make your voice heard

Tomorrow is the International Day of Climate Action, marking six weeks before governments convene in Copenhagen, Denmark, for the UN Climate Change Conference to create a new climate treaty.

Tomorrow is the day to come together to urge world leaders to take bold and immediate steps to address climate change and reduce carbon emissions, by agreeing to an ambitious, fair, and binding global climate deal.

Over 4,000 events are being organized in more than 170 countries, so join an event near you and make your voice heard!

what ARE they searching for?

One of most popular search phrases people who visit our site use is "all recycled stuff."

Which got us to thinking, when someone types that into a search engine, what exactly are they hoping to find? Well, we tried it, and here's what we found:

Where does all the recycled stuff go? from WikiAnswers

Space Baby Beebo sculpture – recycled stuff from Earth Stream

Jewellery made from recycled stuff from How Can I Recycle This?

holiday crafts: Halloween (recycled stuff) from Fun In The Making

Awesome Things to Make with Recycled Stuff from Amazon.com

Recycled "stuff" this year from Flickr

And, of course, our very own footprint: all natural green eco recycled stuff. Aha...we used it right there in the title ;)

Note: the image at top was the first to come up when we searched "all recycled stuff" in Bing. Now that is strange.

going green? give up your dog, not your car

In their book "Time to Eat the Dog: The Real Guide to Sustainable Living," New Zealanders Robert and Brenda Vale claim keeping a medium-sized dog has the same ecological impact as driving 10,000 km a year in a 4.6 liter Land Cruiser.

The Vales estimated the ecological footprint of cats and dogs based on the amount of land needed to grow common brands of pet food.

Constructing and driving the Land Cruiser for a year requires 0.41 hectares of land, while growing and manufacturing a dog's food takes about 0.84 ha -- or 1.1 ha in the case of a large dog such as a German shepherd.

On top of that, meat-eating swells the eco-footprint of canines, and felines are not that much better, according to the Vales.

The average cat's eco-footprint - 0.15 ha - weighs in slightly less than a Volkswagen Golf, but is still 10 times a hamster's 0.014 ha -- which is itself half the eco cost of running a plasma television.

Brenda Vale says the title of the book is meant to shock, but the couple - who do not have a cat or dog - believe the reintroduction of non-carnivorous pets into urban areas would help slow down global warming.

"The title of the book is a little bit of a shock tactic, I think, but though we are not advocating eating anyone's pet cat or dog there is certainly some truth in the fact that if we have edible pets like chickens for their eggs and meat, and rabbits and pigs, we will be compensating for the impact of other things on our environment."

Over 200 comments have been posted on stuff.co.nz - worth reading, if just for entertainment value. (Our favourite: "I wouldn't eat dog. Dogs have got personality. Personality goes a long way.")

trashless tuesday

Great list from ecosalon of The Top 20 Things We Throw Away (That We Shouldn’t). Here's a hint - a lot of them start with the word "disposable"...

Razor Blades
Buy a razor sharpener to make dull blades like new again. (Whoever invented the idea of throwaway shaving razors has a special place in a melting ice cap.)

Plastic Hand Soap Dispensers
Invest in a reusable hand soap dispenser. In addition to giving your bathroom a decorative touch, it’s less expensive to refill them with bulk quantities of liquid hand soap.

Read them all at ecosalon, then find out more about Trashless Tuesday.

nellie's sets laundry straight

Fans of Nellie's will jump with joy (well, about as much as one can muster about laundry) over their new metal tin packaging, replacing a combination of paper and plastic.

According to Nellie's, 'iron and steel are the world's most recycled materials and among the easiest materials to reprocess.' They look pretty cool on the shelf too.

On the burning question of liquid vs. powder, here is their response:

Liquid detergents are made up from at least 50% water. At Nellie's we don't think selling you water and moving water around the planet is a very good idea. The fact is, more cleaning power can be packed into a smaller space using powder.

Not exactly well put - but they have a point.

i search, therefore i'm green

"A single Google query consumes as much energy as an 11-watt light bulb does in one hour."

This according to the home page for Znout, an free Google-based search site. Znout says their search engine turns your "web searches into green web searches," by measuring the energy consumption of their servers, plus emissions from the network infrastructure, plus the energy consumption of your own computer.

Then they purchase renewable energy certificates (similar to carbon credits) to balance out the environmental footprint caused by searching. Apparently, this in itself makes your searches "eco-friendly."

Forestle - another "green search engine" based with Yahoo - donates all profits to the "Adopt an Acre" program of The Nature Conservancy, which uses this money for the sustainable protection of rainforests.

Sounds simple. But, like the debate over carbon offsetting (why are we not trying to reduce emissions instead?), it's not.

Both sites bear the logo "Green Certified Site" - a product of C02 stats, which charges between $10-100 a month in exchange for a logo that says your site is "carbon neutral and energy-efficient."

But hey, what's Google doing about the environment anyway? Search away! Ecocho | Blackle | EcoSeek

way better than sunday school

TerraChoice Environmental Marketing, brainchild behind the Sins of Greenwashing reports, has launched an online game to encourage consumers to make smarter, greener purchasing choices - and avoid the Seven Sins of Greenwashing.

“Name that Sin” is a custom-built Flash application that challenges players with a variety of multiple choice questions, such as identifying a legitimate eco-label from a fake one.

Other questions ask players to select the correct “Greenwashing Sin” that a product claim is committing. The game is designed to play more than once, with new questions added each time.

So go on! Play it now at sinsofgreenwashing.org or on Facebook.

4 ounces of fun in the sun

Congrats go out to C. Matthews of Ottawa, ON, who won the random drawing today for sunscreen from Kiss My Face.

Thanks go out to all of those who entered with their fabulous summer green tips!

a rose by any other name

Everyone needs some time off in the summer, and the team here at footprint is no exception. After some much needed sunshine (avec sunscreen of course!) we're back and eager to bring you more light steps.

Speaking of vacations, one of us had a nasty dining surprise when she found out that her beloved pan-seared Chilean sea bass is actually the Antarctic toothfish - over-fished, and endangered.

Mainly caught in the Ross Sea, Antarctica, industrial fishing for this key predatory fish started in 1996 with New Zealand and now includes a dozen nations.

Though the industry maintains that the fishing pressure has not yet caused irreparable harm to the ecosystem, reports indicate that the fishing already has already had a dramatic impact.

The Ross Sea ecosystem, the last healthy open-ocean ecosystem left on earth, is in immanent danger.

So what's a girl to do?

Stop eating Chilean sea bass for one (try this seafood selector from the Environmental Defense Fund), and start supporting organizations like The Last Ocean Project, who is giving the Ross Sea a voice.

boreal forests 1: kleenex 0

Yesterday, the Kimberly-Clark Corporation - maker of Kleenex, Scott and Cottonelle tissues - announced it will change production standards to increase forest conservation due to pressure from a five year Greenpeace campaign called Kleercut.

At a news conference in Washington DC, Greenpeace and Kimberly-Clark announced this historic agreement that will ensure greater protection and sustainable management of Canada's Boreal Forest. The agreement also will stand as a model for forest-products companies worldwide.

Kimberly-Clark is the largest global tissue producer, manufacturing more than 4 million tons of tissues annually. They had formerly used virgin fibers to produce the single-use tissue materials.

By the end of 2011, Kimberly-Clark will stop using any forest products derived from the Canadian boreal unless that wood is Forest Stewardship Council certified, and the company will ensure that 40% of its North American tissue fiber is either recycled or Forest Stewardship Council-certified, an increase of more than 70% over 2007 levels.

From Richard Brooks, Greenpeace Canada’s forest campaign coordinator:

Today’s announcement shows that perseverance and dedication can achieve great environmental victories even after many years of campaigning.

I expect to a large ripple effect from this policy and its implementation for years to come. We have moved a mountain and that is going to have impacts around the world.