ECO-DESIGN and GREEN BUILDING
Hybrid Tugboat May Give Local Ports a Green Push
Giant sea vessels are so sophisticated these days that they require only a handful of crew members. But the ships still burn a thick, dirty sludge called bunker fuel while at sea and slurp diesel to keep the lights and air conditioning running while in port. Inefficient yard tractors and cranes guzzle fuel and spew exhaust as they stack containers.
And tugboats, pound for pound the most powerful vessels on the water, waste most of that muscle idling or cruising. Now, as seaports try to raise their environmental standards, some companies are finding business opportunities. Foss Maritime Co. of Seattle, has developed the Prius of tugboats, which consumes less diesel and generates less pollution by using batteries for all the vessel’s low-power needs. Foss calls it the world’s first hybrid tug, and expects to deliver it to San Pedro harbor early next year. With billions of dollars going toward expansion projects, ports will have to have a system in place to mitigate the pollution, or the project won’t get approved. The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, the largest cargo container ports in the nation, are willing to serve as testing grounds of the new tugboat, business incubators and venture capitalists. About $1.35 million in development costs for the Foss hybrid tug came from the two ports and the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
The Foss tugboat, which is being built in a factory in Rainier, Ore., will be based at Southern California’s twin ports for five years in exchange for the funding help. Outwardly, it looks much like other tugboats. Inside, the tug is so different that it will be able to operate like a regular work boat while using less fuel and expelling less exhaust. The idea had been kicking around Foss’ offices since 2006, based on the knowledge that tugboats tend to run on full power only 7% of the time and waste their 5,000-plus horsepower by idling 50% of the time. Tests have raised expectations that turning hybrid would cut a tug’s particulate and nitrogen-oxide emissions as much as 44%. That’s enough to impress environmental groups that have been some of the ports’ harshest critics. Source: latimes.com Photographer–Benjamin Reed.
Recycled Glass Countertops Take Home CleanTech Award
The recent 2008 CleanTech Open showcased some of the most exciting and new innovations in the world of sustainability. Among the winners walking away with a prize package worth $100,000 in cash and business resources was BottleStone, a Los Altos Hills company that makes ceramic stone countertops out of recycled glass. It takes about six wine bottles to create a square foot of BottleStone, which is a wonder to think used wine bottles do more than to serve as evidence of one’s drinking habits. What’s more interesting is BottleStone’s durability. In tests, the material proved to be just as strong as 1.5″ thick brick or 2.5″ thick concrete paver. The glass waste used is direct from post-consumer sources, meaning it’s the same stuff that’s on the side of the curb during morning trash pickup, and comprises 80% of the surface material. There is no special processing done to the glass, and therefore there are zero emissions in the production of the new surface material. BottleStone comes in a variety of colors. If you want to customize the material yourself, it can be glazed, stained, and/or waxed to any color. Not to mention the types of bottles you use to make it, putting to good use clearish Corona or milk bottles or even the Cabernet from last night’s dinner party. Source: enn.com
RENEWABLE ENERGY and THE ENVIRONMENT
BP Plans to Focus on US Wind Market
BP Alternative Energy recently released that it plans to focus its future wind developments in the U.S. only, and is looking to pull out of projects in China with Goldwind, Turkey and two projects in India with Suzlon. The company’s U.S. wind plans include installing a cumulative 1 gigawatt (GW) of wind energy capacity by the end of this year and a total of 3 GW potentially by the end of 2010. Based on an assessment that more attractive returns on wind investment are to be had in the U.S., Robert Wine, spokesman for BP, said that the decision to move into only the U.S. wind market was made by the company a month ago. This announcement follows news from earlier in the year that Shell also plans to refocus its wind energy plans on the U.S. market where the company expects the return on its investments to come sooner than other projects in other countries. Source: RenewableEnergyWorld.com
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Dried Mushrooms Slow Climate Warming in Northern Forests
The fight against climate warming has an unexpected ally in mushrooms growing in dry spruce forests covering Alaska, Canada, Scandinavia and other northern regions, a new UC Irvine study finds. When soil in these forests is warmed, fungi that feed on dead plant material dry out and produce significantly less climate-warming carbon dioxide than fungi in cooler, wetter soil. This came as a surprise to scientists, who expected warmer soil to emit larger amounts of carbon dioxide because extreme cold is believed to slow down the process by which fungi convert soil carbon into carbon dioxide. Knowing how forests cycle carbon is crucial to accurately predicting global climate warming, which in turn guides public policy to curb greenhouse gas emissions. This is especially important in northern forests, which contain an estimated 30 percent of the Earth’s soil carbon, equivalent to the amount of atmospheric carbon. Soils in the far north contain a lot of carbon from dead grasses, trees and shrubs. The study sought to find out what happens to carbon dioxide levels when boreal forest soil not containing permafrost is warmed. About one-third of the world’s boreal forests do not contain permafrost, which is mostly located in Alaska, Canada, Western Siberia and Northern Europe. Global warming is expected to hit northern latitudes hardest, raising temperatures between 5 and 7 degrees Celsius by the year 2100.This work was supported by the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, and a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellowship. Source: www.environmental-expert.com
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ORGANICS, NATURALS, SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
National Farm-City Week November 21-27
The people who grow America’s plentiful food supply have a special place of honor during the National Farm-City Week, celebrated November 21-27. This week commemorates U.S. food producers and seeks to recognize their efforts among the nation’s urban citizens. The National Farm-City Week, recognized by a White House proclamation, is organized by the National Farm-City Council, a non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing links between farm families and urban residents. The Council provides local organizations with educational programs about people who grow their food. Communities across the nation hold Farm-City events ranging from banquets to tours to job exchanges. Source: atra.org
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Introducing Butternut Squash Seed Oil
The Food Venture Center at Cornell University played a role in bringing a new product to market. In evaluating waste products from squash processing at grower John B. Martin and Sons Farm, researchers found that roasted butternut squash seeds yielded a desirable food-grade oil. Now Stony Brook WholeHeartedFoods will distribute the oil, as part of a new product line that will also include grapeseed oil from local vintners’ waste. The distributor, a spin-off of a local cookie company, believes the oils will find a niche in the specialty food market, among gourmet cooks and people looking for local foods. Source: www.newyorkagconnection.com
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SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE BUSINESS & INVESTING
Guide Profiles 60+ Green MBA Programs
Net Impact has released its 2008 edition of Business as Unusual,its annual look at MBA programs across the U.S. and around the world that include social and environmental themes. The nonprofit organization published the first Business as UNusual in 2006. The guide includes profiles written by Net Impact chapter leaders from each business school, with details from a survey taken by more than 1,500 Net Impact student members. Along with acting as a guide to green MBA programs for prospective students, Business as UNusual can show employers how schools are integrating social and environmental concerns, and what they can expect from students coming out of those programs. Each school’s profile gives an overview of its curricula, student activities, career services, alumni and administrative support. Schools are also ranked in 13 categories, including how well they prepare students for ethical and socially responsible leadership, if students founds jobs or internships that utilize their values and business skills, and faculty, administrative and student support for Net Impact themes. Net Impact is an international nonprofit with more than 200 chapters globally and a membership of more than 10,000 MBAs, graduate students and professionals. Source: greenbiz.com
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Recyclers Sign Up to Tackle eWaste Scams
As the repeated exposés of IT and electronic waste ending up in illegal and environmentally hazardous scrap yards in the developing world confirm, knowing which waste handling firm to trust with your old kit is a significant challenge wherever your business operates. It is all the more difficult in North America, where lax eWaste laws make it even easier than in Europe for irresponsible “recyclers” to export scrap electronics to locations in the developing world, where they are typically broken down in illegal and hazardous conditions. Chemicals and eWaste lobby groups the Basel Action Network and the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, have moved to address the problem by beefing up the e-Stewards certification program for responsible eWaste recyclers, which incorporate independent auditing and accreditation of those firms carrying the label. The voluntary e-Steward certification, which is carried by 32 US and Canadian electronics recyclers, requires firms to ensure no eWaste is dumped in developing countries, local landfills or incinerators; that prison labor is not used to process the waste; and that private data contained in discarded computers is not released.
The Basel Action Network said that while the scheme had already proved successful, it would be tightened further from early 2010 to include third party auditing of those firms carrying the certification. The Basel Action Network and the Electronics TakeBack Coalition are also hoping that the scheme can provide the foundations for new eWaste legislation in the US that will make it illegal for firms to dump waste electronics in developing countries. In September, a report from the US Government Accountability Office criticized the Environmental Protection Agency’s failure to control harmful US eWaste exports, and called for “stronger enforcement and more comprehensive regulation” to tackle the problem. Source: businessgreen.com PHOTO: Southern China town of Guiyu — a sort of ‘Chernobyl of electronic waste’ / 60 MINUTES.
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INTEGRATIVE and ALTERNATIVE HEALTHCARE
Elderberry is a Flu Virus’s Worst Nightmare
The black elder tree, also called the elderberry tree, has a rich, longstanding history of folklore. According to Earl Mindell in his Herb Bible, which provides folkloric factoids, during the Middle Ages, the English believed that it was the favorite tree of witches, who would take respite among its branches. To disturb such a tree would mean to incur the witch’s wrath. Also, the tree was said to have mystical abilities, and to have such an arboreal on one’s property meant good luck. Maybe those who lived in antiquity somehow understood that the tree indeed offers something nearly “magical.” Its berries, in particular, have been found to contain compounds that can stop a cold or flu dead in its tracks, an accomplishment that still has not found its way into OTC pharmaceutical products or vaccines. Gypsies, notes Mindell, traditionally have used the berry from the black elder tree as a popular remedy for flu and colds. Drunk as a hot tea, it promotes sweating and helps soothe upper respiratory infections. Elderberries offer good levels of vitamins A, B and C, and they have long been used as a savory fruit in jams and pies, providing these vitamins in the diet. Dr. Madeleine Mumcuouglu, Ph.D., a virologist based in Israel, is credited for discovering the mechanism of action of elderberry extract on colds and flu. In her booklet, Sambucus, Black Elderberry Extract, subtitled, “A breakthrough in the treatment of influenza,” she describes what a flu virus is and how it takes hold in the body, as well as providing information on how the black elderberry extract helps thwart the invasion of the virus. Source: www.netnewsdesk.com
Placebo Acupuncture Is Associated With Higher Pregnancy Rate After IVF Than Real Acupuncture
A study comparing the effects of real and placebo acupuncture on pregnancy rates during assisted reproduction has found that, surprisingly, placebo acupuncture was associated with a significantly higher overall pregnancy rate than real acupuncture. The study, published online in the journal Human Reproduction (http://humrep.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/den380v3), looked at real and placebo acupuncture given on the day of embryo transfer in 370 patients in a randomized, double blind trial (where neither the patients nor the doctors knew which treatment was being given). The researchers found that the overall pregnancy rate (defined by a positive urinary pregnancy test) for placebo acupuncture was 55.1%, versus 43.8% for the real acupuncture. The authors say that their results suggest that placebo acupuncture may not act as an inert control for real acupuncture, and that it may be having a real effect. This theory is supported by the fact that measurements for the receptivity of the uterus and the levels of patient stress changed significantly for both the real and control groups after the women had received the real or placebo acupuncture. It is difficult to design a suitable control for acupuncture – a treatment that involves the insertion of fine needles into particular points on the body. In this study, the researchers used a placebo needle that looked identical to a real acupuncture needle, but which was blunt and retracted into the handle of the needle when pressed on the skin, while still giving the appearance and sensation of entering the skin. A trained acupuncturist applied the placebo to the same acupuncture points as for the real acupuncture. Source: www.sciencedaily.com