Max Lindberg: GO's master podcasterEditor's note: When I introduced Max to you a week and half ago, I noted that he'd be producing a new podcast series titled "Greening the Golden…

A Decade of Global Warming As a general principle, it seems that the older we are, the more difficulty we have wrapping our brains around the truly alarming timetable accelerations we’re now being given by experts in everything from climate change to species loss to poverty alleviation. To put it simply, things are getting worse more quickly than we thought, and much more quickly than we’re making things better. Prospects of planetary collapse we once thought native to the next century, or the century after that, are looming as possibilities for the next decade or two. Things are spiraling seriously downwards, so we need to change our thinking and move with a speed unseen since World War Two. Our understanding of climate change, in particular, has morphed quickly this year. We now understand that our deadline to undertake serious steps might best be measured in years, a decade at best, and that action needs to be dramatic and sustained. But our popular culture has not, to put it mildly, caught up to this new reality. That’s why this MTV video is powerful and welcome, driving home artistically the magnitude of the problem and the brevity of a decade (3,650 days… (more)

(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Media at 10:31 PM)

On Sunday, the Western Governor’s Association unanimously passed a resolution titled “Transitioning the West to Clean Energy and Energy Security.” The document highlights the need for diverse energy…

by Warren Karlenzig The future of carbon-free transport lives strong in Groningen. This Dutch city of 185,000 proves that bicycle transportation can reign supreme: people there make about 150,000 trips by bicycle every day. Bicycles and pedestrians entirely rule the medieval-era city hub, cruising along on car-free dedicated pathways and short cuts with no traffic signals in some instances. But people also commute on bikes in large numbers from suburban housing spread out around the city to downtown jobs, via a ring-and-spoke network of paths. Overall, 37 percent of area commutes are made on bikes. Boasting an official town bicycle planner, Groningen has created an infrastructure it refers to “continuous and integral,” which includes massive surface and underground bicycle parking facilities, dedicated bike paths, and two-way bike lanes even on one-way auto streets. Since the early 1980s, 30 city bicycle parking facilities have been developed, including one underground facility at the central train station that sells bikes, repairs bikes and offers valet and secure parking for more than 4,000 bikes. Parking is financed through a low-cost annual membership program that costs $50 a year, while bike valet positions create significant numbers of jobs at the public parking facilities and also… (more)

(Posted by WorldChanging Team in Transportation at 9:31 PM)

Herbicides are great for killing weeds, but they also contaminate soils and groundwater, and are toxic to pets and children (not to mention the rest of us). Check out some alternative options for…

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In 1988, in an effort to expand the distribution of fair trade products to mainstream retailers, a Dutch Alternative Trade Organization, Solidaridad, established a creative solution to increase sales…

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In Garissa, Kenya, camels carry goods between villages that can’t be accessed with trucks. In most of those villages, 80% of people are illiterate. In order to address illiteracy while working within the limitations of the region, a small group of Kenyans started a mobile book-lending service that delivers books to 3,500 villagers and nomads around Garissa. On each visit they bring 200 books, lending each for a period of two weeks and then retrieving them to share with the next community. Camel Library targets children rather than catering to the few literate adults, says head librarian, Rashid Farah, “We believe that maybe in the next ten years, we will have a society which is educated, and the community which is now illiterate will [become] literate.”

Check out Rocketboom’s short video documenting the mission and activities of Camel Library.

(more)

(Posted by Sarah Rich in Education at 5:14 PM)

Herbicides are great for killing weeds, but they also contaminate soils and groundwater, and are toxic to pets and children (not to mention the rest of us). Check out some alternative options for controlling your weeds before going to chemical route.

The best way to get rid of weeds is a little manual labor: Pull 'em. When pulling by hand remove when soil is damp (it's easier than taking them out of dry soil) and try to get ALL of the roots. After pulling weeds toss them in your compost bin. Don't put off weeding. Get to weeds when they're little, before the root systems have a chance to take over your garden.

In 1988, in an effort to expand the distribution of fair trade products to mainstream retailers, a Dutch Alternative Trade Organization, Solidaridad, established a creative solution to increase sales while maintaining consumer trust. The organization created a label, called Max Havelaar, which guaranteed that the goods met certain labor and environmental standards. The label, first only applied to coffee, was named after a best-selling 19th century book about the exploitation of Javanese coffee plantation workers by Dutch colonial merchants.

As the Fair Trade movement continued to grow the idea of a certified label spread to other countries participating in the movement until most countries in Eurpope, the U.S. and Canada had established third-party labelling organizations. In 1997 these labelers created an umbrella organization, the Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International, with the mission to "set the Fairtrade Standards, support, inspect and certify disadvantaged producers and harmonize the Fairtrade message across the movement."

Today 20 independent labelling organizations are members of FLO, in the U.S. TransFair USA is the FLO certifying organization. These organizations certify an ever growing list of commodities including coffee, tea, sugar, fresh fruits, cocoa, rice and vanilla. These products are certified before they are imported into participating markets and are then given the right to use the Fair Trade label on packaging.

Most of us have a fairly narrow view of what it means to recycle: we gather materials (aluminum, paper, glass, plastic) in blue bins and either leave them on the curb for a pick-up service, or take them to a drop-off point. British site How Do I Recycle This? takes a much broader view of the concept — essentially merging reuse and recycling — and provides a forum where users can submit there own ideas for getting more use out of items that most of us would throw away without a second thought.

If you don't live in Great Britan, don't let the UK URL, or location of publishers Louisa Parrry and John Leach, put you off: there's very little in this blog's many posts that applies only to Brits or Europeans. Furthermore, don't expect the tried and true reuse projects that many of us did when we were kids (i.e., making bird feeders out of milk cartons) — the range of materials and recycling/reuse ideas at How Do I Recycle This? is quite eclectic. Some of the more unusual items:

• Foam pizza/garlic bread bases
• Tablet/pill blister packs
• Shed pet hair
• Dead electric razors
• Old potatoes

Parry and Leach post new items on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and users are welcome to submit suggestions (whether they've successfully reused or recycled them item themselves or not).