Eyes on Copenhagen
Tue, 12/08/2009 - 17:47
The eyes of people concerned about our changing world climate all are focused on the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen this week. Those who are in the know are not expecting a new global climate treaty, even though in Poznan, Poland, at last year's conference, such a treaty was predicted to come from the Copenhagen summit. There is still much disagreement between industrialized and developing nations that centers around four points, according to Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of…
Read MoreSUSTAINABLE LIVING- Local Thanksgiving
Tue, 11/24/2009 - 05:12
Eating local embodies the spirit of the first Thanksgiving, when Puritans and Wampanoags sat down together to share a meal, which consisted mainly of shellfish, eels, wild fowl (including swans and eagles) and other local foods that they could gather or grow. When we source our foods locally, we eat in season and celebrate what's available locally. Absent from the first Thanksgiving feast were modern traditional dishes, such as corn on the cob (all corn was dried by that time),…
Read MoreSUSTAINABLE LIVING - Deciphering Labels
Sat, 11/14/2009 - 23:45
Surfing the supermarket shelves will yield a mind-boggling array of new labels on our food. But what do these labels mean, and how truthful are their claims? For example, the "organic" label carries the promise that food is grown according to organic farming practices, in which soil is enriched and tested yearly. But what you don't see on that label are the carbon costs to the environment of transporting organic produce from California or (even worse) Argentina. With such…
Read MoreSUSTAINABLE LIVING - 350 Actions This Saturday
Tue, 10/20/2009 - 09:34
The number 350 seems so innocent, so small, so prime and human-scaled that you can picture it in your mind. It's not like those inconceivable numbers: the trillions that measure the national debt, billions that measure world population and millions that measure the carbon in the atmosphere. Three hundred fifty parts per million is the "safe" level of carbon emissions in the atmosphere, according to NASA scientist James Hansen. We are currently at 385 ppm. In this case, "safe" means…
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