Recyling water filters

After much petitioning, a grassroots campaign has succeeded in persuading Brita water filtration company to provide a recycling program for their plastic water filters. Go here to learn more, and go here to refill your own! (Thanks IdealBite!)

Getting Started on Green Resolutions

Today, some web resources to help you get motivated:

• If you don’t use compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) because they’re not warm and homey enough, consider these top picks featured at Low Income Living.
• More Green for Less Green has recently posted tips on how to make your own cheaper, greener versions of everything from produce bags to dish soap, not to mention the great ideas for saving on groceries–and no, you haven’t heard it all before!
• If you resolved to become more aware of and involved in environmental issues, log on to EarthNews, a blog-format news engine supported bySupported by the Environmental Information Coalition and the National Council for Science and the Environment.

Seen and Heard

Seen: A new element of style. Some creative folks in the Netherlands have created a font that uses up to 20% less ink. Get it free for your computer here. (Thanks to DailyCandy for the tip-off).

Heard: Imperiled bird songs. Audubon published a beautiful and frightening article about Canada’s endangered boreal forest and the North American birds that depend on it for survival. Read about it, and hear the birds sing, at the Boreal Songbird Initiative’s important website.

Coalition to Sue the EPA; Great Lakes Now Protected

From the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s website:

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF), the Virginia State Waterman’s Association, the Maryland Watermen’s Association, the Maryland Saltwater Sportfishermen’s Association, former Maryland Governor Harry Hughes, retired Maryland Senator Bernie Fowler, former Virginia legislator and Natural Resources Secretary Tayloe Murphy, and former Washington D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams today notified the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that they intend to go to federal court to force EPA to require pollution reduction in the Chesapeake Bay.

Visit CBF’s website if you want to watch a video statement, sign a petition supporting the action, or learn how to attend a upcoming rally. Do you think the action is justified? How should we go about saving the Bay?

On a happier note, a historic law now protects the Great Lakes from “depletion and diversions,” according to the Great Lakes Natural Resource Center’s press release.

A Big Step for Boreal Forests

For all of you who signed the Boreal Songbird Initiative petition I posted on the Conservation Page a few months ago, this news should be especially heartening: Ontario’s leader has pledged to preserve 55 million acres of boreal forest (home to prime songbird habitat and climate-regulating trees) in large tracts, a move hailed by conservationists. You can read more about it at the International Boreal Conservation Campaign’s webpage.

Irreplaceable

I’m not talking about the Beyonce song. A beautiful partnership has formed between such seemingly divergent fields as law and art to promote awareness and action on behalf of wildlife endangered by climate change. At their website, Irreplaceable: Wildlife in a Warming World, you can view an online version of the traveling photography exhibit featuring works by some of the world’s best nature photographers. You can learn about animals that may be imperilled by climate change, and you can help. A sprinkling of quotes from the esteemed thinkers of the world, past and present, serves to lift the site into a spiritual experience.

Conservation Page Update

Please check out the conservation page for an urgent action item concerning the Endangered Species Act. Simply click on the picture to visit the National Wildlife Federation for more information and an opportunity to help.

Hooray for Big Corporations

. . . Okay, maybe not all of them, but some consumer product giants like Deer Park, Kraft, and others are making their plastic containers sleeker to deliver the same amount of product in less packaging. They have even anticipated the fears of consumers and printed “Still 8 ounces!” or similar encouragements right on the package. It warms my heart to see even such a small step by the companies that, like it or not, control the majority of the product stream for the majority of the American public.

Another supermarket development you may have noticed is the introduction, and even T.V. promotion, of concentrated dish and laundry detergents. Buying liquids in concentrate saves money and packaging, as penny-pinchers have known for decades with their (admittedly sometimes scary) concentrated juice drinks. We all remember those from school. Now, it seems, concentrate is cool again, as long as you remember to use the amount on the package.

There are, of course, still corporations that need a push from their voters–the consumers–to make some needed changes to products millions use frequently. If you’d like to help, go here to sign a petition for safe cleaning products and disclosed ingredients from leading companies (with thanks to the Audubon Naturalist Society for promoting this opportunity).

Earth Day 2008

What would I be if I didn’t mention tomorrow, a day that has inspired Americans to environmental acts of good will since 1970? Earth Day is always held on April 22, but somehow it sneaks up on one between Easter and Memorial Day weekend. At least, it sneaks up on me. So even if it’s too late for me to do something extravagant, you might be able to. I encourage you to visit the professionals: Earth Day Network, the self-appointed Masters of Ceremonies, if you will, for the holiday. On their website, you can search for local activities, get directions to said activities, and post an activity (there’s still time!). Even if you can’t make it outside, you can sign petitions, register to vote, listen to celebrity pitches for the fight against climate change, read about the environmental impacts of plastic bags, find our your ecological footprint, watch Earth Day TV, and (gasp) even more green things than you can shake a solar-powered cell phone charger at. So try it. And when you’re done, visit ohranger.com, where you can get detailed info and fun activities about all the national parks, so you can start planning your nature-loving vacation. You could even win one.