World water day was March 22th and to honor it, why not talk about bottled water and it’s impact on this planet. From the same people who brought you “The Story of Stuff” here is “The Story of Bottled Water”

The international observance of World Water Day is an initiative that grew out of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro.

The United Nations General Assembly designated 22 March of each year as the World Day for Water by adopting a resolution.This world day for water was to be observed starting in 1993, in conformity with the recommendations of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development contained in chapter 18 (Fresh Water Resources) of Agenda 21.

States were invited to devote the Day to implement the UN recommendations and set up concrete activities as deemed appropriate in the national context.

The Subcommittee welcomes the assistance offered by IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre to contribute to an information network centre in support of the observance of the Day by Governments, as required.

The project, which would have connected Tampa and Orlando with high-speed trains, was rejected by Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican. He said he didn’t want to obligate the state to pay for what could be expensive operating costs for the line. However, the Florida Department of Transportation on Wednesday released a study showing the line connecting Tampa to Orlando would have had an operating surplus in 2015, its first year of operation.
-The Wall Street Journal

It that time of the year once again where people all over the world will come together to show their support for our planet. For one hour, everyone should switch off all lights and electronic devices. For one our, we should all contribute in this movement for change.

It’s not complicated. First you get with a bunch of your buddies and you choose one or more things you all like to do. Second, once you reach earth hour, you switch off all lights and electronic devices in your home and just light up some candles. Then enjoy the moment! It’s quite amazing the fun you can have without consuming energy. I particularly like the board game called Settlers of Catan. Check it out and maybe you can try it for yourself for this year’s earth hour. And if you’re not a big fan of board games, get someone to play some tunes on the acoustic guitar bonfire style!

This Earth Hour, let your support for clean energy shine by switching off your lights from 8:30 to 9:30 pm on Saturday, March 26. Pledge your support at www.EarthHourCanada.org

Here at talkgreen, we like to showcase eco friendly things that are “Rockin”. People don’t like boring stuff and boring doesn’t bring change. The car you see in the pictures is called the Vermot AG Veritas RS III Roadster Hybrid and it’s nothing close to boring. This little thing looks like it can literally rip pieces out of the pavement and it’s powered by a V10 delivering 507-horsepower. But wait a minute… this blog is supposed to be about the environment… and you’re probably asking yourself how can a big V10 be anywhere close to environmentally friendly. The answer lies in between the front axles.

You got it. A 105 kW motor mounted between the front axles gives the car an extra 93 HP and will bring you from 0 to 60 in no more than 3.1 seconds with a top speed of 205 mph.

A few more eco technical details… A Kinectic Energy Recovery System (KERS) is used to refill the batteries under braking and the electric motor powers the front wheels which makes the car all-wheel-drive. Vermot says the Veritas has a range of 31 miles on electric power alone.

An even greater facts is that the company is planning to introduce a fully electric version by 2013.

[Source] Translogic

Here at Talkgreen, we strongly believe in riding your bike as often as possible to get to your destinations. Since we are such big fans of city biking, we though it would be very appropriate to show you the following videos. It features riders competing in the Valparaíso Downhill in Chile. If you thought the downhill races in the mountains were crazy, just wait until you see this one.

More videos after the jump.

Although I was never a big fan of the car-sharing companies such as the one featured in this video, I’m more and more keen on the idea and I have to admit that if well organized and structured it can be very useful. This is specially true for people living in downtown urban areas. The main concern is accessibility. What I mean by this is if you have to walk half an hour to get to one of theses car, it takes away from the functionality aspect. On the other hand, if you can get to one in less then 5 or 10 minutes and you don’t need a car to go to work, then it becomes a plausible idea to not have a car and to use one from the car-sharing business whenever you need it.

As a guy who likes to go outside of the city on a regular basis for outdoors activities such as Snowboarding or cross-country skiing, owning a car is not even a question. But sharing one car for the household (girlfriend and I) and using one from the car-sharing company whenever the extra car is needed would be something to consider.

2,400 to 3,000 sheets per person per year. That’s how many sheets of paper towels we humans use every year. The impact… 3,000 tons of paper towel waste every day in the United-States alone. In more details, 17 trees are cut down and 20,000 gallons of water is consumed for every thousand tons. That is HUGE when you think about it. It’s only a little sheet of paper you say every time you rip one away from its roll.

To fight for this cause, PeopleTowels and Inhabitat came together and launched the Stop the Paper Towels! Design Contest. Basically, they are asking competitors to design something that will open people’s eyes on the situation and encourage the world to cut paper towel waste. The winner will have it’s design printed on a 9×9 inches 100% organic, Fair Trade cotton hand towel plus $500 and 10% royalties on every towel sold.

Click here for more details.

To add to what I posted earlier (A world made of glass presented by Corning), here is a real life preview of a transparent LCD display by Samsung. One thing that I should specify here is the LCD display is actually powered by nothing more than ambient light. With its 46-inch display, 1920 x 1080 resolution and ten-finger touchscreen capability, this is the coolest computer screen I have ever seen!

[Source] Engadget

Imagine a world where everything that surrounds you is made of glass. But not the usual kind. This glass is interactive and tactile in a way that you could think of it as a giant iPad. This could be part of a more eco conscious future reducing our use of paper to almost nothing. If you pay attention to the details in this video, you will see that the waste reduction is not only limited to paper. Right at the beginning, you see the house windows changing shades to allow the sun to come through. This means no more need for blinds or curtains. When the guy operates the stove, you see that there is no more need for switches, buttons or other analog controls. This may not seam like much, but put all those little things together and you get big results. Also, glass is very clean compared to plastic or other petroleum based compounds.

On an economic standpoint, we could see a boom in the advertising market. New ways of connecting with customers and in the process, a new shopping experience. In fact, there is a wide variety of jobs that would be created to support all this glass display infrastructure. From the worker putting it together to the one installing the system and everything in between.

To sum it up, this would really be the world at our fingertips.

As you can see we made the content wider so we can fit bigger pictures. It’s also less crowded and so giving you readers a better experience. Now that we are almost done with redesigning, it’s time for us to get back to writing. We hope you enjoy the new Talkgreen!