Green Sexy

Packaging Gifts the Green Way

 Whether you meticulously peel off the tape or voraciously tear into your presents, piles of wrapping paper often times adorn people's living rooms during this holiday season.  If you've been making a habit of buying up rolls upon rolls of cute wrapping paper every year, just think of all the resources that go into making that wrapping paper---from trees to dyes, to electricity, fuel used in shipping, etc.---you could be doing the Earth harm while trying to bring happiness. 

So what can you do?  For one, reuse wrapping paper or gift bags that you had from the previous holiday season.  Heck, it seems like my family has been using the same wrapping paper and gift bags for years now, and no one seems to mind, since it's what's inside that is truly memorable.  The Guardian suggests that you use nice festively-colored shopping bags that you've gotten from stores as wrapping paper, or even cutting up old gift bags and using those to wrap with.  Another idea they put forth is using interesting magazine pictures or maps as wrapping paper.  The way some teens plaster their walls with pictures of their idols, this could be a fun way for a kid to wrap up a gift.  You could try wrapping your presents in sections of the paper that speak to the personality of the person who is receiving the gift---the sports section for the jock, the comics for the joker, the editorial section for the opinionated one, etc.  They also suggest using left over fabric, gift scarves, or clothing items from a thrift store to wrap your presents in.  A final innovative idea is to wrap your presents in aluminum foil, which will add a real shine and glimmer to your display and can be washed and reused to wrap holiday treats or leftovers in!

If using recycled materials as a means of packaging your gifts doesn't tickle your fancy, then there are some eco-friendly products that you can purchase to help decorate your gifts.  National Geographic's The Green Guide suggests Paporganics' hemp-blend wrap that is made from 90 percent post-consumer fiber with 10 percent hemp.  Paper Mojo makes gift wraps made from jute, lokta or banana fiber---that could impress as much as the gift itself!  For gift bags, you could go with Global Exchange's Native Leaf Gift Bags made in the Philippines using certified less-toxic dyes. Not only is Global Exchange a fair-trade organization, but they will also wrap any of its products in a 100 percent recycled box, tied with a raffia ribbon and accompany it with a recycled rice-paper greeting card for $3.95.  Recycled-fabric gift bags can be purchased from Patagonia.  To fill your gift bags, you could purchase white tissue paper made from 90 percent recycled paper and colored tissue made from 75 percent recycled fibers through Nashville Wraps.  

Well, hope you have a great holiday, and if you're anything like me, you'll have a nice, neatly-folded pile of used wrapping paper next to you, ready to be stored and reused next year! 

Green Workplace Survey

USA Today does these little graphs thingies at the bottom left corner of some of their sections, and today's graph was a pie chart about "Green workplace value".  Basically, the poll surveyed 2,774 college students, asking them "If you had two job offers and one company was 'green', would that have an impact on your decision?"  79% of students responded "Yes", while 21% responded "No". 

Now, this is kind of a vague question with a lot of variables to consider, but this highlights for me just how much environmental consciuosness consciousness has permeated the younger generation...Generation XYZ?  Anyway, everyone seems to be thinking more green than they used to.  Seems that companies could potentially benefit by going green because they will attract more environmentally-conscious prospective employees who would help save the company money by doing simple things such as shutting down computers, turning off lights, recycling paper, etc.

Well, hopefully polls like this will encourage workplaces to go green.

Is Walgreens the New WalMart?

Is it just me, or is there a new Walgreens popping up every two seconds?  Actually, for a while there, a new Walgreens was being opened every 17 hours!  EVERY 17 HOURS?!?  Just recently, as reported in the Chicago Tribune, the nation's largest drugstore chain has announced plans to slow down its seemingly unmitigated expansion and put its plans to take over the world on hold.  Now they'll only be opening a new store every 24 hours---that's down from the current 500 stores a year to a measly 365 stores a year!  How wonderful---that's a new Walgreens for every day of the year!  It's almost like having Christmas all year 'round!  Now, "144 million Americans live within two miles of a Walgreens drugstore, the company said, and 36 percent of the 6,297 existing Walgreens stores are less than 5 years old."  Geesh!  Is there even enough land in this country to accommodate so many new stores?  What is the environmental impact of this obscene expansion? 

This got me to thinking---is Walgreens the new Walmart?  For years I've been railing against Walmart for its practice of closing down existing stores to replace them with Supercenters, while leaving "some 28 million square feet of empty space today in communities across the country."  In 2002, former Walgreens CEO David Bernauer said of Walmart's expansion, "The more Wal-Mart builds, the better for us because every store they open kills two of our smaller competitors."  Ah, birds of a feather stick together as they kill two other birds with one stone, and that stone being unnecessary and wasteful expansion.  Sure, Walmart is a "big-box store" with a footprint of about 200,000 square feet, but its smaller kissing cousin Walgreens may not have the same size, but it shares the same heartbeat.  It's the "I know I'm the biggest retail chain in my category, but I will still steamroll the competition and the environment to become even bigger" mantra.  It's disturbing and disgusting.  Dr. Evil's got nothing on these guys.

Anyway, I haven't purchased anything from Walmart in over four years, and I do not plan to buy anything from Walgreens in the near future.   How about you?  Let's band together to stop Walgreens from taking over the world!

Travel Green This Summer!

You want to get away this summer, but you want to do so in the greenest way?  Bob Schildgen, an advice columnist for Sierra Magazine and author of Hey Mr. Green recommends that you "Don't drive a gas guzzler anywhere."  Instead, you could rent a smaller vehicle, perhaps even a hybrid car for your trip.  Renting a car may seem like an expensive option, but "You could come out ahead financially by saving all that money on gas even when you add in the cost of the rental car", says Schildgen.

Deron Lovaas of the Natural Resources Defense Council says that "Tuning (up) our car and inflating our tires are simple things people can do to save money and cut pollution."

Of the most common transportation options, which is the greenest?  According to the U.S. Department of Energy, trains are the most efficient, then cars and then planes. In addition to their efficiency, trains are a quaint throwback to an earlier era of travel.  When flying, fly nonstop because "Planes burn more fuel on takeoffs and landings than they do at cruising altitudes," according to energy experts. 

Some travel websites give customers the option to donate some money to a green organization to help offset the environmental impact of flying.  

Take this Sierra Club survey entitled "How Green Is My Getaway?" to find out which travel option is the greenest.

However you choose to travel this summer, do so within your means, have fun, and do what you can to be green!

Funny Comics About the Price of Gasoline

George Bush Did Not Leave His Heart In San Francisco

Brian McConnell and a group of friends thought it would be a fitting tribute to name a San Francisco area sewage treatment plant after outgoing President George W. Bush.  Thus, the Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco was formed, and 10, 000 signatures later, the measure to rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant has qualified for the November ballot.  Proponents of the measure cite President Bush's blunders, from the Iraq war to his handling of the economy, and the fact that we'll all be left to "clean up the mess".  Thus, the sewage plant renaming seems like a fitting move to many.

On one hand, passing this measure would really be a blow to President Bush's legacy and would be a tangible demonstration of the disgust of many an American over President Bush's ineptitude. 

On the other hand, this would just confirm a lot of people's opinions of San Franciscans as a bunch of wackie hippy liberals who do more "fighting of the man" than they do actually doing something of true worth.  Also, there are defenders of the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant who say that it, as an entity "is anything but a symbol of inadequacy", and that "Without it, raw sewage and storm water would flow into the bay and the oceans and the streets. That's not our understanding of what the authors of this initiative believe the current president has delivered."

How will San Franciscan voters respond to this measure?  No one knows, but from now on whenever I flush a toilet, I will be reminded of President Bush.  I guess it gives another meaning to the term "W." C.

Ansel Adams: An Artist & Conservationist

We all know Ansel Adams as a gifted photographer who is best known for his stunning black and white photographs of Yosemite National Park.  What you may not know is that Ansel Adams was also an ardent environmentalist and conservationist whose involvement in the Sierra Club furthered the success of that organization and of its environmental initiatives nationwide.   In 1919 at the age of 17, Ansel started off as custodian of the Sierra Club's headquarters in Yosemite National Park.  In 1928 he became Sierra Club's official trip photographer.  In 1930 Ansel became the assistant manager of Sierra Club's annual outing.  His artistic career was furthered when "his first photographs and writings were published in the Sierra Club Bulletin.  In 1934, Adams was elected as a member of the Board of Directors of the Sierra Club, a role he maintained for 37 years."  A volume of Ansel's photographs of the King's River region was instrumental in influencing the Interior Secretary and President Franklin Roosevelt to create Kings Canyon Park in 1940.  "In 1968 Adams was awarded the Conservation Service Award, the Interior Department's highest civilian honor" and "In 1980 Adams received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, for 'his efforts to preserve this country's wild and scenic areas, both on film and on earth.' "  So thanks to Ansel Adams, we can appreciate the beauty of nature in the pictures he took and in the parks he was instrumental in helping to create.      

Here's a beautiful excerpt from a letter Ansel wrote to a friend, as revealed on Ansel Adams American Experience on PBS: 

"A strange thing happened to me today. I saw a big thundercloud move down over Half Dome, and it was so big and clear and brilliant that it made me see many things that were drifting around inside of me; things that relate to those who are loved and those who are real friends. For the first time I know what love is; what friends are; and what art should be. Love is a seeking for a way of life; the way that cannot be followed alone; the resonance of all spiritual and physical things...Friendship is another form of love -- more passive perhaps, but full of the transmitting and acceptances of things like thunderclouds and grass and the clean granite of reality. Art is both love and friendship and understanding: the desire to give. It is not charity, which is the giving of things. It is more than kindness, which is the giving of self. It is both the taking and giving of beauty, the turning out to the light of the inner folds of the awareness of the spirit. It is a recreation on another plane of the realities of the world; the tragic and wonderful realities of earth and men, and of all the interrelations of these."

WALL-E: Disney Goes Green?

Okay.  I admit it.  I loved the Pixar movie WALL-E.  Yes, I'm aware that it's a Disney movie---the same evil company that, along with a handful of other corporations, largely controls the media we are exposed to in this country and around the world.  I usually try to eschew Disney movies like the plague, but that has become a task too difficult to achieve in the last few years because of the somewhat recent appearance of a handful of nieces. 

Anyway, WALL-E is a fantastic cautionary tale of how a careless and consumer-driven society can destroy the Earth, effectively burying it under tons of garbage and e-waste.  The opening scene of the movie is worth the price of admission alone.  The movie opens up with a far shot of the Earth from space, and then as it zooms in closer you see what you think are skyscrapers, but in reality, they are towers of garbage created by armies of Waste Allocation Load Lifter-Earth Class robots, or WALL-E, for short.  A Wal-Mart-esque company named BnL (for "Buy N Large") had effectively hijacked the world's consciousness, pushing its agenda of buying for the sake of buying.  BnL even had worked its way into the oval office (which is not a far cry from the influence that Wal-Mart has on Washington's "finest").  With such unchecked influence, humans became mass-consumers, and consequently, mass-wasters.  Eventually, Earth was evacuated by the BnL corporation because it had become a giant garbage dump.  The only thing left behind were the WALL-E robots and cockroaches. 

Another slam at American excess in this movie is the fact that, after 700+ years on the BnL spaceship they had originally evacuated on, humans have become morbidly obese, lazy, leisure-addicted slobs, who ride around in electronic recliners, while an army of servant robots wait on them.  These humans are plugged-in and tuned out, overstimulated and overfed---alive, but not really living their lives.  Sound like anyone you know?

I guess what I liked most about this movie is that it is an excellent commentary on our modern capitalistic consumer-driven society, and really makes us take a hard look at ourselves.  Trust me, I did not give away too much, so go see this movie!

Hot Eco-Friendly Cheerleaders!

So, now that I've got your attention...

The Philadelphia Eagles are releasing an eco-friendly 2008-2009 calendar featuring their 38 cheerleaders wearing swimsuits made from organic or recycled materials (such as plastic bottles) and other alternative textile sources such as bamboo.  This kind of exposure (pardon the pun) for sexy and ecologically-responsible swim wear could create a spike in sales for such items, which can't be a bad thing.  Oh yeah, the calendar is also printed on post-consumer recycled paper.

So guys, when your significant other voices objections to your Philadelphia Eagles cheerleader calendar that you hung up in your garage, just say that you're doing it for the environment. 

Now that's Green-Sexy!

5 Good Reasons Not To Shop At Wal-Mart

I did it---I stepped into a Wal-Mart for the first time in over four years!  Why did I break my solemn vow to avoid the blue beast?  Well, I was visiting my parents in Pennsylvania and my dad was freaking out because he had to use his government-issued Digital TV Converter Box Coupon by the end of July, so we promptly hopped in the car and drove to Best Buy.  Unfortunately, Best Buy was sold out of the converters, but my parents proclaimed that Wal-Mart would have it.

I could feel my throat tightening up as we pulled into the Wal-Mart lot.  My mind raced, desperately trying to come up with some excuse for why I couldn't enter the den of the Enemy.  In the end, like a dutiful son, I walked through the gates of hell with my parents.  Amazingly, I didn't burst into flames or fall to the ground in convulsions---no, I just pursed my lips in resignation and set my gaze hard against the lure of low, low prices. 

So, why am I so dead-set against Wal-Mart?  I'll give you 5 good reasons not to shop there:

1. Wal-Mart Supercenters increase traffic within your community.  According to the Institute of Traffic Engineers, "a 200,000 sq. ft. discount center on average results in 76,232 car trips per week (with the high end of the range being 92,806)."*  That in turn, would lead to further costs for the community (ie.- infrastructure repair and upkeep and environmental degredation)**.

2. Wal-Mart has closed hundreds of stores nationwide, leaving "some 28 million square feet of empty space today in communities across the country."  With shareholders to please, Wal-Mart is in a constant rush to replace perfectly functional, but older stores with Supercenters, leaving behind abandoned buildings and empty parking lots.*  In fact, this very practice occurred in a nearby town of Brockport, NY, where they closed down a regular Wal-Mart and put up a Supercenter less than a mile away!  Thanks for the dead plaza, guys!

3. Wal-Mart is the Orient of the far West.  "70% of the commodities sold in Wal-Mart are made in China." In addition, "Wal-Mart was responsible for about 1/10th of the U.S. trade deficit with China in 2005."  Also, "If Wal-Mart were an individual economy, it would rank as China's eighth-biggest trading partner, ahead of Russia, Australia and Canada."**   In essence, Walmart has been able to lowball other retailers' prices by obtaining the lion's share of its products from China; a country that, like Mexico, lacks unions and thus has workers that earn low wages.  How many more jobs must our country lose to such unpatriotic business practices?

4. Wal-Mart is bad for National Security.  Wal-Mart has used its formidable political influence as the nation's number one retailer to affect politician's votes on national port security.  Walmart is number one among retailers in 20-foot port containers imported at more than half a million a year (that's 1 container every 45 seconds!).  One of the keys to keeping prices low is to keep the flow of merchandise from China and other foreign manufacturers from being slowed down by those pesky security checks.  Via its retail lobby group, the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA), Walmart has lobbied members of Congress to oppose 100% scanning of port containers (currently only 5-6% of all port containers coming into U.S. ports get scanned!).  Wal-Mart has also lavished cash on members of Congress: "As of 2006, Wal-Mart had given $191,500 to current House Homeland Security Committee members since 2000..."  "In the 109th Congress, eighteen of the committee's nineteen Republican members took in $173,000—90 percent of the total—and four of the committee's fourteen Democrats collected $18,500."  "In the past eight years, Wal-Mart's Washington Political Action Committee put more than $360,000 into current members of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee...twenty-three of the committee's 24 Republicans took Wal-Mart's money—82 percent of the total—compared to only eight of the committee's 17 Democrats."  "Wal-Mart also has spent $63,000 on current members of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs in the past eight years...Ninety-six percent of Wal-Mart's spending went to the committee's Republican members."  Republicans tough on terrorism?  With our ports being one of the most glaring deficiencies in our nation's defense, their actions against port security have made the prospect of "weapons of mass destruction" being smuggled into our ports via un-inspected port containers a frightening reality.**   

5. Wal-Mart is bad for the environment.  Wal-Mart recently executed a public-relations coup by bagging former Sierra Club president Adam Werbach as an environmental consultant.  This move improves their image as a burgeoning "green" company, but despite recent strides in a more ecologically-friendly direction (ie.- smaller packaging, compact fluorescent bulbs, etc.), Wal-Mart's overall negative environmental impact still dwarfs their efforts.  First, let's consider the overall size of a Supercenter---
200,000 square feet on average---all of that was former green space.  In addition, what about the size of the parking lot?  As said in a previous post:  "A hectare of trees (2.471 Acres or 107,637 square feet) can absorb 6 or more tons of carbon per year, according to the International Carbon Bank & Exchange."  Where's the carbon offset for all of the acres of those lost trees that were cleared?  With 2,300 Supercenters in the U.S., each occupying 20-30 acres of land (the size of a football field), the cumulative environmental impact is stunning.  Also consider the "thousands of standard Wal-Marts, Neighborhood Markets, Sam's Clubs, distribution centers and warehouses. It is the largest commercial entity in the United States, both physically and economically, and its stores require massive amounts of land, energy and labor to function."  In a 2005 report by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, it was estimated "that Wal-Mart stores and parking lots covered roughly 75,000 acres (or 117 square miles) in the U.S., equal to the land size of Tampa, Florida" and that their "'Parking lots contribute directly to what is referred to as "non-point source water pollution,' the leading cause of water pollution in the United States."*

I could go on and on about why you shouldn't shop a Wal-Mart, from issues with workers' wages and rights, to health care issues, to its cost to taxpayers, to its corporate practices, to other environmental issues, etc., etc., etc.  It's going to take some sacrifice and some self-discipline, but it's doable.  My wife and I have not purchased anything from Wal-Mart in over four years, despite living in a somewhat isolated area where Wal-Mart is one of few shopping options. 

Do you have a good non-Wal-Mart streak going yourself?  Do you want to start one?  Share your story!       

*Information derived from Walmartwatch.com.
**Information derived from Wakeupwalmart.com.