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green takes the screen

Planet Green, a television channel devoted entirely to the green movement, aired yesterday, June 4. Unfortunately, broke college students like who can't afford the extra channels are unable to watch it, but it's still an amazing example of the proliferation of this movement into popular culture, as television is one of the most ubiquitous forms of popular culture around. Check out the website for the channel, and some of these preview videos ... as soon as I get the chance to watch a bit of it, I'll be commenting more!

H&M

I've been wondering whether H & M is green or not, so I did a little research this morning. Read all about it here.

ecocho

check out Ecocho, a new search engine that grows 2 trees for every 1000 searches made.

how green is the red bullseye?

Having just moved into a new place, my roommates have been making frequent trips to Target for this and that. I always talk about sustainable living, but I'm really learning now the things that are simple (conserving energy and water) and those that are not-so-easy (buying organic food etc.) Target is a broke college student's shopping heaven, but while I was in that red store, I kept thinking, how green is this place?

The better world shopper guide grades Target at a C+ for social and environmental responsibility. But there is no detailed explanation of where the company fails or succeeds at achieving green goals. Co-op America rates the company poorly, citing among other things that "As a big box retail store, Target contributes to environmental and community degradation and sprawl," and "is the subject of repeated allegations of sweatshop sourcing worldwide." Yet according to the Target Corporation website,

"[Target] recognize[s] that we have a responsibility—as team members, as a company, and as global citizens—to minimize our environmental footprint. So we've sought ways to reduce waste, use energy more efficiently, and operate more sustainably. We're proud of our accomplishments and we're continually improving, one store at a time."

The thing is, whether or not Target is true-blue-green or brown-tinted, most college students can't really afford to shop anywhere else for housewares. So if we're going to shop at Target anyway, despite unclear ratings, how do we do it in the greenest way possible?

1) buy the green products


Target online has an entire section devoted to eco-friendly products, and carries known green brands such as Seventh Generation and Method.

2) be skeptical

Reusable shopping bags are among the products on the eco-friendly list. Yet, nowhere in the product descriptions for the bags could I find whether the bags are made from recycled or even organic materials. So it's important to look for details about the "green" products listed, and to know the brands that are good/bad before going in. (This is where the better world shopping guide pocket-sized book comes in handy. More info on greenwashing.)

2) Bring Your Own Bags (BYOB)

Unlike grocery stores that sell cheap reusable bags (made from recycled materials) by the counter and give a discount for those who BYOB, Target has no such policy. Furthermore, they use only plastic bags at the register, and though these bags have clever tips for reuse, quitting plastic is best. So it's important to BYOB. (And check out the Center for a New American Dream's C^3 campaign which includes an entire blog page for BYOB.)

3) Ask when returning a defective item

I returned a set of Gladware that was missing a piece, and the lady at the register told me that it would most likely be thrown away as a defective item. I thought, this is ridiculous! But I had already finished the transaction so that was that. Ask when returning items where they will go - if it's something perfectly good that will be thrown away, I'd say to ask about donating it.

- green = + green

So I moved into my summer sublet apartment this week, and I have to say that the first thing that I realized is that the best way to make sustainable living popular is through pinching pocketbooks. Oil, water, and electricity costs are sky high, so greenness is not the only thing motivating my roommates and me to flick off the lights, take shorter showers (and turn off the water in between scrubbing), and let the yellow mellow.



Why pay for furniture if we could adopt it? Our couch was so-conveniently left by the road across the street, beds and shelving units were picked up on Craig’s List, the TV was bought from the previous apartment owner, and parents, aunts, and grandparents handed down kitchenware and other miscellaneous items to fill the cabinets.

bookmooch

One aspect of popular culture not talked about too often anymore is fiction. Yes, in a world of TV, computers and the Internet, books are still considered a form of popular culture. Well, I am addicted to a sustainable way to get my hands on the books I want. I go to the library of course, but sometimes you just want to be able to keep a book forever, or at least hold onto it for a while. So I use BookMooch.

BookMooch is a book sharing website, where members receive “points” for giving books away and use those points to “mooch” books from other members. When you give a book away, you pay to ship it to the recipient, and when you mooch a book, you receive it for free. It’s inexpensive (about $2.50 to ship book-rate), so say, for the price of one new book (generally around $15 for a paperback) you can get 5+ used books.

Not only this but I find this site to be a real community of avid readers, eager to share book reviews, connect to readers who have similar interests, etc. You can even send someone a “sMooch.”


Though the publishing industry is definitely trying to be more sustainable, BookMooch offers a sustainable solution for avid readers. It saves paper, connects people, and the only thing that is not-so-green is the shipping (but the US Mail will run anyway no doubt).

community

In his essay, The challenge to environmentalism, Bill McKibben writes,

“The average shopper at a farmer’s market has ten times as many conversations as the average shopper at a supermarket—that order of magnitude is a sign of the world we might be able to build, of the pleasures we might be able to substitute for stuff. I predict that environmentalism will find itself increasingly interested in promoting this kind of reconnection: that ‘wilderness,’ since Muir the animating force of environmentalism, will become relatively less important than ‘community.’”

I agree with this statement 100 percent. For me, sustainability has much more to do with a sense of interconnectivity between people and the world we live in. This is why I think that the green movement in popular culture is a good thing – it allows people to make that first connection between their everyday life and sustainability in easy and fun ways that then hopefully will serve as a starting point for bigger changes.

(p.s. - sorry I haven't been posting a lot! My internet access is very limited.)

why expensive gas is great

Although it's not to popular, expensive gas is really the best thing ... Thomas Friedman explains why.

in china, plastic bags no more

Sounds like the Chinese got word of those adorable bags I made and have decided to ditch plastic all together ... I better break out the sewing machine and quick!