·:[ Environmental News Bits ]:·
• • • • •

Below are my five most recent bookmarks on Delicious. There’s a link at the end if you want to join my network. Page down to read the most recent blog posts.

Environmental News Bits is also on Twitter (click the link to the left to follow ENB there). I often retweet interesting stories there without posting them here. Now you can see them here too. Page down to read the latest blog posts.

Read the full post at Lifehacker.

Mac: Wondering what kind of impact your power and fuel consumption have on the environment? ECOBOT helps you figure it out.

Read the full story at Energy Daily.

Business owners should think twice before tweaking workplace temperature settings this fall. According to a new survey of office workers, sixty-nine percent said they would be willing to sacrifice their preferred ideal temperature in the office to help their company conserve energy.

However the survey also found that nearly four in five participants (78 percent) say they are less productive at work when they are too hot or too cold.

Read the full story at GreenerDesign.

Axion International Holdings is increasing the performance of its recycled plastic bridges with a contact from the U.S. Army to build two railroad bridges that can support 130 tons.

Axion will be building the bridges, which will be made almost entirely of recycled post-consumer plastic, at Fort Eustis in Virginia, the home of the US Army Transportation Corps. The bridges will be used for locomotives and freight traffic as part of military movements and base exercises.

Read the full story at GreenerDesign.

Do you remember the scene in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy and Toto are kidnapped by an army of winged capuchin monkeys? Scary stuff, but why? Because (a) there were lots of them, (b) they were organized, and (c) they had an advantage over other armies: They could fly. More importantly, they could fly and use their hands.

It’s this last point that makes the flying monkeys so distinctly fantastic. In the evolution of vertebrates, we simply do not see this phenomenon…ever. If you want to really fly by flapping a limb to get lift and thrust, you have to give up your hands. Bat or bird, no matter how fast or furious, they still can’t type a text message. Would you give up your hands in order to fly? “Well, I am a bit attached…” you might say, and I would agree: Stick with the hands and leave off the dreams of soaring. But we do dream, don’t we?

Read the full story at GreenerBuildings.

In recent weeks, five states and one city have launched green lodging certification programs. I know there are those out there who are not happy about the addition of more green lodging certification programs to our industry, but I am excited for New York, Oklahoma, Indiana, South Carolina, Maryland, and Buffalo, N.Y. Congratulations to those who have worked so hard to put together these programs.

Read the full story at GreenerBuildings.

Local and federal dignitaries celebrated the opening of a development at Fort Shafter, the U.S. Army Pacific Headquarters, that’s being hailed as the greenest neighborhood on a military installation and the largest project of its kind for the Army.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

A major overhaul to the Energy Star program, which currently certifies and labels products that are energy efficient, is imminent. How this overhaul occurs remains to be seen.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

While the push is on to green buildings, the RSC Equipment Rental firm has devised a new service to help reduce the environmental impact of a key component of construction: It tracks the emissions of every diesel unit that rolls out of its lots around the country.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

As negotiators gather in Copenhagen next month to discuss a global climate policy framework, there has never been a better time for companies to influence policy instruments that could dramatically affect the future of climate change.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

Green purchasing by companies is up in a down economy. Our recent October 2009 survey of more than 450 companies found that over the past 12 months there was a 63 percent increase in green purchasing, from computers to chemicals to cleaning supplies. Perhaps even more encouraging, none of the respondents from large companies (those with revenues over $1 billion) identified any decrease in buying green.

Download the full report or read it online. From the introduction:

The ultimate solutions to climate change are workable, cost-effective technologies which permit society to improve living standards while limiting and adapting to changes in the climate. Yet scientific, engineering, and organizational solutions are not enough. Societies must be motivated and empowered to adopt the needed changes.

For that, the public must be able to interpret and respond to often bewildering scientific, technological, and economic information. Social psychologists are aware, through their painstaking scientific research, of the difficulties that individuals and groups have in processing and responding effectively to the information surrounding long-term and complex societal challenges.

This guide powerfully details many of the biases and barriers to scientific communication and information processing. It offers a tool — in combination with rigorous science, innovative engineering, and effective policy design — to help our societies take the pivotal actions needed to respond with urgency and accuracy to one of the greatest challenges ever faced by humanity: global-scale, human-induced environmental threats, of which the most complex and far reaching is climate change.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

In many cases, sustainability initiatives are only as good as the buy-in they receive from employees — the men and women who ultimately turn off the lights, throw their trash into recycling bins, and take the bus to work.

But what are the key ingredients needed to bring employees on board? Brighter Planet, an environmental services company that helps people reduce their environmental impacts, aims to find out with a survey designed to explore how employers and workers interact on sustainability.

Read the full story at GreenBiz.

The new SocialCycling program from DMD Green is an attempt to find uses for products and materials that aren’t handled by typical recycling systems.

DMD Green, an environmental and green business management consultant, says the program will find new uses for non-recyclable items like vinyl-coated fabrication materials.

The SocialCycling program, announced this month, will take post-consumer products and reclaimed material, collect them at a SocialCycling site, sort and separate materials, and then distribute them to converters and artisans that can use them to make new products.

Read the full story at Green Inc.

As I wrote in a New York Times article on Thursday, the $7.2 billion surf business has become the latest industry to ride the green wave. Call it sustainable surfing.

Read the full story in Ars Technica.

Ontario, Canada will have a smart meter in every home by the end of 2010, and its Information and Privacy Commissioner has now weighed in on the implications of placing detailed information on energy use online.

Read the full story in Scientific American.

CO2 emissions rise as natural sinks slow, but how can scientists precisely track this greenhouse gas, especially in advance of a potential global treaty to reduce its emissions?

Via the RFF Library Blog.

Via the RFF Library Blog.

Via the RFF Library Blog.

Via the RFF Library Blog.

National Academy of Sciences, Leslie Pray and Ann Yaktine, Rapporteurs; Food Forum; Institute of Medicine
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12633&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+nap%2Fnew+%28New+from+the+National+Academies+Press%29&utm_content=Google+Reader#description

[Description] In the food industry, scientists are exploring the potential of nanotechnology to enhance the flavor and other sensory characteristics of foods, introduce antibacterial nanostructures into food packaging and encapsulate and deliver nutrients directly into targeted tissues, among other applications.

However, as with any new technology, along with the benefits, there is the potential for unanticipated adverse effects. There is still a great deal to learn about any health outcomes related to introducing nanosized materials into foods and food packaging materials. Developing nanotechnology into a safe, effective tool for use in food science and technology will require addressing these and other questions. Assuring consumer confidence will be equally important to the success of this new emerging technology.

The Institute of Medicine held a one-day workshop, summarized in this volume, to further explore the use of nanotechnology in food. Specifically, the workshop was organized around three primary topic areas: (1) the application of nanotechnology to food products; (2) the safety and efficacy of nanomaterials in food products; and (3) educating and informing consumers about the applications of nanotechnology to food products.

Via Docuticker.

Biodiversity and Climate Change (PDF; 147 KB)
Source: Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology,UK

The effects of climate change on biodiversity are already evident in the UK, and with continued climate change, are expected to increase. This POSTnote explores the observed and future impacts of climate change on biodiversity. It also examines the relationship between biodiversity and adaptation to a changing climate.

Via Docuticker.

Ocean Acidification (PDF; 125 KB)
Source: Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology,UK

The increasing amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere is acidifying the oceans. The resulting changes to ecosystems and marine biodiversity may have negative impacts on fisheries and food security and reduce the coastal protection provided by coral reefs. This POSTnote outlines the science behind ocean acidification and summarises the threats to the marine environment. A global reduction of carbon emissions is the only certain way to minimise these risks.

On November 11th, 2009, at the I-Hotel and Conference Center in Champaign, IL, Willie Cade gave a lecture titled, “The Truth, Tragedy, and Transformation of E-Waste”.

Read the full post at Green Inc.

Houston is America’s oil capital, with its sprawling oil company headquarters and highways so densely trafficked at rush hour that they sometimes feel like endless parking lots. But Houston’s city government and Reliant Energy are trying a modest new effort to green the city’s image with a program called “Power of the Plug-in.”

Read the full post at Green Inc.

With the approach of the international climate talks in Copenhagen, the United Nations Development Program in conjunction with the Olympus Corporation and the Agence France-Presse Foundation created a photo competition aimed at profiling everyday Africans and their efforts to combat climate change. Below is a slide show of some of the winning photographs and the runners-up in various categories.

Read the full story at Green Inc.

California regulators on Wednesday approved the nation’s first energy efficiency standards for televisions, requiring their electricity consumption to be cut nearly in half by 2013.

Read the full story at GreenerDesign.

One of the ways that auto makers are trying to squeeze a few more miles per gallon into their vehicles are with improvements to tires. But tire makers have long been constrained by a principle that says any improvement to rolling resistance (the ability for tires to overcome the resistance they face as they roll over the road) would lead to lower tire durability and lower ability to grip the road in wet conditions.

Some companies are putting that principle to rest, or at least tweaking it a bit, by increasing rolling resistance along with bettering or not harming the other parts of what is called the “magic triangle of tire technology,” as detailed by Chemical & Engineering News.

Read the full story at Greener Computing.

We follow e-waste issues pretty closely here, because despite green IT’s huge potential for game-changing innovation, issues around the disposal of old gadgets represent the industry’s seamy underbelly.

So it’s always interesting when news about e-waste makes one of its occasional splashes into the news; when, after weeks of total or near silence about e-waste issues, you get a slew of headlines on the subject.

That’s been happening for the past week or so around these parts, as bad news crops up from a number of corners about e-waste, with just a small taste of some good news about how organizations are addressing it.

Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) delivers in-person, science-based, multimedia presentations on the science behind climate change to educate, inspire and empower students to take action. ACE presentations are free for schools. After the presentation, ACE helps students take action by creating an Action Team at their school and by connecting students with grants, scholarships, toolkits, online communities and more. Free presentations are currently available for schools in the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento/Sierra Nevadas, Los Angeles, New England, Greater Boston, Houston and Chicago metropolitan areas. ACE presentations will be available in Denver, D.C., Atlanta and New York City starting in January 2010.

Kilowatt Ours Youth Initiative is an award-winning program fostering leadership skills, scientific inquiry, scholastic success and environmental stewardship among young people by engaging students in an interactive program that trains them to become energy conservation leaders in their homes, schools and communities. The program offers a standards-based curriculum, train-the-trainer workshops and a peer mentoring focus that empowers students through the process of assessing home energy use, making informed decisions and taking energy and money-saving steps in their lives.

National Wildlife Federation has teamed up with the film “Where The Wild Things Are” to launch a national campaign to get kids outside. The “Where the Wild Things Are” Activity Guide will help teachers explore the film’s themes, with activities designed for grades 2-5 and extensions for younger and older students. These activities meet national standards for English/Language Arts, Science, Social Studies and Visual Arts.

The Environmental Health Perspectives Science Education Program promotes environmental health science as an integrative context for learning to promote students’ use and understanding of scientific literature. Teachers can browse over 100 science and interdisciplinary lessons based on selected articles published by Environmental Health Perspectives. Lessons align with National Science Education Standards and are designed for students in grades 9 through 12.

In partnership with several community-based youth organizations, Preserve America’s Waterways seeks to generate one million community service hours to protect and preserve our nation’s waterways. At the Web site, project providers can find ideas and guidelines or register their service projects. Those looking to participate in a service project can can find local projects.

Eco-Schools is an internationally acclaimed program that provides a framework to help educators integrate sustainable principles throughout their schools and curricula. Schools that are certified in the program undergo a thorough application process and succeed in organizing and implementing a comprehensive sustainability assessment of the school. Once a school has registered and implemented the seven steps of the program, it is eligible for an Eco-Schools award.

Our nation’s water and energy resources are increasingly important topics of discussion not just in the news, but in classrooms and homes as well. Recognizing the importance of conserving both water and energy to protect the planet and reduce costs — and acknowledging the connection between water and energy — EE Week’s 2010 theme is Be Water and Energy Wise. Register today to participate in EE Week 2010.

Read the full story in Biomass Magazine.

At the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center in Madison, Wis., researchers are looking to leafcutter ants for new enzymatic processes that will further progress to commercialize cellulosic ethanol. Leafcutter ants, which are found in tropical climates and live in enormous colonies that can number in the millions, have evolved several features over time that make their particular cocktail of enzymes attractive to researchers.

Read the full story in Biomass Magazine.

Valerie Reed of the U.S. DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy talked about the direction the DOE is taking to accelerate the development of algae-based biofuels at the Pacific Rim Summit on Industrial Biotechnology and Bioenergy held this week in Honolulu, Hawaii. She said the agency intends to develop advanced biofuels — hydrocarbons and other high-density fuels that can be drop in replacements for diesel and gasoline — in a more accelerated fashion than cellulosic ethanol.

Read the full story at Earth 911.

The holiday season is officially in full-swing, and Thanksgiving marks the beginning of big family dinners, extensive gift shopping and elaborate decorations.

But the season isn’t all turkey, stuffing and pie. According to RecycleWorks, from Thanksgiving to New Years Day, household waste increases by more than 25 percent.

So, start off your holiday season on the green foot by making a few small, eco-friendly changes this Turkey Day. It’s easy to get the entire family involved, have fun and decrease the burden on your wallet as well.

Read the full story at Earth911.

Yeah, it’s made of plastic and has a number, and OK, it’s technically recyclable. But while 80 percent of Americans have access to plastics recycling programs in some form, finding one that actually accepts our daily hard-to-recycle items is sometimes harder than we anticipate.

But instead of trashing that Best of the 80s CD case or those leftover packaging peanuts, consider reusing them in a fun, quirky way. Here are a couple of ideas to get you started.

Read the full story at Earth911.

Black Friday: A day where millions of shoppers, still weary and full from the previous night’s Thanksgiving feast, flock to retail stores across the country at pre-dawn hours to fill their carts and bags with deals aplenty as the holiday shopping season officially kicks off.

Phew. Are you tired from that description? We are too, but as wearisome as that might have been, it’s nothing compared to the drain that can be Black Friday. While deals abound, crowds, traffic, early hours and the like can make the day after Thanksgiving a drain on your energy and the environment.

But don’t fret. Follow our easy guide to a greener Black Friday, and we promise you’ll not only reduce your environmental impact, but perhaps your stress level as well.

For the first time in nearly 40 years, EPA is proposing to strengthen the nation’s sulfur dioxide (SO2) air quality standard to protect public health. Power plants and other industrial facilities emit SO2 directly into the air. Exposure to SO2 can aggravate asthma, cause respiratory difficulties, and result in emergency room visits and hospitalization. People with asthma, children, and the elderly are especially vulnerable to SO2’s effects.

“Short-term exposures to peak SO2 levels can have significant health effects — especially for children and the elderly — and leave our families and taxpayers saddled with high health care costs,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “We’re strengthening clean air standards, stepping up monitoring and reporting in communities most in need, and providing the American people with protections they rightly deserve.”

EPA is taking comment on a proposal to establish a new national one-hour SO2 standard, between 50 and 100 parts per billion (ppb). This standard is designed to protect against short-term exposures ranging from five minutes to 24 hours. Because the revised standards would be more protective, EPA is proposing to revoke the current 24-hour and annual SO2 health standards.

EPA also is proposing changes to monitoring and reporting requirements for SO2. Monitors would be placed in areas with high SO2 emission levels as well as in urban areas. The proposal also would change the Air Quality Index to reflect the revised SO2 standards. This change would improve states’ ability to alert the public when short-term SO2 levels may affect their health.

The proposal addresses only the SO2 primary standards, which are designed to protect public health. EPA will address the secondary standard — designed to protect the public welfare, including the environment — as part of a separate proposal in 2011.

EPA first set National Ambient Air Quality Standards for SO2 in 1971, establishing both a primary standard to protect health and a secondary standard to protect the public welfare. Annual average SO2 concentrations have decreased by more than 71 percent since 1980.

The public comment period will be open for 60 days after the proposal is published in the Federal Register. The agency will hold a public hearing on Jan. 5, 2010 in Atlanta. EPA must issue final standards by June 2, 2010.

More information about the proposal: http://www.epa.gov/air/sulfurdioxide

Read the news release.

Western Michigan University is slated to receive $1 million in federal funding to support its Green Manufacturing project, which will assist businesses throughout West Michigan in creating more energy efficient and sustainable processes and products.

U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, who sponsored the funding in the House, made the announcement Oct. 19 at WMU’s College of Engineering and Applied Sciences. He was joined at the announcement by WMU President John M. Dunn and Dr. John Patten, chair of manufacturing engineering and director of the WMU Center for Manufacturing Research.

WMU’s Green Manufacturing project draws upon existing research and development centers at the University. Faculty researchers and students will collaborate with area manufacturers, especially smaller businesses, to help them build greater energy efficiency into manufacturing processes and promote recycling of materials to further reduce costs. About 25 companies in Battle Creek, Kalamazoo, Benton Harbor-St. Joseph, Grand Rapids and Muskegon have already expressed interest in participating, according to Patten.

Read the full story in the Western Carolina University Reporter.

ConEdison Solutions is conducting a comprehensive campus energy audit and will begin implementing in late spring or early summer improvements such as solar water heating, rainwater harvesting, and heating and air-conditioning controls.

Read the news release.

President Richard L. McCormick of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, hosted New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU) President Jeanne M. Fox; BPU Commissioner Joseph Fiordaliso; and members of the Rutgers community to mark the official opening of the university’s seven-acre solar energy facility. The facility is one of the largest renewable energy systems on a single campus in the United States.

Read the news release.

The City College of New York (CCNY) will offer a new, interdisciplinary graduate program, “Sustainability in the Urban Environment,” that incorporates emerging approaches from the disciplines of architecture, engineering and science.  The program will enroll its first students for the Spring 2010 semester.  It will award a Master of Science degree in Sustainability to its graduates.

Read the news release.

In an effort to tackle the threat of global climate change head on, Stanford University has developed an ambitious, long-range, $250 million initiative to sharply reduce the university’s energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Detailed designs for the plan – drawn up after two years of engineering study – are beginning now.

Changes outlined in the Energy and Climate Plan could reduce the campus carbon impact by as much as 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, far exceeding the aggressive goals of California’s landmark AB 32 Global Warming Solutions Act.

Read the full story in the Bowling Green Daily News.

Western Kentucky University is expanding its energy consciousness.

For years, the Institute for Combustion Science and Environmental Technology has worked on trying to make coal-burning power plants more efficient; the university has attempted and mostly accomplished making its campus more energy efficient and soon ICSET will study how best to convert agriculture products into fuel.

A $500,000 federal budget line item will be used to establish a “theoretical framework” to use a chemical reaction to turn ag products into biofuels, said Buddy Steen, director of the WKU Center for Research and Development.

Read the press release.

The College of Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, is making major new commitments to advance research and education in sustainable, green chemistry.

The college has appointed Alexis T. Bell, professor of chemical engineering, to the newly established Dow Chair in Sustainable Chemistry. Bell is internationally recognized for his pioneering work in devising new catalysts to protect the environment.

The college also has helped to establish the new Berkeley Center for Green Chemistry – a collaboration among the College of Chemistry, Haas School of Business, School of Law, College of Natural Resources, and School of Public Health. Under the umbrella of the Berkeley Institute for the Environment, the center brings together, for the first time, a multidisciplinary approach to research, education and engagement in sustainable chemistry practice. Combining the expertise of chemical and environmental health scientists with economists and policy experts is at the heart of the center’s mission.

Read the press release.

Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) announced a $120 million statewide initiative to speed the adoption of the Smart Grid in Illinois. IIT is leading the Illinois Smart Grid collaboration with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), the State of Illinois, the City of Chicago, Village of Oak Park and more than 50 companies to make Illinois a hub for the effective innovation, validation, deployment and evaluation of Smart Grid technology. This initiative seeks to bring $60 million in federal stimulus money to Illinois to lower electricity bills, reduce blackouts, make energy cleaner and create green jobs.

Read the press release.

U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu today announced up to $338 million in Recovery Act funding for the exploration and development of new geothermal fields and research into advanced geothermal technologies.  These grants will support 123 projects in 39 states, with recipients including private industry, academic institutions, tribal entities, local governments, and DOE’s National Laboratories.  The grants will be matched more than one-for-one with an additional $353 million in private and non-Federal cost-share funds.