March 2, 2009
by Environmental Building Strategies
in Green Building, Uncategorized
Tags: green, Renewable Energy, sustainability, waste, water
So a couple things are on my mind this week. The main one is water however. To date this blog has focused quite a bit on energy, materials, and sustainability however we’ve lacked on the water subject.
Since Karolina let me on to this movie FLOW I’ve been newly recharged to change the world. I can’t express in words how important it is that you see this documentary. It discusses the critical nature of our current water supply in a global context.
It also discusses how multi-national corporations such as Coke, Nestle, and Pepsi are literally destroying aquifers where the “set up shop.” The worst part is they do this in places around the globe that can least afford it. Companies like Coke suck up water that would otherwise be provided for indigenous people and then bottle it and sell it back to them for profit. Lets just ask ourselves, “Does that make sense?” Does it make sense to pay ridiculous amounts of money for something that falls from our skies? Should we start paying for air? How about sunlight?
The greatest part about it is that this bottled water we drink is rarely ever better for our health and of course when you throw in the future impacts of the plastic bottle its stored in, you have a recipe for disaster.
Besides the film, I wanted to share some things the world is doing for water and its conservation.
In Orange County California, wastewater is being treated and discharged back into the ground water. It then is recaptured and used for drinking, showering and such. This is a really important concept because quite often wastewater and sewage is treated and dumped into our oceans. We are dumping potentially viable FRESH water in the salty oceans. An interesting note that Australia does this already – in fact I’ve heard that their President was shown on TV drinking a glass of treated water. Besides that they capture much of their rainfall and understand capture and reuse much better than Americans.
In other interesting news, Ben Block from Greener Buildings talks about how water efficiency is key to energy savings here. Also on Greener Buildings is an interesting article about a mobile transportation device for wastewater treatment. That article can be found here.
Thats about all I have for now – I will leave you with this interesting tidbit I learned…
An investment in wind power produces almost three times as many jobs as the same investment in coal power. And an investment in solar power produces almost four times as many jobs, and energy efficiency, almost thirty times as many jobs as coal power.
–The EBS Team
January 28, 2009
by Environmental Building Strategies
in Lifestyle, Sustainability
Tags: green, sustainability
So almost a month ago I wrote an article titled Top 100 Ways to Continue F*%#ing the Future. To be honest it got quite a bit of press and I have to say I’m somewhat proud.
I didn’t think I had the potential to generate that much conversation. But this blog and EBS’s presence in the field has drawn criticism and compliment from all over including Las Vegas (EBS was there last week for the International Builders Show), North Carolina, and Connecticut.
Some people were honestly pissed! I mean really pissed. I posted the link to our blog on LinkedIn and boy did some people freak out. For the most part it was comments like “inappropriate language in a public forum” but some were down right nasty. I actually had to remove the postings for a while there as I didn’t want to destroy our/my name.
So with that said, I have brought it back. Of course as you see above I changed the uck in the F word to symbols as per many of your suggestions. It’s a good idea. I can’t realistically expect this book to sell if I plaster the F word all over Barnes and Noble. God knows they are too noble for that.
So back to the good stuff: Here is what I’ve seen recently that pisses me off!
1. Keep promoting Green NAHB
–The fact that the International Builders Show can promote “green” (like it was their job somehow revive their industry) when their sustainability efforts fell miles – let me repeat – MILES short of those at GreenBuild. No sustainable ware, distribution material and the waste stream – I can’t even imagine!
2. Keep saying your sustainable
–WalMart’s sustainability efforts are a joke. Do they really think that putting solar panels on their roof’s will allow the public to just pass by the fact that they raped economies all across rural America and placed so many small businesses out of business. The joke is that we’ve let them get so big that they mind as well start a sustainability arm of their company to teach classes – I mean hell – they’d be good at it right?
3. Use those cleaners under the sink.
–I need people to realize how bad the chemicals are underneath your sink. These are poisons. And where does the water you release from your sink and drains go? The long and short of it – the GROUND! So when you go to plant those tomato plants and get ready right around August for those tender tomatoes, just remember where they came from. There are green cleaning products out there that don’t cost a penny more. Check out Green Works
4. Wrap that sh*t in plastic
–Do you have a pet? Well if you do lets think about picking up after them. Waste from our bodies is naturally a very compostable product. So why cover that with a plastic bag – plastic takes years and years to bio-degrade. Buy the bio bags people – they don’t cost anymore and REMEMBER to put them in the compost bin.
5. Print that paper
–Switch your paper to double sided printing. If it has this option set the printer to default double sided printing. Adobe saved $22,000 a year as a result of double sided printing. It just makes sense and we will stop wasting paper. Or if that doesn’t work then consider options like Fiberstone. Its a paper that doesn’t actually have any paper products in it – made from recycled Limestone quarries.
Ok that’s all for now – I will rant some more next week. For now keep F – ing the planet and bucking nature. . .
–The EBS Team
January 20, 2009
by Environmental Building Strategies
in Green Building, Uncategorized
Tags: green, Green Building
I have something for you – a great article, a must read, and a great prelude to Tuesday’s festivities!
Top 10 Green Building Stories of 2008
Well we may not have gotten everything we asked for – As a country we certainly didn’t expect to be here on January 20th.
No one expected to see hundreds of thousands of people in DC rallying behind Mr. Obama.
I think he even fooled himself. Who knows where he will lead us or whether he is qualified – all i do know is it will be DIFFERENT.
That being said I hope we all can get along a little more in the new year – few more hugs, few less drivebys and lets pray he knows economics because we’re going to need some help.
I invite everyone to recap and see where we’ve come over the last year – check out a great article talking all about the successes we’ve had in the green building industry over the past year.
More to come…
–The EBS Team
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