TechQuest

Green living or going for green is hot right now. In the medias and radios. Go Green are on the move, over to the internet. More and more people are creating sites to Go for Green and these sites will grow popular any time in the near future. Visit these sites, read about green living and Go For Green.

Philadelphia Eagles - Learn more about how you can help and other ways you can Go Green year-round.

The Green Guide - Plan your summer travel the green way: smarter preparation, where to stay, how to lower your carbon footprint along the way

JournalTimes - Green ideas make more sense in certain regions or communities.

Go Green Travel Green - Tip for travelers who want to reduce their environmental impact

Go Green Tube - Broadcast Green videos, remove one pound of CO2 from the air for every video you watch.

Go Green Hosting - Great Go Green Hosting, uses renewable energy from the windto power your website.

Lifehacker - Easy Ways to Go Green with Your Computer.

Best Green Blog - Green Blog Directory.

Go Green St. - Eco Living Tips For Going Green

Green & Clean Mom - Moms who are doing their best to be some shade of green.

Things That Make You Go Green - A blog talks about cool ideas to make a bigger impact in areas like housing, investing, volunteering and more.

The Go Green Blog - Learn easy tips & tricks, as well as find some awesome eco-friendly products to incorporate into your everyday routine to make your lifestyle a Green one

By Carolyn Duffy Marsan, Network World

1. Turn off excess air conditioning units

You don’t need to keep your computer room temperature below 68 degrees. The EPA turned off six of the 14 air conditioning units in its National Computer Center and was still able to meet the needs of its computer equipment. This move helped reduce NCC’s annual energy consumption by more than 9%.

2. Change your light bulbs

The EPA’s National Computer Center has green lighting features including high-efficiency fluorescent lighting, motion sensors and daylight dimming sensors, which helped reduce the electricity used for lighting by 70% compared to a similar facility with conventional lighting.

3. Buy Energy Star equipment

The EPA’s Energy Star program puts a seal of approval on computers, peripherals and many other appliances that meet its guidelines for energy efficiency. Formed in 1992, the Energy Star program now rates office buildings for energy efficiency and offers tools for benchmarking the energy usage of commercial buildings.

4. Install screen savers on all computers

Screen savers allow your systems to hibernate when not in use, which saves electricity. Additional savings can come from software that allows help desk workers to fix computers remotely, which eliminates repair-related travel.

5. Consolidate servers and storage devices

Use virtualization technology to reduce the number of servers that you operate. Storage area networks use up less electricity than direct-attached storage.

6. Recycle

Buy IT equipment that can be recycled and recycle it. This reduces the electricity used in disposal of your IT infrastructure.

7. Cut back on travel

The EPA has rolled out video conferencing to reduce travel between its 100-plus facilities nationwide and allows employees to work from home. Other ways of reducing transportation-related energy usage by employees is locating your facility near public transit, providing bike racks and offering preferential parking for carpools and hybrid vehicles.

8. Go carbon neutral

Data center operators can offset their greenhouse gas emissions by purchasing renewable energy certificates from their electric companies. These certificates support the generation of green power from wind, solar or biomass. The EPA buys 100 kilowatt hours of green power each year to offset 100% of the electricity consumption of its National Computer Center.

9. Consider solar power

The solar panel on the roof of the EPA’s National Computer Center generates more than 100,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year. The roof converts the sun’s light into electrical energy and feeds it directly to the building to supplement the main power utility. The solar roof generates 5% of the facility’s power.

10. Don’t forget about water

The Air Force Weather Agency is cutting back on water usage at its new data center at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, which in turn reduces the amount of electricity required to supply water to the base. Drought-resistant landscaping, waterless urinals and storm water retention systems are helping the Air Force save 200,000 gallons of water a year.

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By Cara Garretson, Network World

Companies don’t need to build a whole new datacentre to begin saving on energy. Below are some steps recommended by Burton Group analyst Andrew Kutz that enterprises can take in their existing datacentres to save on power consumption:

1. Cut the physical number of servers through high-density options, such as blade servers, and through virtualisation.

2. Reduce storage hardware by using SANs or other NAS devices that consolidate storage space. Consolidation of physical units greatly affects the amount of power consumed by the datacentre and can also represent lower-acquisition costs.

3. Look for energy-efficient hardware such as multi-core CPUs that reduce redundant and external electronics and therefore save on energy.

4. Check out CPU performance-stepping technology that dynamically adjusts the energy that processors require in relationship to processor load.

5. Dynamic control of a server’s internal fans can reduce the energy needed when the air in the datacentre is cooler.

6. Liquid cooling of server racks can limit the amount of energy needed to remove heat from the datacentre.

7. Follow the hot aisle/cold aisle layout for arranging equipment in the datacentre. Although this technique dates to the mid-1990s, “it’s extremely effective,” Kutz says.

The design lets cool air flow through the aisles to the servers’ front-air intake, and lets hot air flow from the back of servers to the AC return ducts, therefore requiring less energy for cooling.

8. Look for software that is multi-threaded to take advantage of multi-core-processor machines. “Today you can buy a new server out-of-the-box that is multi-core, but the software’s not written for it, so you can’t take advantage,” Kutz says. “This falls in the lap of the software designers, they need to make sure their software is multi-threaded to take advantage of multiprocessor machines.”

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Cars are one of the great mixed bags of our time. They are at once wonders of engineering and a threat to life on Earth. They create convenience and comfort and also snarled traffic and sprawling suburbs.

In the U.S., about 20% of all greenhouse gas emissions come from cars and light trucks like SUVs, contributing to climate change, air pollution, and disease. If you are truly trying to lighten your environmental footprint, the first thing to do is ask if you do in fact need a car. If the answer is yes, there are many things you can do to make your driving life greener.

Top 10 Tips

Here are 10 highly effective ways to go greener. Hit it.

1. Drive a green car

There are now hybrids to match almost any need: two-door, four-door, SUV, luxury sedan. They get better mileage than their conventional counterparts, have cleaner emissions, and save money on gas. If a hybrid isn’t in your future, try for a car with the best MPG you can find; and remember that hybrids aren’t always the most efficient option, either.

Biodiesel can now be found in almost any state in the US. This clean, domestic, veggie-based, carbon-neutral fuel will run in any diesel car or truck with little or no modification to the engine. Straight vegetable oil is an option for the more ambitious green driver and can make fueling up almost free. Another veggie fuel is ethanol, and there are between 5-6 million flex-fuel vehicles already on the road — you may even be driving one and not know it.

Also, affordable, practical electric cars and plug-in hybrids aren’t too far off, either. But whether or not you drive a hybrid or alternative-fuel vehicle, there’s lots you can do to green your car right now.

2. Best practices

Driving technique has a lot to do with your fuel economy. Avoid sudden starts and stops and go the speed limit. Not only does speeding and herky-jerky driving kill your MPG, it’s dangerous. And even if no one gets hurt in a fender bender, how green is it to get a new bumper or have your car re-painted?

As a general rule of thumb, keep your engine speeds between 1,200 — 3,000 RPMs, and up-shift between 2,000 — 2500 RPMs. Also, drive wise and minimize unnecessary miles by doing errands in one trip, getting good directions, and calling ahead.

3. Stay in tune

Getting regular tune-ups, maintenance, and having clean air filters will help you burn less gas, pollute less, and prevent car trouble down the line. Pump up: if every American’s tires were properly inflated we could save around 2 billion gallons of gas each year! (Check your manual for optimal pressure). Lastly, get the junk out of the trunk! All that extra weight is sapping your fuel economy.

4. Car minus the carbon

There are many services out there now that can help you calculate your yearly emissions from driving and offset those greenhouse gasses through various means. Check below for a few carbon offset opportunities.

5. Carpool

Of course. Find coworkers, neighbors, and fellow students headed the same direction. Start with one shared trip per week. Also look into car sharing programs like FlexCar and ZipCar.

6. Leave the car at home.

For shorter adventures, walk, take public transit, ride your bike (regular, electric-assisted, or something fancier), skateboard, rollerblades, or even look into an electric scooter. Carrying groceries or other bulky stuff can still be done on a bike with a backpack or some slick modifications. Check out the Xtracycle, for example.

7. Drive part of the way

If getting where you’re going by bike or public transit alone isn’t going to happen, consider driving part of the way and then jumping on public transit or your bike (a folder would be perfect). A great way to beat traffic!

8. Go easy on the AC

Use the windows to help keep the car cool. Or try an electric or solar fan. Parking in the shade and using a reflective windshield shade can keep your car cooler when parked, meaning it takes less to cool it off when you get back in. If you car is new, however, let it air out. That new car smell is not friendly stuff.

9. Telecommute

Drive less with the wonders of working from home (or internet café, tree house, Mojave desert, etc.) With instant messaging, video chat, teleconferencing, and other world-flattening technologies, making the rush-hour trek to work and back might not be that necessary. Ask your boss or offer your employees a teleconferencing day once a week. Hey, it works for TreeHuggers and 44 million Americans.

10. Aspire to carlessness

Not everyone is going to be able to do it, at least not cold car-key. It will probably entail a shift in thinking and some time, but living car-free might be more within reach than you think. Living closer to work and school is a big part of it. Walking, biking, public transport, car sharing, car borrowing, and teleconferencing are a strong arsenal of tools to help reduce the need for a car. Give it some thought.

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David Best, president of Prism Software, unloads a truck full of old computer equipment during an e-cycling event near the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn.

Erik Hodne’s Denver basement contains two computers, two printers, a stereo receiver, two VCRs, six cell phones, three cordless phones and two Palm Pilots.

Hodne is not a collector, and the machines carry no sentimental value. But like most Americans, Erik can’t figure out what to do with his old tech trash. The 36-year-old surgical tools salesman considered selling some of the items, but he hasn’t had time to figure out how much they’re worth or how to erase the machines of any personal information.

“I feel guilty throwing them in the trash,” said Hodne. “I have got this big 36-inch TV. It’s huge. What am I going to do with this thing? Chances are it will go the basement until one day I can figure out what to do with all this stuff.”

Millions of Americans are equally perplexed when it comes to disposing of old technology. Between 1980 and 2005, 180 million electronic products accumulated in storage, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. And in 2005, Americans tossed an estimated 1.5 million tons of computers, TVs, scanners, printers, faxing machines and cell phones into the trash.

The piles of e-waste will undoubtedly grow in coming months, as the switch to digital television looms. Starting in February 2009, broadcasters will no longer use analog signals, which means an analog TV that works fine today will be rendered useless without a digital converter box or a subscription to cable or satellite service.

The government has issued discount coupons for people to buy digital converter boxes from electronic retailers, and set up a Web site to answer questions about the digital TV switch, recycling and buying energy-efficient TVs.

So what do you do with your unwanted technology?

Avoid throwing old gadgets in the trash, because their inner workings can contain toxic materials including lead, beryllium, cadmium and flame retardants. If crushed or burned these materials can seep into the environment and harm human health. Many states prohibit dumping electronic equipment in the trash, although the EPA maintains that most U.S. landfills include proper liners and groundwater testing to prevent leaching.

The EPA has created a Web site to help you determine whether you should recycle or donate your e-waste. You can also find links and resources for recycling, donating or reselling your equipment at eBay’s Rethink Program. The eBay site also offers tools to erase data on computers and cell phone.

Reselling
If you’re considering reselling your equipment, you can go to Rethink to get started or research prices on eBay or on classified ad sites like craigslist. For $75 and up, you can look up market prices for digital cameras, car stereos, computers and televisions at Orion Blue Book.

CellForCash.com will buy certain models of cell phones, refurbish them and resell them as warrantee phones, pre-paid phones or emergency 911 phones provided to the elderly and victims of domestic abuse. If your phone isn’t one the business will buy, you can get a free shipping label, put your phone in box and mail it to CellForCash.com for recycling. Greenphone.com cuts checks and offers you points good toward gift certificates at retailers such as CircuitCity.com and Starbucks.

Donating
You can donate your technology to a number of organizations, including the National Cristina Foundation. You can go to its website, enter information about your old computer, laptop, fax machines, PDAs, digital cameras and other peripherals, and Cristina Foundation will search its database and connect you with local nonprofits and schools that need machines. Last year, the organization found homes for 50,000 pieces of old equipment. Through eBay Giving Works, you can sell an item on eBay and donate part or all of the final sale price to the nonprofit of your choice.

Before you sell or donate your equipment, you should clear the devices of any personal information. You can find tools online for erasing your cell phone or PDA’s memory and to clear your computer hard drive. A number of companies offer software to wipe computer memory, including Blannco Data Cleaner, , WipeDrive and CyberCide Data Destruction. People can find more on wiping their hard drive on the EPA’s website.

Recycling
Recycling can save energy and valuable resources, including the mining of precious metals and the manufacturing new plastics. Yet most people do not know where to take their equipment. There are more options than you might realize.

You can go to the EPA site for a list of manufacturers and technology companies that offer recycling and links to their programs.

Waste Management, the $13 billion garbage collection company, is planning to expand aggressively into recycling electronics. The company joined Sony last year to open 75 recycling drop-off sites, and the two companies ultimately plan to open 1,000 locations within 20 miles of 95 percent of the population.

“We see it as a huge opportunity in the next three to five years and beyond,” said Waste Management’s Richard Abramowitz. The drop-off centers will recycle Sony products at no cost to consumers. The sites will charge $5 to $50, depending on the market area and size of the equipment, to recycle other brands. To find the nearest drop-off center, you can call 877-439-2795.

Staples recycles laptops, printers, monitors, computers and fax machines at its 1,400 stores for $10 each. The retailer also accepts peripherals like computer mice, keyboards, cell phones, PDAs and rechargeable batteries for free.

Dell Inc. also offers free recycling of Dell branded products with no purchase required and will recycle other branded products with the purchase of a new Dell computer. You can check out their options at Dell’s recycling Web site.

You can drop off your old cell phones off at AT&T stores and cell phones, rechargeable batteries and ink cartridges at Best Buy stores. Motorola’s recycling program lets you print prepaid shipping labels online and send in any brand cell phone to be recycled. Participating K-12 schools can earn money for each phone returned. The Collective Good will also collect and recycle your old cell phone.

Choose carefully
Be cautious when choosing a recycler, because many recyclers ship high-tech trash to Third-World countries to take advantage of lax regulations, according to the Basel Action Network, an environmental nonprofit organization. Best Buy, Motorola, Dell, Staples, Sony and Waste Management say equipment collected does not get shipped overseas.

Jim Puckett, director of the Basel Action Network, said many U.S. recyclers make money by collecting recycling fees and then selling the waste to brokers who ship it overseas. In China, Puckett and investigators watched workers paid $1 a day pull apart equipment by hand or hammer. They burned wires or cooked circuit boards to pull off resellable chips, then dipped those chips in acid and poured the leftover residues straight into the rivers, says Puckett.

Such methods expose workers to contaminants such as lead and cadmium, a known carcinogen. Recyclers also ship computers to Africa, where local entrepreneurs pay for second-hand machines. The vast majority of computers shipped cannot be recycled, repaired or sold and are dumped and burned, harming the environment and human health. When the plastics are burned it creates even more toxic substances such as dioxins and cancer-causing hydrocarbons, said Puckett.

“It’s a lot easier to shunt it off to Third-World countries,” Puckett said. “You really have to watch out when there is a free take-back event. Most are funneling everything offshore.”

The Basel Action Network provides a list of recyclers that have promised not to dump material overseas. These recyclers have agreed to let the group monitor their recycling practices and vendors.

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Most plastic bags are discarded, often after a single use. Recycling of plastics after final use is possible, but plastic bags, in particular, are rarely recycled. According to the UK-based Ban the Bag campaigning group, 0.5% of plastic bags are recycled. Standard plastic bags may take between 500 and 1000 years to decompose, However, such figures are only ever estimates because plastics have not existed for long enough for the precise decomposition time to be measured.

Additives have been developed that allow plastic to degrade and biodegrade within a few months in landfill (as opposed to an estimated 500-1000 years for non-degradable plastic). Plastics made with these additives are called oxobiodegradable, and have been adopted by many ‘ethical’ retailers, e.g., the Co-op in the UK. However, some argue that oxo-biodegradable plastics contribute more to global warming as they release their carbon as carbon dioxide and methane far more quickly than plastics in landfill.

Polyethylene, (IUPAC name polyethene), is a thermoplastic commodity heavily used in consumer products (over 60 million tons are produced worldwide every year). It is a polymer consisting of long chains of the monomer ethylene (IUPAC name ethene).

High-density polyethylene (HDPE) is a polyethylene thermoplastic made from petroleum. It takes 1.75 kilograms of petroleum (in terms of energy and raw materials) to make one kilogram of HDPE. This compound is used to make plastic bags, and other products like detergent containers.

Also used is: Low-density polyethylene (LDPE) is a thermoplastic made from oil. It was the first grade of polyethylene, produced in 1933 by Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) using a high pressure process via free radical polymerisation. Its manufacture employs the same method today. This compound is used in plastic bags and other plastic products like six-pack soda can rings.

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The snow lotus is threatened by over-harvesting for use in traditional medicines. Photo courtesy of Jan Salick.

Most people are familiar with Chinese traditional medicine enough to know that ginseng and gingko can be used to treat various ailments. Yet they may not be aware that roses, peonies, and Boston ivy are in their backyard thanks to China as well. China has a rich botanical heritage that is not well-recognized by the rest of the world. It is under increasing threat as China grows.

National Geographic’s Committee for Research and Exploration has focused quite a bit on botanical research projects in China since Dr. Peter Raven of the Missouri Botanical Gardens became its chairman. Many of the projects they fund go without popular reporting. It is hard for plant collectors to compete against folks who study lions or sharks. Botany is rarely the stuff of headlines. Yet these projects are critical for biodiversity and threat assessments. Much of what scientists conducting these projects have found highlights China’s unique botanical heritage and raises concerns that special efforts should be made to protect it.

Dr. Raven (of the Missouri Botanical Gardens) and the Chinese government are trying to draw attention to a crisis. As writer John Roach reports in his news report, “… in February 2008 China officially unveiled its own plant conservation strategy.”

This effort, however, is rowing against a strong current. As Roach points out, “within three years China hopes to revert nearly 37 million acres (15 million hectares) of farmland to forest. That’s an area bigger than England…” The needs of the Chinese for food and space will only continue to grow.

Protecting the environment is a complex issue for China. Hard choices are being made every day. Is China doing enough to stay green?

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In my daily life, I try my best to recycle (cans, bottles, cardboard, everything) and reduce (I’m weaning myself off shopping bags, which is harder than it seems unless I carry a cloth bag with me on the train every day). Lately I’ve been challenging myself to heed that other R: reuse. Whether an item is destined for the trash can or the recycling bin, I’ve been trying to use things one more time before they get tossed for good.

Newspaper has been an easy place to start. Not only is it ubiquitous–I, for one, have piles of it in the foyer, most of which never gets read–it can also be repurposed in a multitude of ways. (Disclaimer: Like a good green consumer, I read my news online. But a neighbor of mine is a reporter, and she gets a paper delivered every day.) Here are five ways to give your daily news a second life:

• Clean your windows. Don’t ask why, but crumpled newspaper makes mirrors and glass shine. Just spray the surface with your favorite glass cleaner and use them as you would regular paper towels. One caveat: Since newspaper isn’t terribly absorbent, it’s best to use less cleaning spray. You won’t need much, anyway.
• Substitute shredded or crumpled paper for Styrofoam. Instead of using non-recyclable, petroleum-based Styrofoam peanuts to pack items for shipping, run sheets of newspaper through a paper shredder to create stuffing material, or just crumple them into loose balls for extra padding.
• Store fragile dishware. When putting away fine china, place folded squares of newspaper between plates and bowls to protect them. Wrap the whole stack in another sheet before placing them in fabric cases or boxes.
• Start a barbecue. Charcoal chimneys (like this one) are inexpensive and make lighting the grill a breeze. But instead of soaking the briquettes in chemical lighter fluid, as many do, try lighting them using newspaper instead. Just crumple a few sheets and stuff them in the bottom section of the chimney, then fill the top portion with charcoal. Light the paper and the briquettes will light themselves.
• Make “tablecloths.” Sloppy meals (in my house, boiled lobster makes a legendary mess) and kids’ art projects call for casual table coverings. Just spread out a few sheets of the Sunday comics, set your fixings on top, and feel free to leave your manners behind.

© The Green Guide, 2008

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