If your gramma couldn't pronounce it, well, you might not want to eat it. With over 80,000 largely untested, man-made chemicals in use today, whole, organic food is still known as one of gramma’s best medicines. Non-organic factory foods, routinely made with chemicals known to increase shelf life and sales, damage our health and make good nutrition difficult for the average shopper. Reading labels helps shoppers vote for an organic, fair trade food chain, from the CO2 absorbing soil to the farmer to your kitchen table. 

With food prices going through the roof, folks across the nation are returning to an age old tradition—planting beautiful, money-saving and edible landscaping. Instead of just colorful vegetation, growing beautiful and edible yard plants can save money on the food bill, provide a very local source for nutrition, and help reduce one's food related carbon footprint. 

Petroleum based industrial agriculture is a major contributor to climate change and continues to damage air, water, soil, and a rapidly growing number of species. Tune in to hear how grass roots organizations across the US are working to clean up our mainstream food supply by going local and organic.

The Department of Energy estimates that the proliferation of devices with stand-by power gobbles up some 40% of the energy consumed by home electronics. This wasted power equals the annual output of 17 power plants or about six per cent of America‘s total residential electricity consumption. 

Phantom loads are an obvious target for conservation of energy and natural resources and for reduction of toxic power plant emissions.  Fortunately, there are easy and relatively inexpensive upgrades that can reduce this major waste stream from homes and businesses, simple measures that can give a pay-back and possible tax deductions. 

Solar gardens are a brainchild of Paul Spencer of Carbondale, CO, founder of the Clean Energy Collective. An electrical engineer and self-described "serial-entrepreneur," Spencer has a passion for cutting-edge environmental and renewable energy technologies. His vision is to help everyone have access to clean energy and to be part of a practical solution to climate change.

Individuals, communities or businesses can invest in one panel or many, then enjoy the energy and financial benefits while offsetting climate changing pollution from fossil fuel sources. Find out how by listening to this informative 5-minute eco-spot.

One of the most important questions, often overlooked by people shopping for homes is how these homes compare to one another in terms of energy use over the life of the building. Well aware of the major impact on climate change caused by buildings and their energy needs, real estate brokers are learning how to get smarter with the use of sustainable choices in construction, energy conservation and plain common sense.

Listen to a 5-minute eco-spot on how one man, Dr. John Beldock, founder and CEO of Eco Broker International in Evergreen, CO, saw the need for real change in housing and real estate and took action. 

They do have a place in the modern world but just as lead poisoned the Romans, plastics, of all kinds, are toxic to every living thing. Widespread for less than 50 years, we toss over 30 million TONS of plastic waste, including bags, bottles and packaging for food into the ground each year. Made from oil and designed not to decay for up to 1000 years, plastics are a major cause of climate change, decomposing into poisonous molecular bits, affecting soil, water and air. And at sea, the UN estimates there are 46,000 pieces of plastic waste in every square mile of ocean. Swirling plastic gyres that dwarf Texas, daily strangle, starve and poison millions of creatures that support sea life. On land, plastics slow-poison our food chain.

Consumers often get discouraged by the magnitude of the problem, not knowing where to start.  But there are options that anyone can do to help minimize the problem. Find out how in this informative 5-minute eco-spot.

 

Chemicals sprayed on our backyards, city parks and in industrial agriculture have cumulative and lasting effects, resulting in toxic residue in the biosphere. This over-use of chemicals is suspected to be a cause of the widespread bee and bat colony collapse and is affecting ecosystems all the way up the food chain to humans. From local lakes, creeks and rivers to the exponentially growing dead zones in the sea, and from lawns, gardens and farms to the atmosphere, the petroleum intensive production and use of these toxic chemicals is a major cause of climate change.

We can all do our part to help protect ourselves and our planet and that starts right in our own back yard with simple, easy-to-implement, and fun projects that reduce the devastating effects of chemical sprays.

On the shortlist of America's most unsustainable systems like energy and transportation, pesticides in food, and junk mail is daily throw-away PACKAGING, which is a major source of landfill waste and climate changing pollution.

Packaging does serve a purpose. It identifies and protects food and products, and the packaging industry provides jobs. But the wasted packaging that is not recycled or land-filled is often incinerated into the air or found floating in the sea. Swirling masses of plastic waste, called gyres, now exist—the largest of which is bigger than the United States.

There’s an absolute connection between the sheer amount of throw-away packaging and the vast amounts of unseen pollution changing our atmosphere, land and sea.

Flashy packaging is often an illusion to induce sales. But there are options...and smart choices at the store make less waste and pollution for our finite Earth. 

While Washington's broken public systems have a profound effect on local people, corporations are free to fund politicians. Swarms of lobbyists for the power elite have a growing stranglehold on politicians who will put private interests and enormous profits ahead of the public good.

But all the while, folks are learning that real solutions for retooling and creating cleaner living systems exist on the local, community and grass roots levels. Anthropologist Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." How will you get involved?

Sustainability is a popular and somewhat overused catch phrase, often misunderstood by everyone from environmentalists to corporate sales departments.

But Gunter Pauli is one person with a clear vision of sustainability and how ecosystem-based designs can save resources. Gunter is a pioneer in Zero Emissions, who consults internationally on environmental solutions. He's an entrepreneur, visionary writer and member of the Club of Rome. His book, The Blue Economy, illustrates how in ten years just 100 innovations could create 100 million jobs, leaving popular, often expensive ‘green’ concepts in the dust. 

Pauli says, "Sustainability is the capacity to respond to the basic needs of everyone on Earth with what we have." Learn about how this innovative and important concept can help transform our world. 

People love to party. Sure, its good to connect with friends and neighbors, but most of us forget about the hidden costs. We dump left-over food and party snacks packaged in plastic, toss empty beverage bottles by the case, and create mountains of disposable cups, plates and utensils in our landfills, not realizing the impact of our waste.

Party waste is no small part of our enormous, waste stream, but in every corner of online America, folks are catching on to more sustainable lifestyles as they learn to Party Green.