Natural and Sustainable

How long ago was the last time you checked your tires air pressure? Three months? Six months? Longer? With today’s high gas prices, that inefficiency can add up to significant money. At $3 a gallon for gas, a 25 mpg vehicle with neglected tire pressure will require an extra $60 of gas each year compared to a car with properly maintaned tires. The bottom lins is you have to start with a good tire gauge to maintain that pressure. Most digital gauges cost between $10 and $40, depending on the models’ specific features. Like a backlit screen, LED flashlight, and/or programmable memories that retain your car’s recommended front and rear tire pressure.

Here’s how to improve your car’s fuel economy:

Not everyone is in the market for a new vehicle. But that shouldn’t stop you from improving the fuel economy of the car or truck in your own driveway. Below are a few standard maintenance tips, and the precentage improvement they can house on your vehicle’s mpg.

• Replacing a dirty air filter-up to 10 precent.
• Getting an engine tuneup-average of 4 precent.
• Keeping tires inflated to the proper pressure-up to 3 precent.
• Using the recommended motor oil grade- up to 2 precent.
• Seek out low-resistance tires-up to 6 precent.

How to calculate your fuel economy:

1. Fill up your tank. But don’t top off-the extra gas more than likely will get sucked back into the station’s tanks anyway.Even if it doesn’t, the backfire vapors contribute to air pollution.

2. Reset your trip meter to zero. Now you’re on your own vehicles fuel economy clock.

3. Fill your tank when the time comes. In warmer months, you iwll get more gas for your money in the early morning or late evening, when the temperatures are cooler and gas is densest. Cooler conditions also mean less evaporative emissions from pumping gas, smog forms more easily when it’s hottest outside. In winter months, it’s a good idea to keep your tank at least half full for safety and to prevent freezing.

4. Write down the number of gallons it took to fill your tank and the number of miles on your trip meter. A receipt is an easy place to write these down; most already include the number of gallons you bought. Reset the trip meter before you restart the car.

5. Divide the trip miles by the gallons of gas. Bingo, that’s your fuel economy. For example: 293.1 miles divided by 8.374 gallons= 35 mpg

6. Keep a small notebook in you car or make a simple spreadsheet on your computer to track the numbers over time. There you could also records basic notes on mpg influences such as speed, tire pressure, driving conditions and use of air conditioning. If you see a dramatic drop from one tank to the next and don’t have an obvious explanation, your vehicle might need some maintenance. ( Source: Car and Driver 2007)

**Are you a Chris Daughtry fan, well he is the People’s Choice. Over at American Idol, Reed Dunn has the particulars on the rising star and his band Daughtry. Read about it here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Keep your shades down in the summer and up in the winter to help conserve energy. If you have thick shades leave them down in the winter to help hold in the heat if your windows are drafty. To help conserve even more energy, you might consider replacing your windows with Energy Star approved ones.

1. Bloomington, Indiana:

• Population: 68,779
• Climate: Mild, four-season weather. January average temperature; 30 degrees. July average; 76 degrees.
• Median House Value: $150,6000 as of August 2007
• Natural Assets: Elevation is at 840 feet. Near various large wilderness areas, picnicking and fall colors. Nearby lakes are great for canoeing, kayaking and bass fishing.
• Sustainable Initiatives: The city signed the U.S. Mayers Climate Protection Agreement to meet the standards of the Kyoto Protocol, and international agreement to address alimate change by reducing greehouse gas emissions. Bloomington also has a major sustainable development program empowered by a citizen/government commission.
• Also: Bloomington residents describe their hometown with words such as “homey”, “affordable” and “politically active.”

2. Bellingham, Washington:

• Population: 72,992
• Climate: Mild weather with a long rainy season, January average temperature; 35 degrees. July average; 62 degrees.
• Median House Value: $252,000
• Natural Assests: Access to Bellingham Bay, San Juan Islands and Mount Baker as well as the 241-acre Whatcom Falls Park that features four waterfalls and well-maintained walking trails. During the summer, Whirlpool Falls is a popular swimming hole where locals jump off cliffs as high as 50 feet into the natural pool below.
• Sustianable Initiatives: Strong municipal and county commitment to resource efficiency and stewardship. Bellingham has signed the Mayors Climate Protection Agreement and administers the Vluntary Metering Program that promotes residental and commercial water conservation.
• Also: Some locals insist that snowboarding was invented and prefected on the slops of Mount Baker, a 10,800-foot glacier-covered mountain clearly visible from the streets of Bellingham.

3. Ukiah, California:

• Population: 15,580
• Climate: Mild in general, warm summer afternoons, buffered by coastal breezes. January average teperature is 45 degrees; July average temperature is 73 degrees.
• Median House Value: $330,000
• Natural Assets: Elevation: 615 feet. Within an house of the Pacific coast, and neat the virgin redwoods of Montgomery Woods State Reserve, one of the few remaining redwood groves you con’t drive through.
• Sustainable Initatives: Local activism, renewable energy, drafting of a new comprehensive plan for Ukiah.
• Also: Edowed with ecological wealth in the form of a mild climate, fertile soil, and surrounding forests of oak and some remaining redwood, Ukiah and Medocino County are a mecca for all things sustainable.

4. Eau Claire, Wisconsin:

• Population: 62,570
• Climate: Chilly winters and warm, potentially humid summers. January average temperature, 14 degrees. July average, 72 degrees.
• Median House Value: $139,900
• Natural Assets: Chippewa River State Trail, a spectacular riverside trail from Eau Claire to the city of Durland. Access to Wisconsin’s 15,000 lakes and 44,000 miles of rivers and streams.
• Sustainable Initiatives: Extensive use of bicycles and bicycling infrastructure. Methane generator at a local dairy operation and increasing use of solar energy.
• Also: This west central Wisconsin city is not a hige tourist destination, and that’s OK with most of its residents.

5. Paonia, Colorado:

• Population: 1,589
• Climate: January average temperature. 25 degrees. July average teperature, 72 degrees.
• Median House Value: $124,300
• Natural Assets: Great rafting, fishing and camping at Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park and West Elk Wilderness Area; bicycling on beautiful country roads.
• Sustainable Initiatives: Citizen activism (such as the Western Slope Environmental Resource Council) to protect Paonia from over development and create local self-reliance.
• Also: This little western slop gem was first established as a home base for coal miners, many of whom still occupy the bungalow houses of the downtown area.

6. Dixon, New Mexico:

• Population: 1,529
• Climate: Mild summer, erratic in winter. Average January temperature is 31 degrees, July average is 72 degrees.
• Median House Value: $220,000
• Natural Assets: Confluence of Embudo River and Rio rande; pastoral countryside of rolling hils, characterized by sagebrush, apache plume, cliffrose and pinon pines.
• Sustainable Initiatives: Passive solar architecture, local economy, preservation of land, water rights and watershed.
• Also: The housed and farms in Dixon (about half an hour from Taos and an hour from Sant Fe were built failry close together to make use of meticulously maintained acequais, which is irrigation ditches fed by snowmelt.

7. Ocean Springs, Mississippi:

• Population: 17,698
• Climate: Hot and muggy summer. Annual precipitation is 62 inches. Average January temperature is 68 degrees. July average is 82 degrees.
• Median House Value: $120,5000
• Natural Assets: Elevation, 30 feet. Accessto 170,000 acres of public lands in Jackson and George Counties and the 80-mile stretch of the Pascagoula River that is protected from development. At this year’s Wild Wing festival, more than 200 or 342 species of birds in the region were identified.
• Sustainable Initiatives: Restoration of natural wetlands; replacement of destroyed houses with smaller, more energy-efficient homes; and creation of an eco-tourism industry around the unspoiled mature of the area; birds, marine life and other wildlife on huge tracts of undeveloped land.
• Also: If you have survived a hurrican with the fury of Katrina, the word sustainability is partly synonymous with survivability. The dowtown area of Ocean Springs was one of the few commercial districts on the Mississippi coast to come through Katrina intact, or nearly so, but 177 houses in the small city did not.

8. Brattleboro, Vermont:

• Population: 11,994
• Climate: Winters that usually make the holiday season white (average annual snowfall is 68 inches). Average January temperature is 25 degrees. July average is 73 degrees.
• Median House Value: $180,000
• Natural Assets: Skiing at Mount Snow, Haystack and Stratton ski areas, kayaking on the Connecticut River, mountain biking and hiking in the Green Mountains.
• Sustainable Intiatives: Civic activism to preserve quality of life (for instance, no billboards allowed.) Recently, 200 residents took the “localvoe” challenge in which they pledged to eat locally grown foods for either a week or a month.
• Also: Faced with the challenge of preserving their agricultural heritage and their beautiful landscape, the residents of Battleboro created a local tradition that has captured New England’s heart: “The Strolling of the Heifers,” a feminine version of Span’s famours “Running of the Bulls”. (Source: Some information pulled from M.E.N. 2007)

**Need a question answered about wine, or a wine flavor? Or how about making a day of wine touring through different wine countries or just through one winery alone. Over at Wine Outlook, Farley has the latest and greatest on what’s happening now in the world of wine. Read more about it here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Pop your sponges and plastic scrubbing pads in the microwave at full poer for two minutes. This will kill 99% of all the living germs and bacterial spores, including E. coli. Be sure and dampen your sponges and any others before doing this, so that it doesn’t create a fire. This is a environmentally safer alternative to bleaching them.

Always leave a smaller footprint on the environment than when you came. Here’s travel destinations that will help you achieve that.

• Creekside Inn & Resort: Set in Sonoma County, California, the Creekside uses native plants in its landscape, natural cleaning products and guest room soap, shampoo and lotion dispensers (which means no plastic waste from mini disposable bottles.)

• Kimpton Hotels: Kimpton’s EarthCare programs includes paperless check-in and checkout, fair trade coffee along with organic and locallay grown food and discount room rates for hybrid-car drivers.

• Beaches Resort: Throughout their various locations, Beaches has an extensive compost and recycling program that includes kitchenb grease, cardboard boxed, paper and bottles. The hotels also conserve energy and water by using water efficient showerheads, energy efficient light bulbs and solar powered water heaters.

• Hotel Punta Islita: This Costa Rican resort is nestled in a tropical dry forest (unlike a rainforest, dry forests have long periods without precipitation) in the Nicoya Peninsula of Guanacaste. Adventurers can zoom on a zip line above the forest canopy, kayak on the Ora River and ride horses on the beach, while others can enjoy hiking the dry forest while learning about the local species of plants and animals or watch sea turtles hatch.

• Lapa Rios Ecolodge: Founded by two former Peace Corps Volunteer, Lapa Rios is located in Central America’s last remaining lowland tropical rainforest. Set on the Osa Peninsula, its water comes from natural spring, the landscaping contains only local plants and the lodge promotes guest-volunteer programs.

• Carlisle Bay: This Antiguan resort recycles water for irrigation, donates kitchen waste to local pig farmers and gives used equipment to the community.

**Get your kids outside to help them play better and respect nature in a whole new light. Over at Globally Green Living, Sandra Williams has some ideas to help you get them out in the world. Read them here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Print on both sides of the paper, or print paper and after your done use it as scratch paper or add it to your compost pile so it can biodegrade back into the earth.

You can cut your own gasoline use by following these recomendations from the U.S. Department of Energy:

1. Drive sensibly (obey the speed limit and avoid rapid acceleration and braking).

2. Replace your car’s air filter when it’s dirty, boosting gas milage by 10 precent.

3. Keep tires at the recommended air inflation; 3 precent improvement.

4. Use the recommended grade of motor oil; 1 to 2 precent improvement.

5. Buy a more fuel-efficient vehicle. Drive less; carpool; plan car use. Or better yet take the train.

Looking for more alternatives seems to be the topic of conversation in most environmental circles. Natural and Sustainable has posted many posts before stating the urgent reason an alternative needs to be found. Of the various plant materials that can be used to make ethanol, cellulose (found in the plant leaves and stems) is the most promising. Nonfood perennial “bioenergy crops”, such as switchgrass or fast-growing trees, can be grown on subprime leand using much less fertilizer, water, and pesticides than used for corn. Switchgrass potentially yields about four times the amount of energy needed to produce it. They also generate a good income for farmers as well.

Trying to boost national energy security without giving consumers access to the information they need to avoid compromising national soil, water and air security is unacceptable. Using bioenergy crops as ethanol sources would likely result in less soil erosion. But changes to these crops would not rule out the use of fertilizers (although at lower rates than from corn) and synthetic herbicides.

**Over at Writers Unbound, Allena Tapia has a way for freelance writers to find their minimum rate and their ideal rate. Read how by clicking here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Install dimmers or motion sensors for your lights indoors and out. They will help ward off unwanted criminals when you are on vacation as well.

Forestry field trips and programs that invite discovery and enjoyment are available now through the Oregon Garden Rediscovery Forest Education Programs.

The Rediscovery Forest is a demonstration forest for education, research and public enjoyment. It gives students opportunities to discover the importance of Oregon’s forests, see forest development and understand how forests contribute to our quality of life on Earth.

The Rediscovery Forest contains many trails to explore, most of them are ADA accesible. The following is a list of the lesson descriptions:

1. Tree Identification
2. Wildlife Habitiat
3. Forest Ecology
4. Animal Tracking
5. Tree Treasure Hunt
6. Forest and Wetland Food Chains
7. Role of Fire in the Forest
8. Forest Managment
9. Sustainable Forestry and the Oregon Forest Practices Act
10. Natural Journaling

Planning your visit is an easy one: Rediscovery Forest Education Programs are open to the publid and reserved on a first come first served basis. Most groups arrange programs four to eight weeks in advnace. Spring is the busiest time of the season so book your trip to the Oregon Garden now and learn more than you ever thought you could about the sustainablity of a forest.

Go to Oregon Forests to find out how you can regester to be apart of this great program.

Additional Education Programs Offered Are:
• Teacher Trainings/Workshops
• Envirothon, Natural Resource High School Competition
• Natural Resource Career Fair
• Service Learning and Community Service Projects
• Home Schools/Scout Groups
• Arbor Day/Earth Day
• Group Tours

**Are you afraid of death or even the thought of death does it scare you? Over at Long Relationships, JM has a fun activity to make the thought of it all not so over whelming. Mainly putting something into prespective is all anyone has to do. Read the whole story here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Use clean energy.

• Hotel Green: (Nantucket, Massachusetts) Environmentally aware hotel, which opened last year. The rooms have been given a fresh coat of milk-based paint and are outfitted with organic French liunens, window boxes of wheatgrass and hemp shower curtains. ($175 a night for a double)

• Proximity Hotel: (Greensboro, North Carolia). This new hotel’s modern lofts are built in an ultra-eco foundation and have gained praise form the U.S. Green Building Council. The building is constructed of recycled concrete and steel, its roof is covered in grass and solar panels, and it uses and “energy recovery” system to circulate air. ($189 a night for a double)

• Devil’s Thumb Ranch: Tabernash, Colorado. Overlooking the Continental Divide, this ranch provides adventures among the Rockies. The ranch uses a geothermal heating system to keep the handsome lodge and private cabins warm in the winter. Much of the food comes from Morales Farms, which is right down the road from the ranch. ($195 a night for a lodgeing double)

• Hotelito Desconocido: Costa Alefre, Mexico. Italian designer Marcello Murilli’s upscale palafitos (Thatched-roof beach bungalows) on the Pacific resemble those in a traditional fishing village. The hotel is solr-powered, and almost everything in the rooms, at the spa, and on your plate is local and organic. ($312 a night for a double with included breakfast)

• Aspros Potamos: Crete, Greece. Origianlly built as harvets-time housed for olive farmers, these 10 stone cottages have been transformed into charming hotel. Each room is lit primarily by lanterns, with a solr-conversion system powering a fridge and a lamp. Stone walls keep the housed cool in the summer and warm in the winter months. ($50 a night or a house.)

• Whitepod: Aigle, Switzerland. Set in the Alps, Whitepod’s canvas domes look like igloos from the outside and cozy hotel rooms inside. The pids are green colored in the summer and covered with white canvas in the winter for maximum energy efficiency, and are built on platforms that won’t leave a trace on the land. Food is provided by local farms as well. ($275 a night for an Expedition pod.)

• Lama Di Luna: Andria, Italy. No chemicals are used anywhere within the hotel. In each of the ten rooms, the heat is solar-generated and unbleaches sheets dress the feng-shui-arranged beds. ($180 a night for a double, which includes breakfast.)

You Know It’s An Eco-Friendly Hotel When:

1. They proviude bikes, so you can cut down on rental-car use.

2. Stocks its menu with food from local farms or local farmer’s markets.

3. Provides soaps and lotions in refillable container in its bathrooms.

4. Has a kids’ club that encourages communing with nature, rather than just the TV for entertainment.

5. Compost and recycles waste.

6. Sprays the grounds with natural mosquito repellents, not pesticides.

7. Uses solar or wind generated energy.

8. Is built with natural or reclaimed materials.

9. Uses a alternative wasy to purify its pool rather than chlorine.

**Want to know how to make crockpot pork chops? Then you’re in luck, over at Elementary Chef, Stephanie shows just how to do that. Read how by clicking here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Buy or borrow pre-used moving boxes. Or better yet if you do purchase them, purchase ones that have been or are recycled.

When the time comes to pick a rental-car company at the airport with traveling, you may make your choice one whichever company will save you the most moneu, but keep this in mind when making that choice next time you travel: More than 1.6 million rental cars emit carbon on the road each year. With that knowledge alone and gas prices steadily climbing, why not use this guide to make a more eco-friendly, fuel-efficient decision.

1. Enterprise: 3,999 Toyato Priuses and 41,000 vehiucles that run on E85, a fuel makde of 85 precent ethanol and 15 precent gasoline. $60 million pledged to plant 50 million trees over 50 years.

2. Hertz: 3,400 priuses and 35,000 other hybrids. $1 from each of those rentals goes to the National Park Founation to support environmental preservation and education.

3. Avis & Budget: 1,000 Priuses each in California, Portland, OR; Seatle and Washington, D.C.

If you will be taking a trip with children, give Echo Lake Science Center a try. They offer a hands-on learning environment and teach children everything from eco-friendly ways to help keep the earth safe for many more generations to come.

And Always keep in mind when traveling to leave a lighter footprint every time you travel. Check out Eco.Orbitz. This site offers everything from green hotels to a complete low-impact itinerary for a holiday in the jungles of Belize.

**Arkansas beat LSU 50-48 in triple overtime. Over at University of Arkansas blog here at 451 Press there is a link to the RSS feed to read the whole story. Get the whole scoop by clicking here.**

*Natural and Sustianable Living Tip: Find new uses for old things.

Putting plants to work for environmental sustainability and economic development within The Oregon Garden falls under the name of SPROut: (SUSTAINABLE PLANT RESEARCH AND OUTREACH).

SPROut’s Misson is to develop and promote the use of plants and plant material to solve environmental challenges. They build project partnerships and provides outreach and education to integrate research efforts with public and industry development.

What does SPROut offer:

• Outreach:
1. Website and publications
2. Educational literature for Oregon Graden visitors
3. Professional develpment courses
4. Curriculum for Chemeketa Community College’s 2-year Horticulture degree
5. Workshops/Conferences/ Research summits

• Research Support:
1. Research suppoert for Oregon State University’s Horticulture students and faculty
2. Start-up grants to launch research and implementation projects
3. Collaborative grant proposal develpment
4. Background researchg and literature reviews
5. Project management
6. Use of The Oregon Garden site for field-based research

• Research Priorities:
1. Wetlands/Wastewater Remnediation
2. Phytoremediation
3. Urban Water Management and Ecoscaping
4. Native Plant Restoration and Invasive Species Control
5. And Riparian Area Restoration

Current SPROut Research Projects:

• Landowner Tools for Quanitfying Multiple Environmental Services of Riparian Vegetation Buffers for Use in Water Quality Credit Trading in Oregon Watersheds.

• Sustainable Parking Lot

• Botanical Burrito & Floating Nursery Production for Water Treament

• The use of high rate irrigation of Poplar Trees as a nutrient reduction system

• New uses for the World’s Oldest Crop; using Barley straw to control algae in Aquatic Environments.

• Developing Green Roof Plants for Oregon’s Nursery Industry.

For more information contact: Renee Stoops, SPROut Coordinator at rstoops@chemeketa.edu or 503-584-7252 or by visiting The Oregon Garden or SPROut

(SPROut is currently funded by the Natural Resources Conservation Service of the USDA)

**Catch the weekend events over at Albuquerque, New Mexico blog written by Mary McIntyre. If you will be taveling soon, check out the rest of her blog to see if a stop off in Albuquerque will fit in your travel plans by clicking here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Use rechargeable batteries whenever possible. There is many uses in one rechargeable battery then a single use battery. It helps control battery waste in the landfill as well as the carbon impact on the Earth.

FUEL EFFICIENCY: It’s as simple as driving a more fuel-efficient car. Chevrolet currently offers eight 2007 and 2008 models that get an EPA of 30 MPG highway miles. Some models offer the best V8 fuel economy and have a better standard highway fuel economy than some other brands out on the market. It’s all due to new technology and this technology is helping achieve greater fuel economy in most vehicles no matter what the brand.

E85 ETHANOL: For the last seven years, Chevy has been producing vehicles capable of running on a fuel that growns from the earth. The fuel is called E85 ethanol ( 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline). It is the renewable fuel source made from U.S. grown biomaterial. what falls under U.S.-grown biomaterial is corn, and other grain products. It will help us decrease our dependence on petroleum and it burns more clearer than gasoline as well. It has a higher octane rating over gasoline as well. Chevy has over 1.5 millionm E85 FlexFuel vehicles on the road presently.

HYBRID: This fall, Chevy is bringing to the table the Tahoe Hybrid. This hybrid will provide the power of a regular gas-only SUV, but what it will do a step more is control gas-loss and fuel waste. It will also be 25% more fuel-efficient as well. The Malibu® Hybrid will also be added to the line of Chevy cars the end of the fall season.

FUEL CELL: Chevy is bringing to their car line up a test-fleet of 100 hydrogen-powered fuel Equinox® SUVS coming to New York City, Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles in a program called “Project Driveway”. Hydrogen fuel cells use zero gasoline and produce no emissions and it will also help reduce our dependence on petroleum.

ELECTRIC: The Chevy Volt® has a revolutionary GM® E-Flex Propulsion Systen. It is different than any other electric vehicle, because it will use a High-Energy Battery and range-extending onboard pwoer source that can run on gas, or biodiesel to recharge the battery while driving. Also the electric car no matter what the brand helps toward the ultimate goal in reducing our dependence on pretroleum and produce zero emissions.

**There are a lot of fun and cool things to do in Sacramento, California on Veteran’s Day. Read Jennifer Springers suggestions for Sacramento, CA here.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Babies go through about 2,500 diapers before they’re potty-trained; cloth diapers washed at home cost $0.03 per use, while disposables costs about $0.22 each. Disposable diapers produce at least 70 times more waste than cloth diapers, and Americans trash 18 bil diapers each year. To help reduce this waste, the only other option is cloth. Cloth diapers have come along way since the 50’s and 60’s and some cool brands to try are: Under The Nile velcro diapers, G-diapers starter kits, and Seventh Generations chlorine-free diapers.

Fargo, North Dakota and Visalia, California have lush, green farmlands with sunflowers and fruit trees galore. But, while both towns seem like places where the air would be so pure and natural. This is true for Fargo, North Dakota, but, totally opposite of Visalia, California. Even more alarming is the fact that Visalia, Californis has some of the worst air in the entire United States.

The biggest diffeence between these communities lie in the very nature of their surroundings. Visalia is hot and sunny most of the year, with temperatures that often soar abouve 100 degrees. Prime ozone-forming conditions. And Fargo is known by many to be fridgid, with warm but short summers. The city lies on open prairie with strong winds that whisk any pollutants away.

Visalia is in the San Joaquin Valley, and the Sierra Mountains and the Coastal Range surround it, therefore the air in the city of Visalia is stagnant. The residents tend to suffer higher rates of asthma in Visalia over the residents in Fargo.

Do you think your city is one of the poor air quality cities in the United States? Find out here by entering your zip code. And to find out the current air conditions in your own city click here.

**Need a wedding gift idea or just some paper gift giving creativity, then pop over to All Paper Arts for some wedding crafts how-to and more.**

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Always vote for change, for a better life. Never settle on what is.

Dust is full of chemicals!
Clean Production Action, a nonprofit group that promotes the development of sustainable products, tested the vacuum dust in 70 homes across the country and found toxic chemicals in every sample. The list included not only PBDEs but also phthalates (plasticizers in vinyl, hair sprays, and nail polishes), organotins (an additive in vinyl), alkylphenols (found in paint and cleaners), perfluorinates surfacants (in floor polishes, herbicides, and insecticides), and pesticides. These substances may cause allergies and asthma; harm your cardiovascular, nervous, and reproductive systems; and lead to breast, colorectal, lung, and prostate cancers.

So how did they get into your house? It is beleived that these chemicals are in every home with consumer products. Computers, shower curtains, and wallpapper emit chemicals that settle into dust, which we breath, eat, and absorb through our skin. Manufacturers didn’t expect these chemcials to leach out of their products, but it’s happening. They off-gas the most when the’re brand-new, but continue to do so at lower levels through their life. What is not know yet is the level at which this exposure become a poison. To be safe, lower your home’s chemcials burden by keeping it well ventilated (open windows!), using a HEPA vacuum, and avoiding products made with flame retardants and vinyl. Go to Safer-Products for a list of manufacturers that are phasing out these chcmeicals.

For more environmental knowledge go to Environment Talk

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: To reduce your carbon footprint, only leave footprints when you travel. Never leave behind trash. Never pick vegetation unless you’re going to eat it. And you should never pick flowers, trees, or berries in a nation forest or nation park.

Bicycling is one of the most sustainable and beneficial forms of transportation. American car owners drive an average of 40 miles per day. If they rode a bike instead, they could save 14 gallons of gas (an a good bit of money) each week. They would burn around 500 calories per hour while helping keep the air clean and the climate cool. Here’s howto be an earth-friendly cyclist;

1. Buy used or reconditioned bikes: Check Recyled Cycles or eBay

2. Make your bike fit you life: Those who travel with bikes after or use public tansportation might consider a bike that folds to a smaller size. Montague Co offers a full-size folding bicycle; Bike Friday sells a small-wheel bike that folds to hit in a standard suitcase.

3. Increase your wattage: If your one-way car commute is 10 miles or less, an electric bicycle will get you there in about the same amount of time. Electric bikes are everyday bicycles with an added battery-powered electric motor that you plug in to recharge; they are perfect for a sweat-free trip to the workplace. Wilderness Energy sells electric bike conversion kits.

4. Switch to pertroleum-free bicycle products: Biodegradebable degreasers and vegetable-based lubricants will keep your wheels turning. Soy Clean offers a soy-based multipurpose lubricant; Pedras offers a biodegradeaboe degreaser made form citrus extracts.

5. Save bicycles from the landfill: Resource Revival recycles old bicycle parts into clocks, tables, picture frams and jewlery., For a list of more recycle programs, visit the International Bicycle Funds website, At iBike.

(Some information gathered from: Sustainable Travel Internationals Green Gear Guide)

*Natural and Sustainable Living Tip: Be sure to clean your fridge coils once a month for better productivity.