Sustainable Living from Creators Syndicate

Eat Local to Avoid Salmonella for 08/26/2008

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Recent salmonella scares have many people wondering how safe their food system really is. Tomatoes, finally vindicated after the spring salmonella scare, have been replaced on the notorious list by hot peppers.

Commercially grown produce passes through many hands on its 1,500-mile journey from grower to grocer. How many of those hands were washed? How was that food grown? When you start ...

Updated: Tue Aug 26, 2008

Too Much Of A Good Thing for 09/02/2008

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The use of antibiotics is a good thing. They have saved countless lives and allowed us to increase our life expectancy dramatically.

Yet the living organisms, the microbes, that antibiotics were invented to battle have been around much longer than humans. Unlike antibiotics, they have the ability to evolve.

In recent years, dangerous microbes have grown more and more resistant to ...

Updated: Tue Sep 02, 2008

Green Lawns are Hard on the Environment for 09/09/2008

Tue, 09 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Lawns are big business in the United States, with American homeowners spending millions of dollars and many hours manicuring the lawn. But are these showcase thatched patches an environmental hazard?

Water is in short supply, yet 30 percent of East Coast water usage and 60 percent of West Coast water usage goes to watering lawns. Americans pour 10 times more chemicals on their lawns than ...

Updated: Tue Sep 09, 2008

An Old Ally Returns for Fight Against Global Warming for 09/16/2008

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

In 1944, during the height of World War II, American gardens produced up to 40 percent of all the vegetables consumed nationally. It was considered each American's patriotic duty to have a Victory Garden, and many a vacant lot was commandeered to grow squash and corn. People everywhere were plowing up their lawns, planting their back yards and setting out containers on apartment rooftops and pa ...

Updated: Tue Sep 16, 2008

The Language of Carbon for 09/23/2008

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

As you inhale, probably without notice, you are breathing the same air that circulated through the lungs of paupers and kings, presidents and refugees, dinosaurs and trilobites. We breathe oxygen that was once dissolved in the oceans, once exhaled from a tree, and probably passed through the lungs of our children and ancestors as well. We inhale oxygen, and exhale carbon dioxide.

Carbon ...

Updated: Tue Sep 23, 2008

Solution to Global Woes Could be Local for 09/30/2008

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

We are all suffering from the recession, but some communities are suffering less than others. In communities with a strong localized economy, there is less fluctuation, and more money flowing from local business to local business. These communities tend to have a higher quality of life, lower crime rates, and a friendlier and more neighborly attitude. What makes these towns different? They thin ...

Updated: Tue Sep 30, 2008

Recession Is Not All Gloom and Doom for 10/07/2008

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Is it possible that Americans might be poorer but happier in times of recession than in times of plenty?

The National Opinion Research Council at the University of Chicago tries to quantify how happy Americans are with a yearly poll. Since 1950, the number of Americans responding that they were "very happy" has steadily declined. Between 1970 and 1994 it dropped 5 full points, ...

Updated: Tue Oct 07, 2008

Home Energy Audit for 10/14/2008

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

With stocks plummeting, home heating prices soaring and a recession in full swing, many people look toward winter with fear and trepidation. One of the best ways to alleviate this fear is to take a positive action like conducting a home energy audit.

Almost half of our energy use goes into heating and cooling our homes. We already pay an average of 20 percent more in home heating costs, ...

Updated: Tue Oct 14, 2008

Time to Perform a Do-It-Yourself Home Energy Audit for 10/21/2008

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Having a professional energy audit, and taking the auditor's advice, is the best way to lower your utility bills this winter. If you can't find an auditor, or live in an apartment or condo, here are ways you can perform your own audit.

It's as easy as walking through your home with a lit candle or incense stick. Hold it near the edges of windows, doors, and electric outlets. The flame or ...

Updated: Tue Oct 21, 2008

Energy Efficiency is Good for the Bottom Line for 10/28/2008

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Did you know that your business could actually be more profitable if it became more efficient? Rising energy costs and decreasing profits mean tough economic times, but also an opportunity to save money by becoming improving efficiency.

If your business's energy bills are $800 or more per month, you could save money by having an energy audit, and taking the auditor's advice. I'm the dire ...

Updated: Tue Oct 28, 2008

Green Heat for 11/04/2008

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

What is the greenest way to heat? For most of us, it is sunlight, but for others, it may be wood or even fryer oil! With renewable energy, you pay for 20 years' worth of heat (or more) upfront, but yearly operating costs are minimal, and fuel costs do not fluctuate wildly, as fuel oil, coal and natural gas costs do.

Geothermal is the greenest of them all if you are heating and cooling a ...

Updated: Tue Nov 04, 2008

Locavore Thanksgiving for 11/11/2008

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Right now, many of us are planning our Thanksgiving dinners. You have a big decision: to sit in front of a meal of imported ingredients grown around the world, in places the Pilgrims never set foot, or skip the supermarket and source all the ingredients for Thanksgiving dinner from local farms, mills and growers.

Eating local embodies the spirit of the first Thanksgiving, when Puritans a ...

Updated: Tue Nov 11, 2008

Honoring the Hands That Feed Us for 11/18/2008

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Thanksgiving is a holiday built around food. We gather and gorge, sometimes acknowledging the hands of the cook, perhaps thanking the divine, but rarely do we honor the hands that feed us.

Growing the food that feeds our country is one of the most thankless and low-paying jobs a person could have. In 2002, the median net income for a U.S. farmer was $15,848, while hired hands and migrant ...

Updated: Tue Nov 18, 2008

Holiday Joy Without Commercialism for 11/25/2008

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

This holiday season offers Americans a chance to reclaim our holidays as times of joy and togetherness in place of crass commercialism. It seems as if after Thanksgiving, the major news in our country is shopping and whether retail sales will top last year's. Judging from our media, you would think that Americans made the holidays specifically for shopping.

Last year, the average America ...

Updated: Tue Nov 25, 2008

The Greenest Christmas for 12/02/2008

Tue, 02 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Nothing says Christmas quite like a wild evergreen decked out with sparkling lights and loaded with gift-wrapped boxes. Before you head out into the woods with your ax, consider a greener alternative.

The greenest tree is a potted Douglas fir from a local nursery, which you can plant outdoors in warm weather. Your little fir will clean your indoor air during the holidays and clean carbon ...

Updated: Tue Dec 02, 2008

Creating and Sustaining Holiday Joy for 12/09/2008

Tue, 09 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Holiday joy can be a fleeting thing this time of year, as many people feel more like Scrooge than like Tiny Tim. Behind the advertising blitz that bombards us with consumerist images of smiling, well-dressed people giving cheerfully wrapped packages is the dark truth of depression. The U.S. topped the list in depression out of the 14 countries researched in a recent World Health Organization po ...

Updated: Tue Dec 09, 2008

Economic Solution Is a Happier, Sustainable Planet for 12/16/2008

Tue, 16 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

The economic downturn we are currently in the grips of follows hot on the heels of an era of unparalleled growth and wealth. Even though our gross domestic product has tripled during the past 54 years, we can't seem to shake that sinking feeling that the third-class passengers on the Titanic must have had. But the numbers don't tell the whole truth.

Uncounted in our GDP are the social an ...

Updated: Tue Dec 16, 2008

Decreasing the Need for 'Stuff' for 12/23/2008

Tue, 23 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Most of us are surveying the damages right now. All the packages are wrapped and under the tree; the credit cards are maxed; and we spent more than we intended to. Now we have to decide where to put all the new stuff, especially those new gadgets we just had to have and waited in line for during the wee hours after Thanksgiving.

Only about 1 percent of all the consumer goods bought durin ...

Updated: Tue Dec 23, 2008

Sustainable Resolutions Are Easy To Keep for 12/30/2008

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:00:00 -0800

Lucky for us, Santa is very kind. Otherwise, we would have received lumps of coal in our stockings for being major contributors to climate change. Instead of giving us more stuff, I imagine Santa probably sneaked into our houses and swapped out those incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents. He probably is pretty peeved that there is warming happening at the North Pole and that his flying re ...

Updated: Tue Dec 30, 2008

The Number 350 for 01/06/2009

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 00:00:00 -0800

The number 350 seems so innocent, so small, so prime and so human-scaled that you can picture it in your mind. It's not like those inconceivable numbers, such as the trillions that measure the national debt or the billions that measure world population or the millions that measure the carbon in the atmosphere.

Three hundred fifty parts per million is the "safe" level of carbon ...

Updated: Tue Jan 06, 2009