green

The Ride In

~ randyaa ~ Leave a comment

IMG_4488 On our way to Portland we flew through Newark (New Jersey) and for once we didn’t miss our flights because of it… Of course, once we got on the plane to Portland we did sit on the runway for an hour …sigh…

Ahh well, once we were finally in the air Rachel and I watched Kingdom of Heaven on my iPhone and we were then graced with some magnificent views of the Mountainous west coast.

After being in Portland for all of 30 minutes we had a few observations:

  • It’s very green.  There’s huge Ponderosa Pine Trees absolutely everywhere and they’re gorgeous.
  • It’s very green-conscious.  We probably saw 147 bikes between the airport and our Hotel.  There are bike lanes on literally every street, and bike paths next to every highway.  There are “Please Conserve Water” signs everywhere.
  • The flowers are amazing and they’re everywhere
  • It’s Claim Jumpers not Clam Jumpers
  • Shopping is great here.  Lots of outlet stores and no sales tax!  This doesn’t mean we’ll be doing any this trip, but it certainly is a good place to go if you’d like to.  The pearl district seems to be where all the higher class shops are.
  • Unemployment is bad here, we saw beggars on pretty much every major intersection between the airport and the hotel.

We had a great trip in and a nice relaxing first day.

Don't Replace It

~ randyaa ~ 12 Comments

sigg-adI’ve been seeing these ads a lot lately.  They sort of drive me nuts.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for helping the environment, But ads like these make people think they should replace their old plastic water bottles with new environmental friendly water bottles.

You know what helps the environment?  NOT buying products you don’t need.  NOT throwing away your perfectly good non-environmental-friendly water bottle.

This works a lot like cars.  If you’re attempting to help the environment you should be driving a 1974 Chevy until it blows a piston rod, then you should buy another 1974 Chevy and drive it until it dies and then buy another… get the point?  That brand new Hybrid just means that another car will rot in a junkyard instead of on the road where it belongs.

The Solution is Simple at 350 ppm

~ randyaa ~ Leave a comment

The web is abuzz today with two things. One, Amazon.com has been down for hours. Two, the story of Alain Robert (aka spidey) and Renaldo Clarke who both climbed the 52-story New York Times Building.

Renaldo Clarke climbed to draw attention to childhood malaria.

Alain Robert climbed to draw attention global warming and was carrying a banner which stated:

Global Warming kills more people than 9/11 every week.

I took the bait. I don’t have a clue how something like that could even be measured, but his banner alone isn’t why I wanted to look into this guy. I don’t think it’s shocking news that I’m somewhat interested in the developments of Global Climate Change. I like to see what new stuff is happening and what different movements there are. Perhaps one day I’ll even find one that I feel I can contribute to, who knows?

Alain’s T-shirt during the stunt read “The Solution Is Simple .org“.  While I thought this would be nothing more than another meaningless organization that asks you to buy coupons to offset your carbon emissions The Solution Is Simple turns out to be Alain’s personal website and it appears he is very much in the midst of the whole Green Shift. The notion of “Greener is Better” really seems to resonate with this guy.

I have a lot of respect for Alain Robert. It seems everything this guy does has something to do with going Green and he really walks the walk. His site is even hosted by a green company.

Something I found on The Solution Is Simple mentioned twice interested me. 350. As it turns out there is an organization claiming that 350 parts per million is the magical amount of CO2 in the atmosphere which we need.

350 is the red line for human beings, the most important number on the planet. The most recent science tells us that unless we can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, we will cause huge and irreversible damage to the earth.

I’m not sure if this is the magic number or not but it’s something to strive for I suppose. At least it puts a goal in mind rather than just the blanket statement most organizations seem to make of “we need to be greener.”

With his stunt and his website Alain is urging everyone to send a message about global warming to world leaders who are meeting next month at the G8 conference in Japan. You should too. There is a simple form you can fill out to do so on his website The Solution Is Simple.

I’m Randy Aldrich and I Approve this message.

NOTE: I am simply pointing out organizations and companies which have claims to being ‘green.’ I have in no way verified the validity of these statements.  Please let me know if you find anything different.

The Story of Stuff

~ randyaa ~ Leave a comment

Going Green is a common theme in practically everything these days. Why? Perhaps because consumerism has overrun our society and we’re obsessed with the Stuff. The Story of Stuff is a compelling presentation that describes how the stuff we get makes it into our grubby little hands.

The Story of Stuff

Carbon-Free Stackable Cars

~ randyaa ~ Leave a comment

Carbon-Free Stackable CarI recently ran across an idea from MIT students for Carbon-Free Stackable Cars. The idea is to simply extend the range of public transportation. Public transportation typically only allows travel to the most common places. Often your real destination is off the beaten track. If that’s the case and the distance is too great people will often choose private transportation instead. This idea attempts to close that gap.

This reminds me of ZipCar in Boston. They leave cars in residential neighborhoods and allow you to reserve them online. You simply walk to it and pick it up to make use of it by the hour or the day. There’s no attendant and no complications. It’s simply a service you use at your convenience.

The fact that the cars are Carbon-Free is a huge bonus. Since the idea is to travel just small distances it seems like the plugin electric idea is a great fit. I can’t wait to see something like this put into place.