TreeHugger

On This Labor Day, Demand Safe Green Jobs, And Honor Those Who Work With Their Hands

Mon, 06 Sep 2010 09:46:00 -0500

29 dead miners in West Virginia and the 11 on the Deepwater Horizon platform in the Gulf. American labor used to make things and fix things, and used to be proud to do it, for a decent wage. ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

McKibben On Tour, Stops By New York to Inspire Letterman (Video)

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 02:40:04 -0500

photo via 350.org Big props to David Letterman for bringing on Bill McKibben earlier this week to talk to Letterman's 4 million nightly viewers about global climate change and Bill's 350.org project. 350.org has a savvy campaign to get the White House to put solar panels back on the roof after Ronald Reagen had them taken off in the 80s. Dave asked some sharp questions about nuclear power and political inaction, and Bill, as always, was ready with sharper answers that added some hope to the fight for an energy revolution. ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Like a Good Neighbor, the Clean Air Act is There

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 11:19:51 -0500

Clean Air Act has been the EPA's most effective tool for combating air pollution. When it was first enacted, the Clean Air Act only covered five pollutants. But over the last 40 years it has been amended to protect the public from dozens of additional dangerous pollutants. But air pollution doesn't stop at state lines, and as a result people throughout the country are forced to breathe unhealthy air. EPA's proposed Good Neighbor Rule will help states be good neigh]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

YouGoods Eco-Invention Contest Draws to a Close: Cast Your Vote for the Winner Today!

Sun, 29 Aug 2010 09:30:25 -0500

UncommonGoods' open design contest, looking for the next great eco-friendly invention. This week, the judges of the YouGoods contest, including TreeHugger founder Graham Hill, chose three finalists, based on the criteria that they be "unique, economical, and eco-friendly." Still in the running are: a reusable grocery bag with a built-in dry-erase shopping list, a double-wall t]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

James Cameron Hits the Amazon To Stop the Belo Monte Dam (Video)

Sat, 28 Aug 2010 19:38:40 -0500

Image Credit: broddi via Flickr In the months since "Avatar"struck major environmental themeswhile banking nearly $3 billion, James Cameron, an avid environmentalist, has been very busy. He's been bringing his celebrity to fight the oil and coal industries and Read the full story on TreeHugger

Join Extreme Athletes to Protect the 360°

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 17:57:29 -0500

Image courtesy of Protect the 360° "Climate change is real," BMX legend Dave Mirra says, "It affects everything from snow quality to quality of life." Indeed, as Protect the 360° explains, "climate change doesn't just mean warmer weather." Now, from skate parks to ski slopes, action-sports athletes and enthusiasts are banding together to make a difference—and you can join them.]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Boxsal, a Pretty Fun Picnic in a Cardboard Box (Photos)

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 03:35:41 -0500

Boxsal. It is basically a fashionable cardboard box with enough room to fit a bottle of wine, snacks, sandwiches and more. Boxsal comes with beautiful utensils, plates, cups and n]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Inspiring Film: Uniting Government Policy With Grassroots Action (Video)

Mon, 23 Aug 2010 08:18:35 -0500

Image credit: Low Carbon Communities Challenge Even conservatives cheered when one Transition Town received a huge Government check, and with good reason. As part of the massive Low Carbon Communities Challenge the idea, for once, was to explore how grassroots groups could work together with Government, rather than the usual false choice between either top-down or bottom-up approaches to sustainability. I've just come acr]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Join 350 EARTH: A Global Satellite Art Project

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 18:00:43 -0500

Image courtesy of 350.org We need help from artists—we need them to help with an artwork bigger than humans have ever built before, the first global-scale group show. It's going to be slightly wild, and very beautiful. Details in a moment, but first the rationale: Sometimes the work of artists is to remind us of things we've forgotten, things we know in our bones but that slip our minds.]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Don't Miss the Weekend Without Oil August 21 & 22!

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 12:55:00 -0500

DoSomething's Weekend Without Oil challenge. So sign the pledge! The Weekend Without Oil is this weekend - August 21 & 22 - and aims to educate teens and pe]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Oil Change International: It's Time To "Clean Up The Senate"

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 02:47:28 -0500

Majority Leader Harry Reid, the Senate's ringmaster (photo via flickr) As George Parker so thoughtfully detailed last week in is New Yorker story, the U.S. Senate has become a place that produces imperfect policy, when it does produce policy, and the rest of the time the members of the "World's Greatest Deliberative Body" are off raising money. One thing they are not doing is taking action on our dependance on dirty fossil fuels, which is why Oil Change International has launched CleanUptheSenate.com. ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Ask Pablo: Is Replacing Windows A Good Investment?

Tue, 17 Aug 2010 06:17:00 -0500

Image Source: TottoBG Dear Pablo: I am thinking about replacing my windows to cut back on my home's energy usage. Will this yield a good return on my investment or is my money better spent elsewhere? Most windows can be compared to a giant hole in your home's insulation. While a standard wall might have an R-Value (resistance to heat flow; higher is better) of 13-19+, a single-pane window is no better than 1. A gas-filled double-pane window can reach a R-Value of 3, or closer to 2 once t]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Extreme Athlete Tom Jones Paddleboards 1,500 Miles to Clean Up the Oceans

Sat, 14 Aug 2010 09:58:38 -0500

Image Courtesy of NY Daily News We've seen some pretty crazy stuff from stand-up paddlers recently, but challenge extreme athlete Tom Jones has been taking on for the last three months puts all other stunts to shame. Since May 13, Jones has been paddling 1,500 miles from Read the full story on TreeHugger

Honor and Serve Outdoors this September 11th

Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:25:24 -0500

The Sierra Club is excited to announce a new opportunity to participate in the growing youth-driven movement to engage in community service while also honoring those who defend our country every day. This week we launched Serve Outdoors, a call to participate in the September 11th National Day of Service and Remembr]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Can Twitter Change Chipotle's Paper Bag Usage?

Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:16:18 -0500

Image credit: Nesster/Flickr Jamming phone lines, fax machines or e-mail boxes with messages has been a key tactic ever since I first became an environmental activist. I remember one Senator telling me in 1994, before the internet existed as we know it today, before Facebook and Twitter and mass e-mails, that his staff was literally weighing the letters on a scale that we were sending from Sierra C]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Enter Your Eco-Invention for a Chance to Win $1,500 and More!

Wed, 11 Aug 2010 16:50:31 -0500

This innovative chair was last year's winner. Image courtesy of UncommonGoods "Where a new invention promises to be useful," Thomas Jefferson said, "it ought to be tried." To celebrate National Inventor's Month, UncommonGoods is offering an opportunity to put this idea to the test. YouGoods is an open design contest that calls on inventors and designers to submit their best idea for something that is practical, unique, and eco-friendly. Entrants have ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Design Students Create a Brighter Future: SRD Change 2010 Exhibition

Tue, 10 Aug 2010 12:43:31 -0500

(All images: SRD Change 2010) For the past seven years now the SRD (Society for Responsible Design) have held their Change design exhibition showing the latest graduate student thinking around environmentally and socially responsible design solutions. And this year it's on again. Right now. So, if you want to know where the fresh green thinking is imagining our world should be headed in the spheres of Architecture, Interiors, Industrial Design, Landscape, Fashion and Visual Communications, check it out, in the few day left until 15 August 2010.]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Tracking the Extinctions and Adaptations Around Us

Tue, 10 Aug 2010 12:12:26 -0500

Image credit: Wikimedia Commons The last great extinction occurred sixty five million years ago. You can visit the exact point on earth where it started, on the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico. The Chicxulub crater, more than 110 miles in diameter, was formed by the enormous impact of a meteor the size of San Francisco hitting the earth. Life on earth changed radically from that moment of impact.]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Vogue Fashion's Night Out Takes an Eco-Friendly Spin with Bike Helmet Design Contest

Tue, 10 Aug 2010 07:03:48 -0500

Image via Shicon. How do you interpret "Eco Fashion" style in your everyday life? Come up with the best graphic answer and you could win a piece of a €3,000-prize pot! Vogue and Fiat have launched a competition to design a bike helmet for the Fiat 500 folding bike, which fits in the truck of the 2-cylind]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Tell the Senate to Stop Stalling on Clean Energy

Mon, 09 Aug 2010 14:58:59 -0500

... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Ask Pablo: What Makes A Hotel "Green?"

Mon, 09 Aug 2010 07:13:00 -0500

Image Source: Alan Levine Dear Pablo: I am seeing more and more hotels claiming to be "green." What exactly makes a hotel green? Virtually every hotel these days has signs asking you to hang your towel if you want to use it again or leave it on the floor if you don't. This does not make it a green hotel though, it just makes common sense. According to Project Planet InterContinental Hotels estimates that it saves alm]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Deep in the Forest, an Eco-Fashion Exhibit Visually Links Textiles with the Environment (Photos)

Sun, 08 Aug 2010 06:47:31 -0500

'Portable Pelt' 2009 by Tara Baoth Mooney, one of the curators of CCANW's Fashion Footprints exhibition. Photo: Sean Michael In an effort to highlight the major social and environmental impacts of the fashion and textile industries, the Centre for Contemporary Art and the Natural World (CCANW) and graduates from the MA Fashion and the Environment at London College of Fashion present "Fashion Footprints: Sustainable Approaches," which opened this weekend at CCANW's Project Space, in the heart of Haldon Forest Park (Exeter, Devon, UK). The interact]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

As Pepsi's Refresh Challenge Rolls On, Green Causes Vie for Funding

Sat, 07 Aug 2010 16:33:41 -0500

Image Credit: PowerShift 2011 via Refresh Everything In January, we told you about Pepsi's Refresh Everything initiative, giving away $20 million in grants to individuals, businesses and non-profits that are working for change in six categories: health, arts and culture, food and shelter, the planet, neighborhoods, and education. The grants are awarded by popular vote: ev]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Massive Russian Seed Bank of Berries at Risk of Demolition

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 14:56:05 -0500

Photo: Pavlovsk Station, one of the world's first seed banks begun by Nikolai Vavilov in 1926. Vavilov personally collected seeds of over 200,000 plants (HuffPo) It could be a potentially devastating loss for global biodiversity: we've caught word over at Huffington Post that the world's largest collection of fruit and berries, housed in one of the world's oldest seed banks outside St. Petersburg, Russia may be demolished later this year for a housing ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Weekend Without Oil To Help Teens Reduce Consumption

Thu, 05 Aug 2010 11:31:00 -0500

Minus Oil series), so when we heard from DoSomething about their Weekend Without Oil it was as if the idea had been plucked straight from our heads. With a goal of getting teens to reduce their oil consumption, the Weekend Without Oil will be held August 21 & 22nd, so mark your calendar! Find out more about the Weekend Wit]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Training to Swim the English Channel: The Final Countdown

Wed, 04 Aug 2010 13:49:16 -0500

Photo via EarthWatch Guest blogger Caroline Chisholm, head of marketing and communications globally for Earthwatch Institute, a non-profit organization dedicated to a sustainable environment, is swimming the English Channel in August to raise funds for Earthwatch initiatives. There is nothing like a deadline to galvanize the mind. The final hurdle before attempting my English Channel crossing was the prospect of a marathon six hour qualifying swim. This presented two major challenges. Firstly, I've never spent more than two and a half hours in the sea. And even that]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

How to Turn a Toothbrush Into Gold

Tue, 03 Aug 2010 11:20:00 -0500

Image via Ellie Marie When I first started Terracycle, I spent a lot of my time explaining what upcycling was. It was this foreign concept whose name wasn't on a lot of people's radar. Now, a handful of years later, more than 10 million people are collecting the brand specific waste that we've used to make a range of products; it has become increasingly common and may some day be as conventional as recycling. Currently, several startups are building their busi]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Volcom Drives Jean Donation Program for the Homeless, Donate Yours Today!

Sun, 01 Aug 2010 07:19:43 -0500

Volcom. Last year, Volcom, in collaboration with the National Coalition for the Homeless, donated over 5,000 pairs of jeans to fifty homeless shelters nation-wide in a jean recycling program called, "Give Jeans a Chance." This year, the athletic apparel brand is back with 200 more participating Volcom stores in North America and hopes of collecting 10,000+ pairs of jeans. The campaig]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Enter the CoolClimate Art Contest and Offer Your Vision of a Cleaner Future

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 17:06:12 -0500

Image credit: CoolClimate Art Contest The Earth may be our home but disasters like oil spills and threats like deforestation and global warming mean that it might not be such a hospitable place for much longer. Still, in the face of these obvious problems, many people refuse to recognize the need for immediate action. the CoolClimate Art Contest is an opportunity to reach out to those who ignore the problem or Read the full story on TreeHugger

Foodprint, An "International Conversation about Food" Comes To Toronto

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 10:32:00 -0500

Sarah Rich (of Worldchanging fame) and Nicola Twilley (of Edible Geography) as a series of international conversations about food and the city....a truly cross-disciplinary discussion that explores the past, present, and future of food and the city." Sarah and Nicola have gathered a stellar list of local and international moderators and panelists for this year's event in Toronto, Canada. ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Residual Gurus Rock! Electronic Music Unplugged with Recycled Instruments (Video)

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 03:17:33 -0500

photo credit: © Xirriquiteula Teatre The five Barcelona-based Residual Gurus have decided to fight trash with comical roaming concerts, and are touring Europe at the moment. These talented musicians know how to transform rubbish into a spiritual performance that turns the street into a stimulating yet unpredictable haven. "Eastern rhythms, electronic sounds, original instruments, laughter, meditation and improvisation combine in an unrepeatable, collective ritual." The musical group Karam started the show Residual Gurus last year to raise awareness about our trash pro]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Win a Home Energy Monitor! Enter Our Sweepstakes with Microsoft Hohm

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 15:45:00 -0500

Image via Microsoft Hohm We're seeing a boost in partnerships between software and hardware companies when it comes to monitoring energy consumption at home. The latest partnership joins up Microsoft's Hohm, an online platform for managing energy use, and Blue Line, which offers a power monitor and Wifi unit that can now be combined to upload your home's energ]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Katie Alcott of Frank Water on Being an Insider Rebel Within The Bottled Water Industry (Interview)

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 08:29:42 -0500

All photos by author - taken at WOMAD 2010 festival Here's a frequent question asked by people wanting to create positive sustainable changes in the world: Is it more effective to work as a change agent from inside the current system or is it better to be an agitator shaking things up on the outside? Katie Alcott, founder of Frank Water, has wrestled with this question in her mission to raise awareness about the importance of safe drinking water and sanitation. Her decision to infiltrate t]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Top Green Fashion Designers Compete on the Catwalk for Charity (Video)

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 06:35:41 -0500

Behind the scenes with Samantha Pleet as she designs for the Do-Gooder Design Challenge. And by Catwalk we do literally mean "catwalk". Yesterday's News, makers of eco-friendly cat litter, made from recycled newspaper--hence the company']]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger

Join the Campaign to Recycle 1 Million Pounds of Batteries By October

Sat, 24 Jul 2010 08:00:00 -0500

photo: Call2Recycle The majority of the public is aware of the necessity of recycling or better, reducing the waste that you generate in the first place. And now Call2Recycle is campaigning to remind the American pubic about recycling rechargeable batteries so that they too can be diverted from the landfill. In fact, they are calling for the American public to recycle 1 million pounds o]]>... Read the full story on TreeHugger