No Impact Man: Saving the Planet One Family at a Time – Colin Beavan
December 17, 2009 by Bookman
Filed under Lifestyle and Wellness, New Books, People and Education, Resources and Waste
The No Impact Man project by Colin Beavan is a funny and sincere experiment to find out whether individuals can live without leaving any environmental impact.
From Amazon
In the growing debate over eco-friendly living, it seems that everything is as bad as everything else. Do you do more harm by living in the country or the city? Is it better to drive a thousand miles or take an airplane? In NO IMPACT MAN, Colin Beavan tells the extraordinary story of his attempt to find some answers – by living for one year in New York City (with his wife and young daughter) without leaving any net impact on the environment.
His family cut out all driving and flying, used no air conditioning, no television, no toilets…They went from making a few concessions to becoming eco-extremists. The goal? To determine what works and what doesn’t, and to fashion a truly ‘eco-effective’ way of life. Beavan’s radical experiment makes for an unforgettable and humorous memoir and an attempt to answer perhaps the most important question of all: What is the sufficient individual effort that it would take to save the planet? And what is stopping us?
Related Info
Check out Colin Beavan’s blog to read his thoughts and adventures during the No Impact Man project. The project is also made into a film, watch the trailer here:
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Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal – Tristram Stuart
December 17, 2009 by Bookman
Filed under New Books, Recommended Books, Resources and Waste
An excellent look into how we waste food, from farmers, food producers, supermarkets to consumers, and what we can do about it.
From Amazon
With shortages, volatile prices and nearly one billion people hungry, the world has a food problem – or thinks it does. Farmers, manufacturers, supermarkets and consumers in North America and Europe discard up to half of their food– enough to feed all the world’s hungry at least three times over. Forests are destroyed and nearly one tenth of the West’s greenhouse gas emissions are released growing food that will never be eaten.
While affluent nations throw away food through neglect, in the developing world crops rot because farmers lack the means to process, store and transport them to market. But there could be surprisingly painless remedies for what has become one of the world’s most pressing environmental and social problems.
Travelling from Yorkshire to China, from Pakistan to Japan, and introducing us to foraging pigs, potato farmers, freegans and food industry directors, Stuart encounters grotesque examples of profligacy, but also inspiring innovations and ways of making the most of what we have. Combining front-line investigation with startling new data, Waste shows how the way we live now has created a global food crisis– and what we can do to fix it.
Related Info
Check out Tristram Stuart’s website for more facts, photos and campaigns on food waste.
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Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things – William McDonough and Michael Braungart
December 17, 2009 by Bookman
Filed under Design and Technology, Recommended Books, Resources and Waste
Cradle to Cradle shows that waste can become food for nature or to be used as technical nutrients for making new products. There is no such thing as waste.
From Amazon
A manifesto for a radically different philosophy and practice of manufacture and environmentalism
“Reduce, reuse, recycle” urge environmentalists; in other words, do more with less in order to minimize damage. As William McDonough and Michael Braungart argue in their provocative, visionary book, however, this approach perpetuates a one-way, “cradle to grave” manufacturing model that dates to the Industrial Revolution and casts off as much as 90 percent of the materials it uses as waste, much of it toxic. Why not challenge the notion that human industry must inevitably damage the natural world, they ask.
In fact, why not take nature itself as our model? A tree produces thousands of blossoms in order to create another tree, yet we do not consider its abundance wasteful but safe, beautiful, and highly effective; hence, “waste equals food” is the first principle the book sets forth. Products might be designed so that, after their useful life, they provide nourishment for something new-either as “biological nutrients” that safely re-enter the environment or as “technical nutrients” that circulate within closed-loop industrial cycles, without being “downcycled” into low-grade uses (as most “recyclables” now are).
Elaborating their principles from experience (re)designing everything from carpeting to corporate campuses, the authors make an exciting and viable case for change.
Related Info
Learn more about Cradle to Cradle design from the MBDC website or William McDonough’s website. You can also learn about the wisdom of designing Cradle to Cradle from this 20-min TED video by William McDonough.
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Worldchanging: A User’s Guide for the 21st Century – Alex Steffen
December 17, 2009 by Bookman
Filed under Business and Economics, Cities and Buildings, Design and Technology, Energy and Climate, Government and Politics, Lifestyle and Wellness, People and Education, Recommended Books, Resources and Waste, Science and Nature
This book compiles the bright green solutions that are found in the Worldchanging website.
From Amazon
Worldchanging is packed with information, resources, reviews, and ideas that give readers access to the tools they need to build a better future. Written by a diverse collaborative of innovators, Worldchanging demonstrates that the means for making a difference lie all around us.
This team of top-notch writers, brought together by Worldchanging.com founder Alex Steffen, includes Cameron Sinclair, founder of Architecture for Humanity, Geekcore founder Ethan Zuckerman, and sustainable food expert Anne Lappé, among many others.
Each chapter offers practical answers to important questions, such as: Why does buying locally produced food make sense? What steps can we take to influence our workplace toward sustainability? How can we travel, live, work, and learn in world-changing ways? How, in short, can we participate in building a better future locally and globally?
Worldchanging proves that a life that is sustainably prosperous, thoughtful and democratic, dynamic and peaceful, is not just possible, it’s here.
Related Info
Visit Worldchanging.com for more bright green solutions. Or watch this TED Talk by Alex Steffen on Inspired Ideas for a Sustainable Future:
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