green products
Green Festival Seattle 2010
My favorite thing about eco-friendly products and green living is that there are so many expos, conferences, and events that provide fun and easy ways to learn more about green companies. I was really excited when I saw a flier for the 2010 Seattle Green Festival and just completed my registration to volunteer for the event. Green Festival also takes place in San Francisco, Chicago, and Washington DC and struck gold when it was here last year.
The festival is a joint project by Global Exchange which aims to create green economies that embrace diversity and Green America which promotes economic power and sustainability around America. The festival is Saturday and Sunday, June 5th and 6th. Saturday from 10am to 7pm and Sunday from 11am to 6pm at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center.
The Cups I See Everywhere
Beverage cups at Mariner’s baseball games, parfait cups at the University of Washington, and cold or hot coffee cups, everywhere I turn the Cedar Grove Composting label seems to be there as well. Now it’s become a fun game to point out every label I see.
Cedar Grove is a leading organic recycling company in the Pacific Northwest which started way back in 1938. They even proudly state that Cedar Grove Composting has grown to become the largest single dedicated yard waste composting facility in the United States. They provide 100% natural soil amendments, soil blends, and mulches. Also, the cups I’ve been seeing everywhere are 100% compostable and will break down into quality compost. Cedar Grove also provides recycled paper sandwich bags, cutlery, straws, and cold or hot food containers. On July 1st, Seattle will require that all single-use service ware be either recyclable or compostable. Cedar Grove is assisting this movement 100% and will make it easier to save money on waste costs going to a landfill and protect the environment by enriching the soil with nutrients from food and service-ware waste.
UW’s Earth Day Fair
Is the day after this Earth Day called Green Friday as opposed to Black Friday? Either way, I learned a lot on Thursday while at the University of Washington’s Earth Day fair on the HUB lawn. With many booths, people, and brochures, the Earth Day event was definitely an educational success. The event included signing up for contests and giveaways, planting a small plant, trying to guess what a typical garbage bin has accumulated and many friendly people to share ideas with about how to live green. Here are some of the companies and groups I got the pleasure to learn more about on our sunny Earth Day!
The University of Washington Environmental Stewardship & Sustainability.
This group is involved with many different projects around UW including the Climate Action Plan which is an institutional plan toward becoming neutral towards our climate. Some other projects they are involved in are the CFL Exchange Project to exchange all incandescent light bulbs on the Seattle campus with energy savings CFL bulbs, Earth Club at UW, and Project Earth at UW Tacoma. Their website also includes great information on what you can do to reduce your footprint on the Earth. At their booth on Earth Day they handed me a Greenlite light bulb which uses 75% less energy, saves $68 in energy costs, and 1 Greenlite = 12 standard bulbs!
Eco-Chic Expo Seattle
Now for a local, small business and community centric alternative to the Seattle 2010 Go Green Conference. Seattle’s Eco-Chic Expo is being held on Saturday, May 1st, at the Ravenna-Eckstein Community Center located in Northeast Seattle. A self described “interactive green lifestyle event”, the event is put together to provide the general public with an interactive day of tips, tricks and products to help people live greener, yet fashionable, lives. The Expo is free to the public and features a number of local companies dedicated to sustainable lifestyles. › Continue reading
Get The Stamp of Green Approval
I used to be a rice bag! Well, not me…
With the weather improving (I’ll take 65 degrees any day!) and it finally feeling like Spring, girls are dusting off their sundresses and flip flops to match. If you are looking for that perfect pair of flip flops, make sure you try on the unique I Used To Be A Ricebag collection from BC Footwear. They are made with love and stamped with approval, featuring an imprint that says “I Used To Be A Ricebag” surrounding a recycle symbol. It’s another type of reusable bag that will definitely gain you a lot of compliments.
The eco-friendly shoe, just like the title says, is handmade from used rice, detergent and various other storage bags. Previously intended to end up in a landfill somewhere, these bags can now show off their unique colors and patterns walking down the street. They feature a cushioned insole and rubber sole and fit true to size. BC makes two types of these chic sandals, the Danke Ricebag and the Earthquake Ricebag. › Continue reading
Keep Your Agenda Green
The Equology Series of recycled paper planners from Quo Vadis
As you organize your homes during Spring cleaning make sure to think of organizing your everyday events as well. A personal planner is the perfect way to decrease the quantities of sticky notes around your desk, and manage information about your upcoming commitments in one vital place. Choosing the right planner, however, can be daunting. While trying to search for the perfect one for myself, I ran across planners made by Quo Vadis. They are extremely useful and chic, while also being environmentally friendly.
Quo Vadis works with the Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) which is the largest forest certification program in the world. More than 6,000 companies have obtained forest certification through PEFC standards, and they also offer tens of thousands of PEFC-certified products globally. Forests certified by PEFC are bio-diverse, socially beneficial, and based on the sustainability of present and future generations. To learn more about how PEFC is teaching forest owners, companies and consumers how to manage, produce and buy responsibly, visit the the PEFC website.
The Big Business of Organic Foods
Who owns your favorite organic food label? Think most organic products and companies are independent- think again. Odwalla = Coca-Cola; Green and Blacks Chocolate = Cadbury; Cascadian Farms = General Mills. The list goes on and on. In fact, if you see it at a chain grocery store, your favorite organic or natural foods product is probably owned by a big corporation. See the graphic below for your favorite organic brand and their parent company.
It is the natural progression of business. In 2005, US organics accounted for 2.6% of the food market, growing at a rate of 17-20% a year resulting in a $52 billion industry in 2008.
The plus side
- Organic food is easy to find, is plentiful and the costs are reasonable.
- The food is predictable in quality, flavor and taste. Often smaller producers have a smaller production line and work in small batches with less strict ingredient or quality controls. While this can add to the uniqueness, it occasionally can produce unexpected results.
- It can expand the organic market, adding and converting farmers and updating practices to the mainstream.
The Environmental Impact of Everyday Things
Kotex Ad 1941
Now before I get into this topic I want to address the readers who might be cringing here. While acknowledging that public discussion of menstruation is a bit on the taboo side socially, environmentally it does have an impact. As such it needs to be discussed openly. For something that happens to half of the human population, the whole process and associated products are treated with a bizarre amount of shame and secrecy. Fact is, it’s a big issue. It’s expensive economically, can have serious health effects and produces a lot of waste. When it comes to environmental issues, pretending like it doesn’t happen or doesn’t have an environmental effect is a problem in and of itself.
So girls, and guys who know girls, this is important. No snickering. Pay attention. Thank you.
Commercial tampons were introduced to the public in the US around the 1930′s. Tampax was the first brand to be sold with an applicator in 1936. The basic design and concept has more or less stayed the same ever since. The main selling points of the products revolved mainly around comfort, ease of movement and athleticism, discretion, coverage and absorbency. For a brief period in the early nineties, the brand Tampax advertised their product as “environmentally friendly” urging women to “think green” by buying the brand with a biodegradable applicator.
But how “green” are these products, really?
Environmentally, there are two main issues at stake: the impact of production, and the impact disposal. A typical woman can use anywhere between 8,000 to 17,000 tampons in her lifetime. › Continue reading
