Help NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC KIDS Magazine set a Guinness World Record™ by donating your old jeans and other denim to help create the world's largest collection of clothes to recycle.

What Will Be Done With All This Denim?
All the denim will be donated to Cotton From Blue to Green.®.  This denim drive recycles jeans into UltraTouch™ Natural Cotton Fiber Insulation, which is used to help build houses in places that have been damaged by hurricanes, tornadoes, and other natural disasters. Your jeans will help set a record, keep clothes out of landfills, and build houses for families to live in!

It’s a Fact
It takes about 500 pairs of jeans to recycle enough denim to insulate one average-size U.S. house.

Here’s How You Can Get Involved!
1. Get a parent’s permission and select as many denim jeans as you like. (Any denim clothing is OK.)
2. The denim must be used.
3. The denim can be any brand.
4. The denim can be any color or size but must have been worn by a human (no doll clothes!).
5. Please print out this form and include it with each package!
6. Send as many jeans or denim items as you wish to:

NG Kids / Set a Guinness World Record
P.O. Box 98001
Washington, D.C. 20090-8001

For shipments that cannot be delivered to a P.O. box:
NG Kids / Set a Guinness World Record
1145 17th St. NW
Washington, D.C. 20036

Jeans must be received by June 30, 2009!        

If you live in the Phoenix metropolitan area instead of shipping material yourself, you can bring all your denim to a.k.a. Green before June 15th! They will bag everything up & truck one-huge shipment to the main denim drive in Washington DC.

We have a plan, it is called GaiaTech, ( available by link as downloaded-able Word file) You can use it yourself as a template to edit from if you like, or just get educated; feel free to share it GaiaTech is offered as an Open Source Solution by Peace Portal.

The principle objective of the GaiaTech EcoVillage (“GTV”) is to demonstrate practices that ensure a high quality of life for village participants while ensuring locally sustainable development, conservation of the bio-diversity of natural resources, and self-sustainability through social, economic, geologic, and climatic changes.

A further objective of GTV is the substantive exchange, give-away, and transfer of empirically tested practices or technologies which produce skills that ensure the development and sustainability of its social, economic and environmental attributes.

The development of these sustainable technologies is envisioned to provide for their expansion to a greater part of the Planet. Various village humanitarian and commercial organizations will accomplish this objective through interdependent development, education, local induction of self-sustainable and ecologically sensitive technologies, practices, and products for application in rural and urban settings of need worldwide.

Definitions
Since each individual has their unique idea about what is meant by "EcoVillage”, "Sustainable", and

“Quality of Life”, these concepts are specifically defined and provide a criterion to which all practices should adhere.

EcoVillage:
¨ Demonstrate lifestyles which are "successfully sustained into the indefinite future"
¨ Ensure stability through periods of economic, geologic, societal, or climatic changes
¨ Weave together into one fabric, all aspects of village living, including; housing, energy, health assurance, education, commerce, agriculture, cottage industry, recreation, and culture
¨ Promote the ability of the individual to experience a quality life of physical, mental, emotional and spiritual fulfillment
¨ Meet every aspect of the definition of "Sustainability"

Sustainability:

Meeting "the needs of present life-forms in a healthy manner without compromising the ability of future generations of all life forms to meet their own needs." Specifically, activities are defined by GTV as sustainable when they meet the following criteria:
¨ Use materials in continuous cycles
¨ Use renewable and reliable sources of energy

¨ Are primarily founded upon the qualities of being human (i.e. creativity, communication, coordination, appreciation, and spiritual and intellectual development.)

To read more, open the file attached here!

Conference watch: This Friday, February 27th, "innovators, entrepreneurs, visionaries, and eco-designers" will meet at the Greener Gadgets 2009 expo in New York City. Well-known eco-inventor and engineer Saul Griffith has been enlisted to give this year's keynote. The 2008 lineup included keynote speaker Mary Lou Jepsen of One Laptop Per Child, and leaders from HP, BusinessWeek, Nokia, Climate Savers and Engadget.

Greener Gadgets promises this year to "be even bigger and better" than the 2008 inaugural event. Among the more exciting things happening at the conference, the winner of the Greener Gadgets Design Competition will be announced and presented with $3,000. Awesome.

At the conference, attendees will "discuss the future of sustainability for the consumer electronics industry." According to the facebook event page for the conference:

This year’s conference will feature engaging discussion on:

-Emerging energy technology
-Real solutions for e-waste recycling
-New inventions in energy generation and efficiency
-Future forward recyclable gadgetry
-The business case for going green

While registration is now closed, you should be able to catch exciting news over on their blog.

corporate governance

"The Corporate World" what a term! It is so. These large companies are like little countries. They have their own laws, rules and standards. The hierarchy is fascinating. It's a necessity so there is order and coordination between the differing departments all with there own jobs/tasks/procedures. Inherent and built in to this hierarchy are many flaws. The social division seems to me to be the basic reason for any or all of these flaws. This division is struck across lines of salary and education. People who have degrees naturally feel elite compared to those who do not. People who are salaried also tend to look down on the hourly worker. Now a days we have the contract or part time worker which has become the new under class. Delegation of work is encouraged. The lower levels of the work-force invariably get strapped with the lion’s share of the tasks. Dependent on the productivity of these workers is the evaluation of the upper management abilities. In some states where the workers are not considered valued people on a responsible social level the penalties for low productivity are damaging and harmful. The consequences are frequently dismissal from the corporation without proper encouragement or training. This makes for a transient workforce that migrates from corporation to corporation with no chance of a dignified retirement. Upper management meanwhile continues to insulate himself or herself from the bulk of the workforce. This further causes them to lose site of their responsibilities to address workers respectfully and honorably. Here is an example that I would like to share from my personal experiences in the medical community. Look in the parking lot. The nurses and the allied health people all drive middle class cars but the management teams always drive really nice new cars. The charges for health care are out of the realm of reality. No one seems to have an answer for why that is but it's obvious. The upper-management teams of the hospitals, insurance and pharmaceutical companies have separated themselves socially from the bulk of society and greed has infected them. They have no compassion or reservation for raising the rates and prices and they stuff their bank accounts with the profits. The universities and the colleges have made matters worse because they have encouraged a "club" mentality a standard of entitlement. This is so insidious and hidden in the exclusive terminology and languages they use to converse and ply their trade. So people come out of the educational system with a ruthless attitude and a business like self-righteousness. This evolves eventually into an out of touch, upper management, corporate type royalty. There is little conviction of their responsibility to a generation that needs their expertise to help them have productive meaningful lives. Instead everyone else is looked at as a burden and/or asset to be taken advantage of, or used. Eventually if this is not addressed and seen as a problem our society will be severely and adversely damaged. I'm hoping these words will expose the flaw and produce a spark for a good change. I'm concerned however that my observations will be labeled as counter productive and incorrect. I know I'm right though. The evidence is everywhere, from the higher fuel prices to the cost of housing and land. Of course the cost of drugs and alcohol hasn't changed much. Perhaps if people stay "under the influence" they won't notice. edeichinger2006, 

 Lackner’s research http://www.thebreakthrough.org/blog/2008/03/ from_synthetic_trees_to_carbon.shtmloncarbon

American Museum of Natural History
Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future

On Display October 18, 2008 – August 16, 200

If you live in the New York area or are planning a visit to New York City over the next 10 months, you may want to check out a new exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History on climate change.

Climate Change: The Threat to Life and A New Energy Future, will examine one of the most pressing scientific issues of our time—the massive, human-induced warming of Earth, a phenomenon that could lead to drought, rising sea levels, heavy storms, and other events with potentially dire impacts on the health of society and the natural world. This exhibition will explore the science, history, and impact of climate change, and illuminate ways in which individuals, communities and nations can reduce their carbon footprints.

"Evidence has been accumulating for some time that Earth is warming due to human activity," said Museum President Ellen V. Futter, "but we are only just beginning to come to terms with the breadth of the consequences of this phenomenon, and to learn what we can do to mitigate them. The fact is," Ms. Futter continued, "we do have options; but implementing solutions will require individual, national, and global action. Climate Change will examine both the consequences of global warming and possible solutions to this critical problem."

Climate Change will give visitors a scientific context to help make sense of today's most urgent headlines on global warming. More importantly, the exhibition will inspire visitors to participate in the world-changing discussion on how best to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The central part of the exhibition will explore the effects of climate change on several separate but interrelated areas: Earth's atmosphere, oceans, land, and polar ice sheets. Scientists have documented a dramatic increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere over the past 150 years—especially CO2 (carbon dioxide)—caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, and other changes in land use. Climate Change will use realistic dioramas, hands-on activity stations, and dynamic animations to understand the climate's response to the build-up of greenhouse gases and explore the repercussions for today's world and future generations.

One activity allows visitors to investigate raising the sea levels on a dynamic scale, model of Lower Manhattan to graphically illustrate the flooding that would be caused by the melting of ice sheets and warming of oceans. The movements of clouds, ocean currents and seasonal ice that reveal how climate works will be internally projected on digital video globes throughout the exhibition. A ghostly coral reef—a victim of "coral bleaching"—will show how increased CO2 in the oceans and higher water temperatures are killing corals and the communities that they anchor. And a six-foot-tall model that represents one ton of coal will provide a startling visual reminder of each visitor's own carbon footprint: Scientists estimate that every person in the world burns, on average, the equivalent of three tons of coal every year. The exhibition will also explore the options for future energy sources—including coal-burning combined with a CO2 capture and sequestration, solar power, nuclear energy, and wind power.

Climate Change does more than examine a complex and immediate problem—it lays the groundwork for potential solutions, from the personal to the national and global, and shows how these are within our grasp. The exhibition will empower and encourage visitors of all ages to help address the climate change problem by reducing energy consumption in their daily lives, whether by buying energy-efficient appliances, growing their own food, switching to compact fluorescent bulbs, or choosing to walk or take mass transit to get to work or school. Please visit the American Museum of Natural History web site for more information and details.

Source: City Pass

When Chris Samila an Arizona State University student took a trip to Costa Rica to see the Arenal Volcano, he noticed that many homes in Costa Rica used compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).

Instantly, a light went on in his head.

“In the middle of the jungle, they're using CFLs. Why not here?” he asked himself.

Samila, a senior in ASU's School of Global Studies, also began to realize that he and his generation would be the ones most affected by the depletion of the world's resources.

“I really did not realize the global scope of the issue until I began studying here,” Samila says. “The school also opened my eyes to the global economic potential of making America a strong leader in sustainable technology.

All of those thoughts coalesced, with help from the School of Global Studies Student Association and other organizations, to produce the Green Summit, a one-day sustainability event that took place on ASU’s Tempe campus in April 2007.

When he organized last year's first GreenSummit, Chris Samila never imagined that anyone but students would come, and perhaps residents of Tempe and Phoenix.

But they did come, and the summit was so successful that Samila has planned a second summit, set for September 5-6, 2008 at the Phoenix Convention Center.

And it will become a nationwide event, Samila says. He already is planning to hold a GreenSummit in Atlanta next year, and he has his sights set on other cities in the United States.

It's one of the most affordable conferences in America given the wide range of sustainability topics and number of presenters.

“The goal of the summit goes beyond conserving paper,” Samila says. “It is designed to be a catalyst for change.”

The GreenSummit will have a number of components this year. There will be a two-day conference for both professionals and consumers, offering more than 100 educational sessions, and an exhibition hall with more than 120 exhibitors with cutting-edge green products and services.

There also will be networking events, a green industry career fair and green building tours around the Valley.

Samila expects more than 10,000 people to attend, including a delegation from Eastern Europe that the U.S. Department of Commerce is bringing to showcase American innovations and ideas revolving around sustainability.

“This year, we have organized the Green Innovations Expo into 10 categories to help manage the expansive and complex idea of sustainability,” says Samila.

“These categories help define the diverse variety of ideas, products and research in order to highlight how sustainability affects your personal and professional life.”

The categories include Green Building Design, Green Chemistry Materials, Business Products and Services, Renewable Energy, Transportation, Greener Computing, Fashion, and Beauty among others.

Samila says people often ask him how he has the time to produce such a large conference, in record speed, while he is still an undergraduate student.

“My answer is that I'm a ‘permanent senior’ at the moment. I hope this will be a permanent career for me.”

2008 GreenSummit Expo and Conference

The Natural Resources Defense Council's online magazine Onearth featured Chris Samila in an article called, "Most Likely to Succeed" which you can read HERE.

 We have have over 1000 Environmental based Experiments, labs and lesson plans 

for Teachers/Home Schoolers and their students. Search topics like Global Warming (of course), climate change, air pollution, science, ocean etc..

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www.greenplanetsearch.com is also: 

*An environmental search engine with over 3000 sites indexed and adding more green sites daily (we are an actual search engine, this is not another Google custom search)

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Below is a screenshot of our home page showing  the ECO LESSON PLAN ENGINE on the top of the page.

Directions for LESSON PLANS, go to www.greenplanetsearch.com on the top of the page it will say ECO SEARCH ENGINE.

On the right of that you will see the black which states "switch to eco lesson plans" Click It, then you will see it change to the ECO LESSON PLANS, type in your search and learn!!! 

In a revolutionary leap that could transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine.

Until now, solar power has been a daytime-only energy source, because storing extra solar energy for later use is prohibitively expensive and grossly inefficient. With today's announcement, MIT researchers have hit upon a simple, inexpensive, highly efficient process for storing solar energy.

READ MORE
Site provided by www.mit.edu

More than 265 teenagers from 44 U.S. states and nine Canadian provinces will meet at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff this week to participate as finalists in North America's largest high-school environmental-education competition, the 2008 Canon Envirothon.

The Canon Envirothon is an annual competition in which winning state/provincial teams compete for recognition and scholarships by demonstrating their knowledge of environmental science and natural resource management. The teams, each consisting of five high school-aged students exercise their critical thinking and problem-solving skills.

READ MORE

While Ausra CEO Robert Fishman was far from excited yesterday about the BLM solar moratorium policy, he was perfectly happy to tout his company’s new 130,000 square foot manufacturing facility in Las Vegas. “This is a crossover point for this industry. Ausra’s factory is accelerating Nevada’s and America’s solar future by tripling worldwide manufacturing capacity, relieving the supply constraint that has slowed the industry, and continuing to drive down costs,” Fishman said in Ausra’s press release.

The factory will be the Palo Alto-based companies first North American manufacturing and distribution centers and will supply reflectors, absorber tubes and other components for the company’s solar thermal power plants. At full capacity, the facility will produce more than 700 MW of solar collectors annually.

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