Posts Tagged ‘environment’
Monday, April 6th, 2009
Brigitte shares her story on doing her part for the environment:
I just wanted to share some of what I am trying to teach my 4-year-old son about the environment and our part in it. We live in a small town north of Whistler and we walk, ride our bikes or sled to his school every day, and recycle every week.
We live in a very small condo with geothermal heating. We only use heat in the winter maybe about 2-3 hours a day. I always turn lights out if we are not in that room. We have air conditioning but do not use it in the summer. The best thing is that we have an Athena/Ionways water machine that gives us Alkaline water right from our tap and we fill our glass bottles up every day, NO PLASTIC BOTTLES EVER! Only about 1/10 of plastic bottles are ever recycled, and 1.5 million barrels of oil are used annually to manufacture the bottles! This water machine has changed our lives.
I also own a house cleaning business using only acidic water produced by this machine and tea tree oil for disinfecting as well as other natural products. I am hoping to buy some land soon in BC and be totally self-sufficient, living off the land! I teach my child to love and respect everything in nature and he loves the song by Jack Johnson, the three R’s, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle! He also always stops to pick up garbage on the ground and finds a garbage to put it in!
Tags: air conditioning, children, environment, geothermal, love, nature, plastic bottles, recycle, reduce, respect, reuse, tea tree oil
Posted in Consumer Issues, Green Living, Green Parenting, energy, garbage, off the grid, recycling | No Comments »
Friday, February 20th, 2009
Karla Haslam from Toronto, ON writes:
Inspired by your Nature Challenge program, our office decided to sit down and take a look at how we do business.
We carpool when we can, and we never print anything before asking ourselves if it’s truly necessary. When we do print documents, we ensure that we share paper copies among two or three of us at a time. We save all our documents on a shared drive so that we can all easily access them without further printing.
Every team member brings a garbage-free lunch daily, and we make tea or coffee in the office kitchen to reduce the use of take-out cups and lids. We do as much online teaching to our clients as possible and actively promote eLearning as part of our business. In comparison to traditional in-class training, we’ve seen that eLearning can save learners the expense of travel, reduces the need for printed materials, and even eliminates the logistics of catering for a large group.
Our company’s team building activities have included discovering new second-hand stores to supplement our “business casual” attire! This year, and each year moving forward, we will be taking one business day to volunteer our time as a team to a cause related to the environment. Finding new ways to be green has been fun and kept our creative juices flowing!
Tags: carpool, eLearning, environment, garbage-free lunch, Nature Challenge, office, printing paper, recycyle, reduce, reuse
Posted in David Suzuki's Nature Challenge, Green Living, computers, garbage, recycling, transportation | No Comments »
Monday, January 5th, 2009
Ryan Lee, a Grade 5 student at Olympic Heights Elementary school in Calgary, AB shares his inspiring essay on the state of the environment:
The Problems of Our Environment
One of the social issues concerning today’s youth is environmental problems, such as using too many unrecyclable objects, pollution, global warming, and destruction of natural habitats. Please read and react to help our environment.
To begin with, pollution is almost the root of global warming. Although global warming is normal, pollution actually speeds it up. Global warming is a process in which the Earth is heated up by the sun’s rays that are trapped inside the Earth’s atmosphere by greenhouse gasses such as, Co2 (Carbon Dioxide).
Another problem within our environment is the continuous use of unrecyclable objects. We should always recycle. Recycling is a way of reusing products. Some of the many reusable products are paper, glass, some metals and plastics. We should use these products more often than products we cannot reuse. Another reason why this is a problem is because we can’t recycle. Sometimes we use products we can only use once too much.
Also the destruction of natural habits on the Earth is a big problem. This is because of our greed and carelessness. The beautiful features of our Earth will disappear if this does not stop. Some water on Earth is already so polluted that it looks really disgusting. These habitats belong to precious animals which are dying because their loss of home and territory.
If we do not stop polluting our Earth and save our planet, our only home will be spoiled. In this essay I have explained the use of unrecyclable products, the horrid effect of pollution, the meaning of evil global warming, and the destruction of our precious animal homes. I hope you have felt the need to save our Earth, our home because it is the only one we have.
Tags: environment, global warming, Grade 5, natural habitats, pollution, recycle, reduce, reuse, Ryan Lee
Posted in Green Living, climate change, forests and wild Lands, recycling, species | 3 Comments »
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008
Lynn Keating from Calgary, AB writes:
For several years now, we have filled up our hybrid vehicles with fuel that contains ethanol, thinking this was the environmentally correct action. However, lately I have been reading articles indicating this may not be so. What is your position on this controversial topic?
Ryan Kadowaki, Climate Change Administrator for the David Suzuki Foundation responds:
While our organization has not been directly involved with the biofuels issue, I would say that we foresee a niche market for these fuels. The large-scale use of biofuels, though, is problematic.
Biofuels are not capable of replacing oil entirely, and there is the very real concern about using farmland to supply fuel for vehicles rather than growing food for human consumption. For biodiesel, we absolutely support its production when the fuel source is recycled cooking fat (i.e. deep fryer grease), as this constitutes reusing a "waste" product (though of course there would be other potential uses for it).
For ethanol, we do favour lignocellulosic ethanol (made from straw, corn husks, forest residue, etc.) because it does not require arable land to produce and it also has a much higher net energy (although this may have negative consequences for soil nutrient levels). In terms of the net-carbon benefits of using corn-based ethanol, there is still considerable debate on this issue, but as of yet, the modest to non-existent greenhouse gas benefits do not appear to outweigh the issue of arable land use.
Additional insight on this issue can be found in a Science Matters article by Dr. Suzuki on September 14, 2007, "Biofuels not necessarily all that green" .
Tags: biodiesel, biofuel, corn, environment, ethanol, farmland, greenhouse gas, human consumption, hybrid vehicles, straw, waste
Posted in David Suzuki, Food, Green Living, Sustainable economy, agriculture, transit, transportation, vacation/holiday | 1 Comment »
Monday, October 20th, 2008
Sonya Tremblay from Nova Scotia writes:
I am an educational assistant at West Colchester Consolidated School in Bass River, Nova Scotia. I head up an environment/science club for grades 1 to 3. This year, the kids have learned a lot and have done a lot to help save our planet.
They’ve made a print of their hand and wrote on it “lend a hand and turn off the lights.” They then went around and posted them by each light switch. They made posters and sent out the nature challenge to all the grade levels from primary to grade 9.
The group also made an environment quilt of drawings from students in all grade levels showing how they could help save the planet or what the community could do. Each child was given a 8×8” square of paper to draw their rough copy. After that was complete they were given the same size quilt square to reproduce their piece to sew together in one big quilt.
I have never seen such a beautiful quilt. The children all came together to make it and stand up for a cause. It now hangs in the school gymnasium, and it’s amazing to see the children come in the gym and go find their square. You can see how proud they are. I thought I would share this idea with you and tell you that you can make a difference in so many ways.
Tags: arts and crafts, environment, ideas, Nature Challenge, quilt, science group, students, team work
Posted in David Suzuki's Nature Challenge | No Comments »
Monday, October 6th, 2008
This year’s First Annual Reyouzd Festival in Bruce County, Ontario called together eco-retailers from across the province to raise awareness on the art of reusing. They also raised money for students entering post secondary studies in Environmental, Landscape, or Farm Science Programs in Ontario. And the David Suzuki Foundation was represented through distribution of printed materials and screening The Sacred Balance .
For the occasion, the vacant Teeswater Town Hall was bedecked with handmade flags from reclaimed materials and extreme birdhouses created by John Looser of Brussels, Ontario . Reused fridge magnets with a picture of the world in a pair of hands saying "You Can Make a World of Difference — Buy Used" were handed out as a keepsake, and the message was clear: buying used is the easiest and most cost-effective thing you can do to help sustain our environment.
Huron-Bruce MPP Carol Mitchell opened the festival, which played host to WWF-Canada and more than 40 other exhibitors. Highlights included the trio Dropping Science rapping a message about the environment and farming practices, as well as the interesting garden planter made from a repurposed dog bone container by Gloria Lloyd of the Kincardine area. Artists who paint on anything (barn board, used sheets, etc.) and use anything (reclaimed house paint, art paints, etc.) to produce their works that even incorporated egg shells in one piece, also participated and inspired.
"I think people are doing wonderful things in this part of the country," says the festival’s Lynne Taylor, who’s planning next year’s second installment. "Come see us sometime. We don’t say ‘Bruce County: Ontario’s Natural Retreat’ for nothing!"
Tags: artists, bird houses, cost-effective, environment, festival, garden, repurposed, reuse, Reyouzd, sustainable
Posted in Consumer Issues, gardening, recycling, sustainability, vacation/holiday | No Comments »
Monday, September 15th, 2008
Right now, one of the most important things all Canadians can do for the sake of the planet is participate in the upcoming Federal Election.
“If we fail to put the focus on the environment, the message to the next government - regardless of which party prevails - will be a mandate for more inaction.
We cannot let that happen. We do not have the time or the luxury.” David Suzuki, September 2008
Election Day will be here before you know it.
• Arm yourself with information.
• Ask candidates the hard questions.
• Vote.
We’ll help. Join the conversation at www.voteenvironment2008.ca .
Tags: 2008, election, environment, vote
Posted in David Suzuki, David Suzuki's Nature Challenge, Human Health, Sustainable economy, Vote Environment 2008, climate change, sustainability | No Comments »
