Conservation 101: the Compete to Conserve Blog

Saying Goodbye (for now)

Tim — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 17:10:44 +0000

The Compete to Conserve team would like to thank you for participating on our Beta site and for sharing your feedback! We’re currently refocusing our efforts, and this includes a massive overhaul of the website. Effective immediately, we will be closing CompeteToConserve.com. We are working hard to bring you a new and improved service to help you track and reduce your personal consumption. We think you’ll like it and hope to see you around when we launch.

If you have any questions or if you need access to anything you’ve posted on CompeteToConserve.com, let us know by emailing info at competetoconserve.com.

Thanks again for your support. We’ll see you around real soon!

- The CtoC team

Community Guidelines What we are Compete To Conserve is a growing community...
Welcome to Compete to Conserve As founder and CEO of Compete to Conserve, I’d like...
Paperless: The Wave of the Future At Compete to Conserve we are challenging ourselves to be...

Paperless: The Wave of the Future

Cris Dobbins — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 23:06:34 +0000

At Compete to Conserve we are challenging ourselves to be a paperless business. As an internet based company, with staff all over the place, we are on our computers all day. Keeping digital files makes sense, plus it does not require any extra energy use since our computers are usually on.

I first realized that we could run an almost-paperless business when my office printer broke about a month ago. Instead of fixing it, I looked at is as a blessing and used it as an opportunity to re-train myself. To be completely honest with you, I haven’t missed my printer at all.(Well, almost never, I did need my friend to print out some movie tickets the other day)

Transitioning to paperless was easy considering all the choices we have with today’s technology. It’s sooooo, last year to use paper. For example, we(CtoC team) started exchanging information by passing flash drives back and forth. We also us Google Docs much more to share and edit documents between us. We are rarely in the same room, though when we get together we still use digital formats. It helps that we are all nerds and feel much more comfortable with our computers in front of us. Laptops make a much better shield then a piece on paper.

Join us and challenge yourself and others to go paperless or simply join the conversation with our community.

Go paperless on all billing

Green your office

Create your own challenge

Paperless or Less Paper? photo credit: House Of Sims Heralded as the epitome...
New Year, New You, New Planet A New Year = a New Chance to Set Sustainability...
Archives Do not edit this page...

Slow Down & See Your Town Competition Rules

Cris Dobbins — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 20:58:26 +0000

Slow Down & See Your Town

Compete to Conserve challenges you to slow down and discover your community. What are you missing as you quickly dive through your neighborhood? When you slow and take a walk what will you discover?

Walk to work, run an errand, or simply stroll through your neighborhood and see what you discover. Take a photo of something you see along the way and share your photo here or tell us the story of your experience.

Lets create more sustainable lives for ourselves by really connecting with the community around us. We might even make some new friends along the way.

The most inspired submission will win our Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag.

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN, AND ANY PURCHASE DOES NOT INCREASE YOUR CHANCES OF WINNING. Submitting an entry constitutes your full and unconditional agreement to and acceptance of these Contest Rules and the decisions of Compete to Conserve Dot Com, Inc. (“Compete to Conserve®” or “Compete to Conserve”), which shall be final and binding on all matters relating to this Contest.

To enter the contest on www.competetoconserve.com (the “Website”), submit an original entry in the form of simple text, or a digital image of the entry in any medium in the form of a .jpg, .gif, .png that does not exceed (150) kb in size. Multiple entries into the Contest are allowed, however each separate entry requires that you submit a different and original idea as part of that entry into the Contest. Compete to Conserve reserves the right to reprint or republish all entries. By submitting an entry, you are granting Compete to Conserve the right to reprint or republish that entry, along with your name information contained within the Website, online or in print. See Compete to Conserve’s Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions http://www.competetoconserve.com/page/privacy_policy and http://www.competetoconserve.com/page/terms_of_service for complete details.

This Contest begins January 23, 2009 and ends February 28, 2009 and is open to all legal residents of he United States age 18 and older, except employees, agents, or representatives of Compete to Conserve Dot Com, Inc. and Foundation for Energy Conservation, or any of their parents, subsidiaries, sister companies, or affiliates, or any member of their immediate family. Prizes are not redeemable for cash and must be accepted as awarded.

Entries must be submitted to the “Slow Down & See Your Town” competition page, http://www.competetoconserve.com/competition/view/16/slow-down-see-your-town , no later than 11:59 p.m. Pacific Standard Time on February 23, 2009 (the “Deadline”). All entries must be received by the Deadline to be eligible to win a prize. Entries received by telephone, fax, courier or personal delivery will not be accepted. Entries that are lost, late, misdirected, garbled, or incompletely received, for any reason, including by reason of hardware, software, browser, or network failure, malfunction, congestion, or incompatibility at the Website or elsewhere, will not be eligible. Compete to Conserve will not be responsible for any printing or typographical errors in any materials associated with the Contest. Compete to Conserve, in its sole discretion, reserves the right to disqualify any person tampering with the entry process, the operation of the website, or otherwise in violation of the rules.

Compete to Conserve will choose one (1) winner from all entrants who have submitted an entry prior to the Deadline and subject to the terms and conditions contained herein. The winner shall be chosen by Compete to Conserve’s panel of judges at their sole discretion based upon which entrants display the most (i) original, (ii) authentic and (iii) creative idea expression. All decisions are final. Compete to Conserve reserves the right to change the contest rules. Any entries or submissions which depict or glorify lewd, obscene, vulgar or profane behavior, or which utilize lewd, obscene, vulgar or profane language, either as part of the submission or as the name of the submission, may be disqualified at the sole discretion of Compete to Conserve.

The winner will receive:

1. One Re-Useable bag made from recycled materials

2. One Compete to Conserve baseball hat

3. One .6LT Re-Useable SIGG water bottle

4. Six Water Saving Faucet Aerators 1 Shower Shut-Off Valve

5. Hot Water Gauge

6. 60 watt soft white CFL light bulbs

7. 32 FL. OZ. bottle of Lucky Earth Waterless Car Wash.

8. 16 FL. OZ. bottle of Mrs. Meyer’s Clean Day Countertop Spray

9. One Energizer Rechargeable Compact Battery Charger with re- chargeable batteries.

The approximate retail value of this prize is $125.00. The winner will be informed via email at the email address submitted by the winner at registration on the Website. To claim a prize, the winner should follow the instructions contained in the notification. Compete to Conserve reserves the right to republish the winning entry with the winner’s name and profile image on the Website at any time in any location on the Website. ALL FEDERAL, STATE AND LOCAL TAXES ASSOCIATED WITH THE RECEIPT OR USE OF ANY PRICES ARE THE SOLE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE WINNER.

All entries must be original and you agree to defend, hold harmless and indemnify Compete to Conserve, its respective parents, affiliates, subsidiaries, divisions, advertising and promotion agencies, or any respective officers, directors, employees, partners or agents from any of these entities, against any and all claims of alleged or actual infringement of any intellectual property rights, proprietary rights, rights of privacy and publicity, moral rights and rights of attribution raised by third parties against Compete to Conserve in connection with your entry. Compete to Conserve, its respective parents, affiliates, subsidiaries, divisions, advertising and promotion agencies, or the respective officers, directors, employees, partners, or agents of the forgoing (collectively, the “Released Parties”) are not responsible for (i) any injury, losses or damages of any kind resulting from participation in this Contest or acceptance, possession or use of the any prize; or (ii) any warranty, representation or guarantee express or implied, in fact or in law, relative to any prize, including but not limited to its quality, mechanical condition or fitness.

If for any reason the Contest is not capable of running as planned, including infection by computer virus, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, force majeure, fraud or technical failures, which corrupt or affect the administration, security, fairness, integrity, or proper conduct of this Contest, Compete to Conserve reserves the right at its sole discretion, to cancel, terminate, modify or suspend the Contest, and judge entries from among all eligible, non-suspect entries received prior to such action. Released Parties assume no responsibility for any error, omission, interruption, deletion, defect, delay in operation or transmission, communications line failure, theft or destruction or unauthorized access to, or alteration of, entries. Released Parties are not responsible for any problems or technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer on-line systems, servers, or providers, computer equipment software, failure of any e-mail or entry to be received by Compete to Conserve on account of technical problems or traffic congestion on the Internet or at any Website, or any combination thereof, including any injury or damage to participant’s or any other person’s computer related to or resulting from participation or downloading any materials in this Contest.

The Contest and these Official Rules will be governed, construed and interpreted under the laws of the United States of America, State of California. The Contest and all accompanying materials are copyright 2008 Compete to Conserve Dot Com, Inc. All rights reserved.

Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition Rules This year we challenge you to celebrate the holidays...
Give More & Use Less: Enter Our Holiday Competition Do you believe “giving more” isn’t the same thing...
Slow Food Nation Aims for Zero Waste [caption id="attachment_702" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Slow Food Nation '08 in San...

People, Not Politics, Shall Inherit the Earth

craig — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 10:47:02 +0000

photo credit: wili_hybrid

Hiram Warren Johnson, California’s governor between 1911 and 1917, championed for the State’s initiative, referendum and recall laws. Johnson served as the leader of the nation’s Progressive movement until August 6, 1945, the same day the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

In the past 20 years, Johnson’s legacy extended to the rise and fall of California’s 25th Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird, the State’s love/hate relationship with the death penalty, the decision to make English the official language of California, and the recall of Governor Joseph Graham “Gray” Davis, Jr. in 2003. Most recently, Johnson and the Progressive movement established the framework for Proposition 8.

Whether or not you liked Governor Davis, in many ways the decision to recall him from office revealed an unfortunate flaw in California’s political system. At its core and without getting into the substantive issues, Proposition 8 showed the nation just how antiquated and dangerous California’s proposition system can be. In an earlier posting on this Website, I questioned whether California had outgrown its operating instructions. Now, I wonder if California can sustain itself and still hold tight to the 100-year old system that still houses its progressive ideals.

The principles of progressivism — the desire to remove corruption and undue influence from government, the desire to include more people in politics, and the idea that government plays a critical role in solving social inequities — are just as important today as they were during Hiram Johnson’s leadership. The rising population of California, however (3,426,861 in 1920 and an estimated 38,000,000 in 2010), may render these noble causes obsolete.

At Compete to Conserve, we’ve been working hard since last year’s launch continually to improve our website while staying the course, eco-wise. Well into the first month of the new year, we have been challenging our community to think hard about doing more, getting involved, and being more green. We want our members to understand that everyone can make small changes every day that add up to create real impact, and we like to remind everyone that you don’t have to be an environmentalist to save energy and natural resources.

In today’s political climate, it is important to know that individual actions really do make a difference, especially when some of the traditional notions of progressivism seem to falter as our population grows. That’s why we like to remind ourselves that people, not politics, will inherit the earth. These same people — our community — can work together toward the goal of a sustainable 2009.

Weekly Green Round-Up: Politics and The Environment photo credit: Mannequin- In the spirit of the fast-approaching...
Proposition 8 Underscores California’s Struggle to Achieve Sustainability photo credit: AlbySpace California’s Proposition 8 is wrong. While...
The iPhone May Destroy Civilization…Or Not photo credit: pedroelnegro [ in love with dark side...

New Year, New You, New Planet

Cris Dobbins — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 20:35:26 +0000

A New Year = a New Chance to Set Sustainability Goals

Have you been thinking about doing more, getting involved, and being more green? Thanks to involved Compete to Conserve members like you, everyone can make small changes every day that add up to create real impact. You don’t have to be an environmentalist or an expert — just someone who cares.

Here are new year’s resolutions you can join in our Challenges section to make a difference in 2009:

Julie New Year’s Resolution: Support the Community where I live (patron local businesses, buy locally made products, invest in organizations promoting what helps my ‘hood, etc.)

Cris New Year’s Resolution: Get involved in my local green organizations. Plant some trees. Clean up some beaches…etc…

Mickipedia New Year’s Resolution: Start composting in 2009.

Read Anne’s 12 week story, “My Urban Compost Odyssey” from her personal challenge separate and Green bin my organic waste in the kitchen

Up for a New Sustainability Competition?

Join our new Competition Challenge yourself to keep 5 sustainability resolutions for 2009!

We invite you to post your “green” resolutions in our new competition and then join new challenges to support your resolutions throughout the new year. With your support and involvement, Compete to Conserve can help even more people reduce, reuse, and recycle in 2009.

Here’s to a healthy, happy, and sustainable new year!

The Secret to Lowering Your Dry-Cleaning Bill and Saving the Planet photo credit: TheeErin Here’s something the dry cleaning industry...
Paperless: The Wave of the Future At Compete to Conserve we are challenging ourselves to be...
Give More & Use Less: Enter Our Holiday Competition Do you believe “giving more” isn’t the same thing...

Give less and you shall receive

micki — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 00:13:44 +0000

The holiday season has come to a close and so has the Compete to Conserve Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition. We were really impressed with the ideas our members shared for how to have a more sustainable holiday season. Entries ranged from making reindeer ornaments out of wine corks to adopting families in need to sharing a little technical know-how by backing up loved ones’ data.

The winner is gcrush whose entry warmed our hearts by reminding us what the holiday season is really about: spending time with people you love and sharing yourself with them. Here are some of gcrush’s ideas to Give More by Giving Less:

Spend quality time with your lover.

A gift of time and love goes a lot farther and longer than any purchase.

Be present (that’s a present all in itself).

Love had you like never loved before!

This is our give more by giving less, and we like to spread this all year long! - georgette (and shone)

We couldn’t agree more, Georgette! We’re happy to welcome you to the Compete to Conserve community.

Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag $125.00 value

As the winner of our Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition, gcrush will receive our Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag! Way to go, gcrush!

For your chance to win prizes, check our Competition page where we regularly post new contests for our members!

Give More & Use Less: Enter Our Holiday Competition Do you believe “giving more” isn’t the same thing...
Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition Rules This year we challenge you to celebrate the holidays...
Weekly Green Round-Up: A Green Holiday Season photo credit: krisdecurtis Our weekly round-up is back -...

Give More & Use Less: Enter Our Holiday Competition

anne — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 02:20:04 +0000

Do you believe “giving more” isn’t the same thing as “buying more”? Are you planning to celebrate the holidays in a way that won’t tax your wallet — or the planet? Well, now is your time to shine! Because from now until Monday, January 5, 2009,* Compete to Conserve invites you to enter our first annual holiday competition: “Give More & Use Less.”

Share Your Ideas for a Green Holiday Season

Post photos, videos, or a simple written entry on our official competition page: http://www.competetoconserve.com/competition/view/14/coming-soon-give-more-and-use-less-holiday-competition

One Grand Prize Winner Will Receive Our Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag, Which Includes:

• One reuseable bag made from recycled materials

Share your ideas to win our Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag (valued at $125).

• One Compete to Conserve baseball hat

• One .6-liter reuseable SIGG water bottle

• Six water-saving faucet aerators

• One shower shut-off valve

• One hot-water gauge

• Four 60-watt soft white CFLs

• One 32-ounce bottle of Lucky Earth Waterless Car Wash

• One 16-oune bottle of Mrs. Meyer’s Clean Day Countertop Spray

• One Energizer rechargeable compact battery charger with rechargeable batteries

How Will You Use Less?

There are lots of opportunities to use less during the holiday season, whether it’s hosting a party, giving gifts, decorating, or simply sharing time with family and friends. Tell the Compete to Conserve community what you’re doing, and you can inspire others — as well as win a bounty of green prizes to start your new year right.

* Be sure to post your entry by 11:59 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time to be entered to win our Ultimate Green Your House Gift Bag.

Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition Rules This year we challenge you to celebrate the holidays...
Give less and you shall receive The holiday season has come to a close and so...
Have a Heifer-ific Holiday photo credit: thadman With the “slide” toward the holidays...

Give More & Use Less Holiday Competition Rules

Cris Dobbins — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:03:42 +0000

This year we challenge you to celebrate the holidays and conserve our planet’s natural resources. Share with us the creative ways that you will give more and use less this holiday season, in any way, for any holiday. The most inspired submission on “greener” giving will win our Ultimate “Green Your House” gift bag.

Green Your House Gift Bag

To enter the contest on www.competetoconserve.com (the “Website”), submit an original entry in the form of simple text, or a digital image of the entry in any medium in the form of a .jpg, .gif, .png that does not exceed five (150) kb in size. You can use video format by pasting the video’s embed code into the video entry format box. Multiple entries into the Contest are allowed, however each separate entry requires that you submit a different and original idea as part of that entry into the Contest. Compete to Conserve reserves the right to reprint or republish all entries. By submitting an entry, you are granting Compete to Conserve the right to reprint or republish that entry, along with your name information contained within the Website, online or in print. See Compete to Conserve’s Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions http://www.competetoconserve.com/page/privacy_policy and http://www.competetoconserve.com/page/terms_of_service for complete details.

This Contest begins December 15, 2008 and ends January 5, 2009 and is open to all legal residents of he United States age 18 and older, except employees, agents, or representatives of Compete to Conserve Dot Com, Inc. and Foundation for Energy Conservation, or any of their parents, subsidiaries, sister companies, or affiliates, or any member of their immediate family. Prizes are not redeemable for cash and must be accepted as awarded.

Entries must be submitted to the “Give More & Use Less” competition page, http://www.competetoconserve.com/competition/view/14/coming-soon-give-more-and-use-less-holiday-competition , no later than 11:59 p.m. Pacific Standard Time on January 5, 2009 (the “Deadline”). All entries must be received by the Deadline to be eligible to win a prize. Entries received by telephone, fax, courier or personal delivery will not be accepted. Entries that are lost, late, misdirected, garbled, or incompletely received, for any reason, including by reason of hardware, software, browser, or network failure, malfunction, congestion, or incompatibility at the Website or elsewhere, will not be eligible. Compete to Conserve will not be responsible for any printing or typographical errors in any materials associated with the Contest. Compete to Conserve, in its sole discretion, reserves the right to disqualify any person tampering with the entry process, the operation of the website, or otherwise in violation of the rules.

The winner will receive:

1. One Re-Useable bag made from recycled materials

2. One Compete to Conserve baseball hat

3. One .6LT Re-Useable SIGG water bottle

4. Six Water Saving Faucet Aerators 1 Shower Shut-Off Valve

5. Hot Water Gauge

6. 60 watt soft white CFL light bulbs

7. 32 FL. OZ. bottle of Lucky Earth Waterless Car Wash.

8. 16 FL. OZ. bottle of Mrs. Meyer’s Clean Day Countertop Spray

9. One Energizer Rechargeable Compact Battery Charger with re-chargeable batteries.

Slow Down & See Your Town Competition Rules Slow Down & See Your Town Compete to Conserve...
Give More & Use Less: Enter Our Holiday Competition Do you believe “giving more” isn’t the same thing...
“How Trashy Are You?” Challenge Got something at home you almost threw away but decided...

Update: Lead, Trash, High Cost Killing Last California Condors

anne — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:55:13 +0000

photo credit: Velo Steve

In August, we wrote about a California Audubon report that said lead poisoning from spent hunting ammunition is killing the last California condors — birds that, thanks to two decades of human intervention, were brought back from the brink of extinction. The report also noted that this costly recovery effort is unrealistic and unsustainable unless lead is banned from hunting ammunition.

Now the Los Angeles Times reports that: “A ban on hunting with lead ammunition within the California condor’s 2,385-square-mile range will be expanded to prohibit its use in the shooting of small nuisance animals [such as squirrels and rabbits].”

Good News for California Condors

The majestic birds with wingspans up to 9 1/2 feet are scavengers, like vultures, which means they ingest lead while eating the carcasses of hunted animals and gut piles.

The California Condor Preservation Act had already banned lead ammunition from hunting large games such as deer and antelope (presumably an easier sell to hunters because people don’t want to ingest lead from game they’ve hunted either). This will be the first time the act applies to small animals, which are more likely to be left behind, and thus more likely to be eaten by California condors.

Read the complete story at: http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-me-condors4-2008dec04,0,1706424.story

Lead, Trash, High Cost Killing Last California Condors photo credit: apert Thanks to enormous human intervention and...
Giant Plastic Trash Continent [caption id="attachment_640" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Image courtesy VBS.tv's excellent 12-part video...
Green Cinematic Happenings - UPDATE For those of you who read Green Cinematic Happenings Coming...

Welcoming the Rise of the “Green” Phoenix

craig — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 07:34:33 +0000

photo credit: waving at you

Compete to Conserve finished some improvements and opened its doors a little wider this week, as the prospect of greening the nation’s economy seemed to grow somewhat bleaker because of the current crisis.

Many religions and cultures throughout antiquity had a slightly different spin on the idea of self-renewal and self-regeneration, especially in desperate times. We like to keep things simple, so let’s just say we’re looking for some lemons to make lemonade.

The nation’s economy has seen better days. Stuck in the middle of a mortgage crisis, an insurance crisis, a credit crisis, a stock market free fall, and an estimated 500,000 individuals joining the ranks of unemployed last month, most of us would embrace some good financial news.

Now is the ideal time for a greener economy to rise out of the ashes of the financial crisis, paving the road toward sustainability on all fronts. Some argue that “biomimicry” — nature inspiring design — can offer an economic model to save our economy. Academia across the nation is calling for an entirely new economic model, and some argue “[t]he wreckage of an unsustainable financial system could turn out to be the best catalyst for a more sustainable alternative.”

Without arguing the cause or solution, it seems like financial recovery may take some time. Well we have good news at Compete to Conserve, because we have some time. We believe that you don’t have to be an environmentalist or an expert to conserve resources, and our website is designed to help you make small everyday changes that add up to create real impact.

Since our July 22 launch, we’ve been working hard to improve our website while staying the course, eco-wise. If you haven’t been around lately, please take a look. Sign up if you like and we can, collectively, work on making a daily difference. We can let that mythological bird make the statement.

Green Cinematic Happenings Coming Your Way Environmental issues took center stage in Hollywood when Al Gore’s AN...
Israeli Red and Green: Balancing War in the Middle East with Global Sustainability photo credit: naama Two years ago last month Israel...
Weekly Green Round-Up: A Green Holiday Season photo credit: krisdecurtis Our weekly round-up is back -...