulnerable to sea level rise, and many have few options when it comes to internally relocating coastal residents. But, determined to play a role in deciding their fate, a group of small island countries have banded together to make their own energy use sustainable.

Lawyers for an environmental activist who disrupted an oil and gas auction for land near Utah’s national parks say the protest drew attention to parcels that shouldn’t have been for sale.

Inexpensive and Natural Acne Cures

David Quilty — Thu, 10 May 2012 13:30:20 +0000

When fighting a battle against acne, too often doctors immediately prescribe toxic drugs in an attempt to placate their patients. In addition to being toxic, some of these anti-acne drugs have been implicated in suicide attempts by users. Is this the best we can do when trying to deal with acne and other skin issues? Hand out drugs that may not just harm you but may also kill you? Thankfully it is not, as there are many inexpensive and food-based natural acne cures that may just do the trick for you, sparing you from toxic ingredients and chancy meds.

While not everything will work for everyone, chances are that you will be able to find a natural acne cure using just ingredients you may already have in your cupboard or refrigerator. Check them out:

Natural Acne Cures

Oatmeal
Honey
Olives
Olive Oil
Egg Whites
Brewer’s Yeast
Tomatoes
Cinnamon
Lemon Juice
Yogurt
Tea Tree Oil
Baking Soda
Garlic
Aloe Vera
Mint Juice

I am not a health expert and I am certainly not a dermatologist. Let’s make sure no one thinks otherwise! But in doing some research online, I found that there are plenty of ways that people are reducing or eliminating their acne using only natural foods and ingredients. These ingredients are either applied directly to acne, mixed together to create pastes, diluted with water to make face washes, or turned into natural masks one can make at home to combat acne.

It’s up to you to take charge of your health and skin and determine what works best for you, but you can use these ingredients as a starting off point for tests and research. Before trying anything, I highly recommend you test your concoction on your wrist or some other inconspicuous location to test how it reacts with your skin. In addition to these natural ingredients, there are several other ways you can combat acne as well.

Other Ways to Fight Acne

Drink plenty of water
Eat more vegetables
Reduce daily intake of dairy
Use natural, organic, non-toxic face soap
Reduce or stop using makeup. If you must use makeup, try a natural makeup
Avoid sunburns and all-day sun exposure by using a safe sunscreen. I use Badger SPF 30
Wash your hair regularly
Keep your hair out of your face
Wash your sheets and pillowcases more often
Stick to a Paelo diet

However you choose to deal with your acne, I would advise doing everything you can to try to find natural acne cures before resorting to toxic prescriptions. What’s the use of working so hard to get clear, healthy skin if you are going to just pump yourself full of chemicals? Acne can be a very difficult condition to deal with, but with some research and testing you may just be able to use a natural acne cure that is safe for you and for the planet. Use prescriptions as a last resort and try out some of these cures first!

Natural homemade organic facial masks of honey image from BigStock

How to Build a Solar Clothes Dryer

David Quilty — Tue, 08 May 2012 13:30:00 +0000

Were you thinking I was going to tell you how to build something different? Like, say, an off-grid yet electricity-powered clothes dryer that runs off a bank of solar panels on the roof? Guess again. Clothes dryers use so much energy to dry your clothes that there isn’t even an Energy Star rating for them; they just guzzle enery. There is no way of getting around that when you use a dryer you plug into the wall or into a gas line you burn a ton of fossil fuel. However, you can build a solar clothes dryer that uses no energy and releases no carbon emissions; it’s called a clothesline.

How to Build a Solar Clothes Dryer

You can hang dry your clothes inside the house, hanging them from a ceiling fan or throwing them over the bathroom shower curtain rod. You can string a line across your kitchen or garage. You can buy a drying rack that folds up neatly and fits in the closet when not in use. Outdoors, you can hang your items from a tree, a railing, your balcony, or an actual clothesline. I use a clothesline, as you can see here:

When I lived in New Mexico, I used an edge of my yard fence, some old rope I found in the car, and a 6 foot downed tree limb I lugged home from the forest to make my clothesline. Here, I didn’t have to do that as someone a long time ago was smart enough to put up two poles and string some line between them. There is no excuse to not have a clothesline of some sort to dry your clothes on, unless you live in one of these communities trying to outlaw outdoor clotheslines. Why do this instead of using an energy-hogging dryer? Here are a few reasons from my list 10 reasons why you should line dry your clothes:

Reduces energy use
Saves money on your utility bill
Saves money by not forcing you to buy a dryer
Less wear and tear on clothing
No waiting around at the laundromat for the dryer to finish
Clothes smell better
The sun acts like bleach, making your whites brighter

A Challenge

So this weekend I have a project for you – Build yourself a solar clothes dryer that you can use all summer. If you are so inclined, once you are done send me a picture of it and I will publish it on the site to inspire others. What have you got to lose? A few hours and a few bucks? That’s a small price to pay for everything that you, and our planet, will gain by you going solar when you can. Good luck!

A 3-Minute Journey Through The Last 250 Years Of Our Climate History

David Quilty — Mon, 07 May 2012 21:36:58 +0000

Welcome to the Anthropocene is a 3-minute journey through how one species (clue: it’s us) has change the planet. It takes place through the last 250 years of our history, from the start of the Industrial Revolution to the Rio+20 Summit.

The film charts the growth of humanity into a global force on an equivalent scale to major geological processes and helps to better understand humanity’s geographic imprint.

Check out the video:

The film was commissioned by the Planet Under Pressure conference, a major international conference focusing on global climate solutions.

What’s the Agenda for the Rio+20 Conference?

David Quilty — Sun, 06 May 2012 13:30:04 +0000

Q: I understand there is to be another Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June 2012, 20 years since the last one was held in the same city. What’s on the agenda this time?

According to the United Nations, the so-called “Rio+20 Conference”—officially the UN Conference on Sustainable Development—is a new attempt in a new millennium to “lay the foundations of a world of prosperity, peace and sustainability.” The event will take place June 20-22, the 20th anniversary of 1992’s United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD)—the “Rio Earth Summit”—and the 10th anniversary of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg.

The main agenda items will be reviewing the progress and difficulties associated with moving towards sustainability, assessing responses to the newly emerging challenges faced by our societies, and strengthening political commitments to sustainable development. Underlying themes include finding ways to leverage the green economy to foster sustainable development and poverty eradication, and setting up an effective institutional framework for future global sustainable development initiatives. Delegates from the 200+ nations and thousands of private and nonprofit sector attendees will focus on sustainable cities, decent jobs, food security and sustainable agriculture, energy, oceans, and disaster readiness.

To the World Resources Institute (WRI), a Washington, DC-based think tank devoted to sustainability issues, Rio+20 is important as it forces the world’s nations to “review progress on and reaffirm a global commitment to the policies designed to foster economic growth that is both inclusive and respects the planet’s limited carrying capacity.” WRI adds that amid a global recession, a widening gap between rich and poor and heightened competition for energy, food and other natural resources, the conference couldn’t be timelier but “unfortunately, no clear vision for Rio+20 has emerged, and expectations…remain low.”

But conference participants are busy preparing. The Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future (SFSF), a network of non-governmental participants, is busy developing the Global Transition 2012 Initiative, which will lay out specific recommendations culled from organizations and thought leaders around the world.

“A goal of the initiative is to achieve an outcome from Rio+20 that catalyses a ‘Global Transition’ to an economy that maximizes well-being, operates within environmental limits and is capable of coping and adapting to global environmental change,” reports the SFSF. “The Global Transition 2012 initiative will propose focused and accessible goals, targets and policy interventions that will chart a clear route towards the greening of the global economy, and the achievement of social and economic justice.”

Rio+20 participants hope this event will be remembered as an historic occasion when nations of the world aligned behind the cause of staving off global environmental catastrophe. But the more likely outcome is a few non-binding agreements that will soon be forgotten by constituents, the media and even many of the participating countries. Not since 1987’s Montreal Protocol to phase out ozone-depleting chemicals have nations of the world been able to come together in a significant way to address specific environmental ills. And without any binding agreements already on the table, Rio+20 doesn’t look to dazzle either.

CONTACTS: UNCSD; SFSF; WRI.

Green News For The Weekend Volume 260

David Quilty — Fri, 04 May 2012 13:30:04 +0000

A collection of green news from the past week..

Last week I started as the staff writer over at Revmodo, a new clean-tech website. If you haven’t visited it yet, please take a minute and check it out. We’re going to be doing some cool stuff over there.

Opponents of genetically modified foods are making headway in California with a proposed ballot initiative that would require food companies to label many products containing such ingredients.

It’s not enough to look at just the amount of water available in a given area when assessing local water resources, according to Growing Blue. Water managers and urban planners also need to take into consideration the impact of human activities on those resources, and thanks to a new web tool, a more accurate water footprint can be calculated.

I cannot recommend the documentary Forks Over Knives enough to you guys. It has changed the way we eat here at my house.

Natural cereal brand Kashi made headlines in recent weeks after information about the company’s corporate ownership and use of genetically modified and pesticide-containing ingredients went viral in the social media space.

The changes to the 2013 Chevy Volt bring several welcome updates to an already-winning formula. The most notable, however, is the new EV Hold driving mode that joins the Normal, Sport, and Mountain modes. What does EV Hold do and when would it be useful?

Have a great weekend everyone!