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The 90 Day Plan

Saturday, August 14, 2010

The 90-Day Plan: DAY 55

DAY 55


Americans tend use 1-3 pounds of paper everyday.  GO PAPERLESS to save trees and ease clutter.  Most banks and other companies allow for secure, convenient account access and provide paperless statements, make the switch today.  Another way to save paper is to widen document margins and print double-sided.  How many phonebooks are hiding in your home?  How often do you really use them?


Challenge:   Cut junk mail today—call 1-888-5 OPT OUT.  How do trees and plants minimize erosion?  Why is water clarity important for aquatic life?


For More Information:


http://www.wikihow.com/Go-Paperless

http://www.obviously.com/junkmail/


Friday, August 13, 2010

San Diego and Washington Legend Tommy Hough Speaks Up on BP!


Environmental champion Tommy Hough is best known for many things - Treehuggers International, Brunch with Bob and Friends, a committed outdoorsman and environmental advocate, and in this author's opinion he is the only worthwhile DJ to run the morning show on San Diego's FM 94.9 because of his and Halloran's great taste in music and deep personal interest in bringing the ethos of environmental protection to the rock and roll arena. With a gentleman's demeanor and activists persistence, Tommy lays it on the line for Surfrider, Sierra Club, and a number of other organizations fighting the good fight to protect the health and natural beauty of our environment -from the mountains to the coastline.

Below the Surface co-founder Jared Criscuolo recently conducted an interview with Tommy on the BtS team's observations in the Gulf of Mexico and work to protect your beach, one river at a time.

Check out Tommy's Op-Ed Piece on BP, the Deepwater Horizon spill, the US Government and the perils of offshore drilling on his internationally syndicated Treehugger's International group and stay tuned on Sunday morning at 5:30 on San Diego FM 94.9 for his interview with Jared either on the radio or streaming live at FM 94.9!

The 90-Day Plan: DAY 54

DAY 54


Please BEGIN USING COMPACT FLORESCENT bulbs (CFLs) in place of conventional ones.  By making the switch to CFL's you are installing a bulb that will last ten-times longer and use 75% less energy than conventional bulbs.  Although CFL's are a great way to save energy, make sure that you dispose of them as you would other HHW.


Challenge:   Compared to their present electricity bill, if you were to replace every bulb in your home with CFL's, how much money could you save this year?


For More Information:


http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=cfls.pr_cfls

Thursday, August 12, 2010

The 90-Day Plan: DAY 53

DAY 53


To maximize heat when cooking food on the stove, KEEP a LID on IT!  By covering dishes on the stove as you prepare food, cooking time will be reduced and you can save as much as 2/3 of energy.


Challenge:   It may not sound like much fun, but you can save energy by cleaning the burners on your stovetop.  Is it a good idea to pour grease down the drain?


For More Information:


http://www.lowcarboneconomy.com/community_content/_tips_did_you_know/677


Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Audubon testifies for living Gulf resources

Melanie Driscoll, Audubon's director of bird conservation in Louisiana, testified on an experts' panel during a well-containment hearing held by the new federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement director Michael Bromwich in New Orleans Aug. 4. Federal officials asked her to speak on behalf of the living resources of the Gulf of Mexico, providing a counterpoint to the comments of engineers, professors and businessmen. Her testimony follows:

We, the living resources of the Gulf of Mexico, need you, the oil companies, the federal and state governments, and the American public, to focus on prevention of oil spills and to be able to implement immediate well containment in the event of a blowout if you are to move forward with deepwater drilling.

We, the islands and marshes, the mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, and plants of deep- and shallow-water environments, need you to protect us before you protect your profit margins.

We need you, the federal government, to create and enforce strict regulations to ensure that deepwater drilling can be conducted with a greater degree of safety. We need the gas and oil companies to follow and respect those regulations, to change the batteries, to complete safety tests, to take the test results seriously, and to spend the money to troubleshoot every time there is a sign of a problem with a well. Because once the well blows, it is too late to avoid damage. There will be harm. There will be deaths, human and animal, and there will be economic damage to communities and the American public. This can no longer be acceptable business practice.

We need you to put as much money, creativity, and effort into research and development of blowout prevention and well containment as you put into methods to drill faster and deeper, and more money than you put into cleaning up those few of us that you can capture and rehabilitate.

We need you to employ the best solutions suggested from input by the world's best scientists and engineers. You must listen to those experts and implement their solutions to protect the living resources. Whether these strategies include duplicate blowout preventers, relief wells that are dug to within feet of a well, not miles, before oil is ever tapped, or new technologies such as the ones suggested this morning, we need you to have backup strategies in place.

Because several of the technologies used during the initial weeks after the well blew out were used during the Ixtoc spill of 1979, and they failed in 400 feet of water. You were inventing new technology while tens of thousands of barrels of oil were gushing into the Gulf per day. Invent the new technology now and field test it before the next blow out, not during. Just as new products and technologies are lab-tested before being used to clean wildlife during an oil spill, we need you to test the new products and technologies for well containment, not during the next blowout, but beforehand.

Because once the blowout happens, and the best solution lies several months down the road, the harm is done. Deaths have already happened, counted or not.

Day 1: Two attempts to shut down blowout preventers with ROVs failed
Day 6: Blowout preventer repairs fail
Day 10: First oiled bird rescued
Day 18: Containment dome failed
Day 39: Top kill fails, junk shot fails
Day 46: Spike in collection of live, oiled birds
Day 47: plan to close vents on containment cap abandoned
Day 66: Hurricane Alex approaches, well gushes unchecked
Day 78: Marked increase in collection of dead, oiled birds
Day 81: Old containment cap removed
Day 86: Well thought to be completely contained
Day 87: Supertanker skimming test considered failure

You turn our home into a war zone.

You disturb our peaceful nesting islands in your attempts to help us.

You protect us after the fact, with imperfect protection, imperfectly managed.

It must never again be acceptable to perform a massive chemical experiment on our gulf or ocean waters and the living resources within. Without the technology in place to stop a leak, and without access to a sufficient workforce of vessels to skim the oil near the well site, we came under assault from the chemical dispersants you employed to keep oil from our shores.

You must realize that we are your indicator of the harm you are causing your food source, your environment, and yourselves. After the 11 workers killed during the rig explosion, we were the next to die from the oil. But our deaths only foreshadow the potential deaths of the workers exposed during cleanup, though their deaths may lag by years. We represent the reproductive failures that your children may experience in 10 years. We, the living resources, include those children, their parents working with hazardous chemicals, the residents of the Gulf Coast out of work and losing hope as their livelihoods depend on living resources.

There is no escaping the law of reciprocals. When you fail to contain a well for three months, you fail to protect all of us, birds, dolphins, fiddler crabs, shrimp, crabs, oysters. When you focus on profit, not prevention, you fail fishermen, oystermen, crabbers, captains, guides, and their wives and husbands, their children.

You must enforce and respect strong regulations, you must create and field test effective technologies, and you must place those solutions at well sites before any additional deepwater drilling occurs, for all our sakes. Thank you.



The 90-Day Plan: DAY 52

DAY 52


Nothing has changed the way we eat more than the refrigerator.  RE-THINKING the way we use the REFRIGE can cut energy costs on one of the kitchen's most costly appliances.


Challenge:   If your refrigerator was purchased before 2001, technology and efficiency has greatly improved.  Using the below link, how quickly could the savings of a high efficiency refrigerator add up to pay for itself?


For More Information:

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/consumer/tips/refrigerators.html  



Tuesday, August 10, 2010

The 90-Day Plan: DAY 51

DAY 51


While we are still in the kitchen, PLAN a NO-BULL MEAL.  An appetizing figure suggests that Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, CAFOs, located in the US produce three times the amount of sewage as American citizens.  It is estimated that 60-pounds of animal waste are generated for every one pound of beef produced.


Challenge:  Why is nonpoint source pollution difficult to regulate and enforce?


For More Information:


http://www.pewtrusts.org/our_work_report_detail.aspx?id=30009

America's Environmental Report Card: Are We Making the Grade. By: Harvey Blatt

Monday, August 9, 2010

The 90-Day Plan: DAY 50

DAY 50


There can be a high cost to low prices.  BUY FAIR TRADE certified products.  Fair Trade products increase environmental, social, and consumer standards.


Challenge:  What began the Fair Trade Movement?  Why is important to know the origin of products you purchase?


For More Information:

www.fairtradersource.org

http://www.transfairusa.org/


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