Celine Dion’s Florida Mansion Used 6.5 Million Gallons of Water in Two Years

Celine Dion, despite being known for singing an incredibly annoying ubiquitous song for the blockbuster film that made Leonardo DiCaprio a household name, apparently hasn’t learned much from the actor. The Palm Beach Post checked out the Canadian diva’s water usage at her Jupiter, Florida home and what they found is astonishing. Over the past two years, 6.5 million gallons of water were used at the home. And that’s just one home of many she owns.

ABC News has it:

That’s nearly 18,000 gallons of water a day, about 100 times more than the 170-gallons-per-day the average resident uses every day, according to the Florida-based U.S. Water Institute. Dion’s annual water usage could fill more than 10 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

For the past few years, according to Graham, Florida, along with much of the southeast United States, has experienced a water shortage due to increased population and record-low rainfall. In addition to causing a spike in water prices, the drought has created a tug of water in the northern part of Florida with neighboring Georgia, over water from Georgia’s Lake Lanier.

“If we want to protect our ecosystem, we’re certainly going to have to be more careful,” Graham said. “Definitely, anything like 6 million gallons per year is way out there.”

When you think about it, it’s not all that surprising. She looks like the effing cryptkeeper. Maybe all of that water is necessary to keep her skin from collapsing in on itself. That, and the blood of 666 virgins. Seriously, this woman is the spawn of the devil. How else can you explain the fact that she’s so popular despite a tremulous voice that makes me want to hide under my bed when I hear it?

Link [ABC News]
Photo credit: Columbia Records

High School Student Finds a Way to Biodegrade Plastic in 3 Months

Holy awesome! Some high school kid in Canada came up with a way to bio-digest plastic shopping bags. For a freaking science fair! Amazing. 500 billion plastic bags are produced worldwide every year, and they take up to 1,000 years to decompose. We’re all aware of the fact that plastic bags pose a lot of problems – they clog up landfills, choke marine life and are seen floating in water far too often. Finding a way to get rid of them is huge.

From The Record:

Daniel Burd’s project won the top prize at the Canada-Wide Science Fair in Ottawa. He came back with a long list of awards, including a $10,000 prize, a $20,000 scholarship, and recognition that he has found a practical way to help the environment.

Daniel, a 16-year-old Grade 11 student at Waterloo Collegiate Institute, got the idea for his project from everyday life.

“Almost every week I have to do chores and when I open the closet door, I have this avalanche of plastic bags falling on top of me,” he said. “One day, I got tired of it and I wanted to know what other people are doing with these plastic bags.”

The answer: not much. So he decided to do something himself.

He knew plastic does eventually degrade, and figured microorganisms must be behind it. His goal was to isolate the microorganisms that can break down plastic — not an easy task because they don’t exist in high numbers in nature.

Daniel ground the plastic bags into a powder and mixed it with ordinary household chemicals, dirt, yeast and tap water to encourage microbe growth. For three months he allowed the concentration of microbes to increase, and put the culture into three flasks with strips of plastic bags. Six weeks later, he found that the bags weighed an average of 17 percent less. Not satisfied with that result, he continued working on the solution until he isolated his most effective strain of plastic-eating bacteria and got a result of 43 percent degradation in 6 weeks.

What a cool example of how innovation can come from the most unexpected places.

Link [The Record]
Photo credit: Flickr user scottwyden

Scotland Building a 300ft Bridge for Squirrels to Cross Traffic

Poor squirrels. There’s just one example of animals that we’ve displaced with all of our strip malls and highways, but a highly visible one. No wonder they raid our birdfeeders and gardens – we’ve made it a lot harder for them to go about life as they’re meant to. That’s why we’re glad to hear about Scotland’s new squirrel bridge. That’s right: it’s a bridge just for squirrels.

From Scotland on Sunday:

The aim of the Kingcausie Wildlife Overbridge, as it is known, is to give safe passage to the area’s colony of red squirrels and other wildlife as they cross between their newly- divided territory. The animals will be expected to scamper above the heads of motorists as they travel along the bypass in a road cutting below.

The structure – the longest of its type in Scotland – will be similar to a pedestrian footbridge, but ‘planted’ with shrubs to create a natural-looking corridor. Engineering experts said it could cost as much as £100,000.

However, the owner of the Kingcausie Estate says he wants to preserve the red squirrel habitat as it is and the bypass should be re-routed away from the wood.

Scotland officials are determined to save the red squirrel, and are doing what they can to ensure that foraging habitats of the little creature are left intact. They’ll be watching to see how the squirrels adjust to using the bridge.

Look at the picture of this thing. Cuuuuuute!

Link [Scotland on Sunday]
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

Apple Working on Solar Powered Portable Devices

There’s no way around it: portable electronic devices are here to stay. We’ve all got them: cell phones, electronic organizers, laptop computers, mp3 players and other handhelds. While it’s great that many of them are getting lighter and smaller, what we’d really love is to be able to charge them with the power of the sun. Well, we’re getting closer.

TrendHunter Magazine has it:

Imagine your iPhone or iPod automatically charging by the sun as you use it. A new Apple patent promises exactly that, by exploring the use of solar power in various versions of their mobile devices: iPhone, iPods and portable computers. The mechanism augments the devices, including the transparent screens, with layers of solar cells,.

According to the patent, “Solar cells are typically stacked with other layers made of transparent or semi-transparent materials… Some of these layers may be used for display or input purposes, and some layers may be coated with various materials or they may be etched with product logos or other patterns.”

We have all of our fingers and toes crossed on this one. How great would it be to sit on the beach or in your garden, with your phone and iPod charging next to you, no cords required? Steve Jobs, you’re our only hope, give us solar powered handhelds!

Link [TrendHunter Magazine]
Photo credit: Flickr user ernop

McCain Doesn’t Want to Give Veterans Increased Education Benefits

Apparently, John McCain wants you to support the troops – but not too much. Wear your flag pins and display those yellow ribbons on your vehicles with pride. But don’t actually give the troops the education benefits they were promised before joining the armed forces. That would be wrong, apparently. See, a bill was recently introduced in the Senate that would expand education benefits for veterans. It’s the least we owe them for their service, right? Well, McCain quotes a study that was done on the bill that claims retention rates would decrease by 16% if soldiers were offered more money for college. The funny thing is, he failed to read the quote in the same study that showed that recruitment rates would simultaneously increase – by 16%. Now, we all know that Senator McCain is no mathematician, and I’m not either, but last time I checked, 16 minus 16 equals…. Zero.

From Yahoo News:

McCain, the all-but-nominated Republican presidential candidate, opposes a Democratic-backed bill that would significantly expand the breadth of education benefits for veterans, first adopted for those returning from World War II. Democrats want the proposal included in a war spending bill the Senate is scheduled to vote on this week.

The legislation, sponsored by Democratic Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia and Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, also veterans of Vietnam, would guarantee full tuition payments to veterans at any public school in their home state. Its expected cost is $52 billion over 10 years.

McCain says the legislation is too expensive and has proposed his own version, which would increase the monthly benefit available to most veterans to $1,500 from $1,100. It would not offer the equivalent of a full scholarship.

As Jon Stewart noted on the Daily Show last night, “Where did potential soldiers get the idea that the military was some kind of ‘fast-track to college’ in the first place?” Oh, right, it could be all those ads the military runs where grateful soldiers talk about the military being the only reason they were able to attend college. Nice blunder, McCain – especially when your military record was probably the biggest benefit you had on your side.

Check out a clip from last night’s Daily Show here.

Link [Yahoo News] + [Comedy Central]

Sweet! The Dutch Build the World’s First Solar Speedboat

Oh, how I love basking in the sunshine, smelling the salty air and dipping a foot into the water while relaxing on a boat. Too bad motor boats are really not good for the environment – they’re noisy, they use a lot of energy and leak oil. Then I saw this: the world’s first solar powered speedboat. Drrooooollll.

From gizmag:

Electricity and water: we usually do everything we can to keep the two apart, but it seems the electric engine revolution is moving through the boating world as well. And when you’re out on the water enjoying a speedboat, what more appropriate power source is there than the sun? The Czeers MK1 prototype solar speedboat is a 30-knot photovoltaic dream in delicious shades of carbon fiber Carbon fiber , solar cell and lush orange leather. Solar boats for environmental warriors eh? Next thing you’ll be telling us they’re making wind-powered ones.

The Czeers MK1 prototype is, as far as its Dutch creators are concerned, the world’s first solar speedboat. The Delft Technical University Solarboat Team built the original platform as an entry in the 2006 Nuon Frisian Solar challenge, which it easily won – and in the process, attracted serious investment power from Rabobank to get a full scale test boat built.

The resulting test boat, made from 100% carbon fiber inlaid with leather trim, photovoltaic cells on almost all horizontal surfaces and an LCD touch-screen control system, launched at the Millionaire Fair in 2007, and has since proven itself up to 30 knots on the water.

We are really looking forward to being rich ass green media tycoons. We’ll have a whole fleet of these babies. They won’t have leather trim though (yuck!). Seriously though, this thing is pretty sweet. No oil, no fumes, no engine noise. If you’re wondering about the cost, let’s put it this way: there’s a reason the LCD touch-screen system was launched at the Millionaire Fair.

You can check out a video of it in action on YouTube, complete with a weirdly inappropriate song choice (Aphex Twin).

Link [gizmag] + [YouTube]

We Can’t Offshore Our Pollution to China Anymore – It’s Coming For Us

A common refrain among conservatives regarding pollution produced by American companies is, “Let China deal with it”. Apparently, the prevailing opinion is that if Chinese people need work and Americans are giving it to them, they should be grateful for it regardless of the fact that we’re only adding to the air quality problem in this heavily populated country. A staggering 300,000 to 400,000 Chinese die prematurely each and every year due to the effects of outdoor air pollution, but that doesn’t change the minds of global warming deniers who refuse to take any culpability for the problem. The thing is, folks, that pollution isn’t going to stay in China: it’s starting to march toward the skylines of Californians.

From The New York Times:

In short, roughly as many Chinese die every two months from the air as were killed in the earthquake. And the problem is becoming international: just as Californians can find Chinese-made shoes in their stores, they can now find Chinese-made haze in their skies.

This summer’s Beijing Olympics will showcase the most remarkable economic explosion in history, and also some of the world’s thickest pollution in both air and water. So I’ve returned to the Yellow River in western China’s Gansu Province to an isolated village that has haunted me since I saw it a decade ago.

Badui is known locally as the “village of dunces.” That’s because of the large number of mentally retarded people here — as well as the profusion of birth defects, skin rashes and physical deformities. Residents are sure that the problems result from a nearby fertilizer factory dumping effluent that taints their drinking water.

None of this is surprising: rural China is full of “cancer villages” caused by pollution from factories. Beijing’s air sometimes has a particulate concentration that is four times the level considered safe by the World Health Organization.

If you’re truly naïve enough to think that this problem is never going to reach America, you’ve got some growing up to do – or perhaps you just need a reality check to shake you out of your greed-induced fog. There is no hiding from this problem. America is not protected by a magic bubble put there by Jesus to protect bible-thumping conservatives who believe the world owes them something. You shake your fists at realists who can see these problems coming, literally, from miles away and yet your precious ‘American lifestyle’ is going to be the undoing of us all. We can’t offshore our pollution to China anymore. It’s coming for us.

Link [The New York Times]
Photo credit: ABC News/Reuters

Tom Brady Rewards Charitable Linemen with Gas Guzzling SUVs

Tom Brady, quarterback for the New England Patriots, is apparently a fairly generous guy. So generous that he gifted three of his teammates with expensive gas guzzling SUVs. He also gifted the rest of the world with increased air pollution and energy consumption. Way to go!

From Green Daily:

At a press conference celebrating the success of his collaboration with Best Buddies International, he thanked three of his teammates who had also donated their time and money to the cause. In return for their generosity (and for “their protection”), Brady gave the offensive linemen really expensive cars to drive around next season — which sounds nice (because hey, who wouldn’t be excited about a $50,000 automobile?), but when you consider that the Audi Q7 gets 12-14 mpg, these hot rides suddenly seem a little less appealing.

Especially considering that Audi has been working on a hybrid version of this model for almost a year, it seems silly to dish out that forward-thinking SUV’s gas guzzling cousins instead.

When this news broke, Green Daily prefaced their story with ‘No one wants to be a jerk about Tom Brady’. Well, I will- screw Tom Brady. I’m no sports fan and all I know about Tom Brady is he left his pregnant girlfriend for Leo DiCaprio’s supermodel leftovers. No doubt his charitable giving makes him a better man than a lot of people out there, but, hey Tom – why not consider future generations of children, too? These giant irresponsible vehicles are going to make the world a less pleasant place for your son’s generation and those that come after him.

Link [Green Daily]

Conservative Group Plans to Waste Tons of Energy on ‘Carbon Belch Day’

Oooh, sometimes you hear a bit of news that makes you feel like you’re bordering on a killing spree fueled by murderous rage. This is one of those stories. Conservative grassroots organization Grassfire.org is calling for people to waste as much energy as possible on June 12th, telling people to do things like “hosting a barbecue, going for a drive, watching television, leaving a few lights on, or even smoking a few cigars”.

Information Week has it:

The point: the group wants to “help Americans break free from the ‘carbon footprint guilt’ being imposed by Climate Alarmists.”

Grassfire.org says it’s skeptical over claims that man-made sources of carbon dioxide emissions — from automobile exhausts to manufacturing plants — are raising the Earth’s temperature at a dangerous rate. Theories about global warming were highlighted by former Vice President Al Gore’s 2006 film, An Inconvenient Truth.

Grassfire.org president Steve Elliott, in a statement, said such theories are off the mark. “It’s time for Americans to purge ourselves of the false guilt that Al Gore and the Climate Alarmists have placed on us,” Elliott said.

Grassfire.org said it chose June 12 as the day it wants Americans to rev up their SUVs because it coincides with expected debate in Congress over a $1.2 billion carbon tax rebate program. “Carbon Belch Day will have at least as much impact on the so-called ‘planetary emergency’ of man-made global warming as the goofy save the earth mandates telling us to turn our lights off for an hour,” said Elliott.

If this sounds like an April Fool’s Day joke, check your calendar. It’s for real. There are actually douche nozzles like this out there in the world. These people really don’t get it – they’re living in a state of denial. No doubt, they’re part of the camp that thinks those of us who care about the planet we all live on and depend upon for survival are just trying to rob them of ‘the American way of life’. Because apparently, being an American means being a total self-absorbed asshole.

That’s right, conservative douchebags: watch out, we’re coming for you and your Norman Rockwell America. The one that exists SOLELY INSIDE YOUR OWN HEADS. We are bringing you reality, like it or not. Scratch that, you’re bringing it upon yourself with idiotic moves like Carbon Belch Day. Maybe you’ll be lucky and die before we start to see the real effects of how our wasteful lifestyle has harmed the planet, but your kids and grandkids may not be so lucky. So go on being selfish – it’s only the entire world at stake.

Link [Information Week]
Photo credit: Grassfire.org

Woody Harrelson Will Live on a Remote Island and Fast for 40 Days

More Woody Harrelson news! This guy is quickly becoming my favorite eco-celeb because he’s genuine and kind of kooky, which makes writing about him more fun. Woody is known for being extremely dedicated to environmentalism, animal rights and the vegan lifestyle. In the past, he’s done some fairly eccentric things, like the 38 day green juice fast and flying his vegan shoes and belt to Cannes after forgetting them at home. Now, he’s planning the most extreme display of weird Woodyism yet.

From Now Magazine via Ecorazzi:

Woody Harrelson plans to live on a remote island and eat nothing for 40 days – to see how the experience affects his brain.

The actor, 46, will go ahead with the experiment as soon as he gets a break in his work schedule.

‘I’ve always wanted to do it,’ he says.

‘I know it’s going to be really hard. But can you imagine it? Eating nothing for 40 days? Swimming and surfing every day in a remote place? Where does the mind go?’

Yoga-loving Woody loves isolated places.

I can only imagine what would happen to my brain after 40 days. Hell, after five days I would be hallucinating. I’d start salivating, Homer Simpson style, over visions of plates of hot food and mugs of coffee. Good luck, Woody!

Link [Ecorazzi] + [Now Magazine]
Photo credit: Flickr user gohsuket

Eco-Chick.com Kicks Ass!

Eco-chick.com is the go-to source for all things eco-friendly and feminine. It’s a virtual treasure trove of green eye candy, fun features and valuable ‘green’ info. Eco Chick fills the niche left between all of the environmental blogs that cater to men and moms. Sometimes, you just wanna know about the best natural mascara, the latest in green fashion and, as the site’s founder and editor in chief Starre Vartan says, where to get a fair trade spanking paddle.

From the site:

Starre founded Eco Chick in October of 2005 with the idea that women who cared about the planet needed a place of their own on the web. At the time, most environmental blogs were guy-oriented, and very serious, and Starre thought that while discussion of scientific issues was important, consumer action would be second only to policy shifts in protecting the environment and creating a more sustainable culture. Enabling individuals to clean up their lives also gives each and every person an opportunity to realize their impact natural environment, a principle imperative to real change.

It’s a simple principle; every object has a life cycle, whether it be a bar of soap, a take-out container, an energy bar, a pair of shoes or a loveseat. It was somewhere before you got it, and it will go somewhere else when you’re done or gone. Just because you can’t see it before or after you buy it/use it/eat it/love it doesn’t mean you’re not responsible for it. We’ll show you how to find the things you love, and keep you updated on what’s going on in that great green world.

Recent stories on Eco Chick include natural cleaning recipes, ruminations on the effects of the natural sweetener ‘stevia’ going corporate, an organic bedding giveaway, reviews of organic booze and observations of green practices in Paris, France.  Starre and Olivia Zaleski, the Managing Editor, also write for the Huffington Post and several other green blogs including The Daily Green and Treehugger.

Fun Eco Chick fact: the site is run and hosted by anarchist webmaster, Dan Sieradski. He’s the guy who created the website for Matisyahu, and if you don’t know who that is, go check it out, because he’s beyond awesome. An orthodox Jew from Pennsylvania playing reggae – amazing.

Finally, a little shameless self-promotion if I may. If you just can’t get enough of yours truly here on EarthFirst.com, check out my posts over on Eco Chick, where I write about beauty and herbal medicine.

Link [Eco Chick]

Consumption of High Fructose Corn Syrup Not Affected Much by High Corn Prices

It’s no secret that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has taken over America. It’s in nearly all processed foods. When my husband and I set out to eliminate high fructose corn syrup from our diet last year, we were surprised to see how many things it was hidden in. Luckily for those of us who want to avoid it, it’s mostly in stuff that’s not good for you anyway: cereals, condiments, juices and soft drinks. Consumers are getting more aware of the fact that HFCS is linked to obesity and diabetes, and recently asked Hansen’s ‘Natural’ Soda (emphasis mine) to stop using it. Despite more people trying to avoid it, though, HFCS isn’t going away, even though recent increases in the price of corn have lowered sales slightly.

From The Ethicurean:

Hansen’s says that 30% of consumer calls it received were asking for a change from HFCS to a more natural sugar. “Consumers asked and we listened,” is how one executive put it. This response is a refreshing change from the typical corporate doublespeak along the lines of “public pressure had nothing to do with our decision, it was planned long ago.”

Of course, cane sugar production is not without its flaws — workers are mistreated, fertilizer overapplied, ecosystems damaged, and so on, as an episode of the Deconstructing Dinner radio program explains in detail.

However, Hansen’s switch, along with record high corn prices, has me wondering if consumption rates of HFCS are changing, and if so, how fast.

There is a slight decrease of a few percentage points per year. Between 2006 and 2007 — when there was a 12% price increase — consumption dropped only 3.4%. Unfortunately, data for 2008 are not available, so we can’t tell whether the latest price rise is having similar effects on consumption.

The most likely reason for the relatively small decrease in consumption is that HFCS makes up only a tiny portion of the retail cost of even the most HFCS-intensive product like soft drinks. The February 2008 issue of Amber Waves estimates that a 2-liter bottle of soda contains 15 ounces of corn in the form of HFCS. At the 2007 average price of $3.40 per bushel (about 56 pounds of shelled corn), the value of corn in the soda is only 5.7 cents. So a 20% rise in the price of corn results in a raw material cost increase of only about a penny, an increase that the giant soft drink companies or fast-food chains can certainly absorb for a little while.

Unfortunately, American companies are hooked on HFCS, and that’s probably not going to change anytime soon even if prices continue to rise. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that people did begin to switch to sugar instead of using HFCS: unfortunately, that opens a whole other can of worms, since Big Sugar has its own problems. Weaning ourselves off of the use of so many sweeteners would be a great step, but in sugar-crazed America, that just ain’t gonna happen.

You can see all of The Ethicurean’s charts and data here.

Link [The Ethicurean]
Photo credit: Flickr user graham

Time for Businesses to Get Green or Else

Whether you believe that climate change is man-made or not, it’s happening. It’s no longer a matter of if, it’s when. While obviously, we think the evidence is staggering that humans have done great harm to the planet, let’s put that aside temporarily so we can all agree: businesses need to catch up with the ‘green’ movement or suffer the consequences. It doesn’t matter if you don’t believe in global warming. What matters is whether you want to be successful in the future of business.

Andrew Winston, co-author of the book Green to Gold, a guide for businesses going green, writes on his blog:

First, rising prices for nearly everything mean we’re entering the big leagues. Whether you call it “green” or “eco-efficiency” doesn’t matter; either way, all the efficiency tools we have – such as total quality, lean manufacturing, six sigma – are going to be put to the test. If your company has a knack for cutting out waste and reducing resource use, it will survive and thrive. If you can’t reduce your reliance on fossil fuels in your whole value chain – from sourcing to manufacturing to distribution – you may be in trouble.

Second, if you can offer a new “supply” to help bolster that side of the Econ 101 curves, you will have a giant market to satisfy (those billions of consumers). And I’m talking about smart supply growth, not the corn ethanol kind that actually exacerbates all of our problems. I’m talking new low-carbon energy, water saving technologies and processes, good design principles, building efficiency, and on and on.

It will be interesting to see how all of this plays out. Some big companies helmed by people who don’t see a need to change may go belly-up despite their current confidence. The ones that are too slow to move will be left behind, and the ones who move quickly will survive and get richer.

You can read more of Andrew’s tips for businesses looking to go green on his blog.

Link [Andrew Winston]
Photo credit: Flickr user Gaetan Lee

Artist Benjamin Verdonck Literally Nesting in a Rotterdam Tower

File this under awesomely weird: artist Benjamin Verdonck has created a man-sized nest and perched it high above the city of Rotterdam, clinging to the side of the Rotterdam Weena Tower. He calls this art project ‘The Great Swallow’ and to give you an idea of just how weird it gets, there is indeed an egg in there. What’s in it or what the artist aims to do with it isn’t clear. The picture alone makes this afraid-of-heights girl want to cling to something solid for dear life.

Neatorama has it:

A nest is hanging high from the Rotterdam Weena Tower. Feathers fly around it. There’s a man in the nest. He nested there only four days ago. He stretches his arms out wide open, as if he wants to fly. But it also seems like he is trying to stay upright (losing his feathers). Some people even think that the man wants to embrace them.

If you’re wondering what the hell that nest is made out of, it’s apparently the crowns of twenty-three silver birches, one birch, one willow, two straw bales, one bucket of spit (um, what?), three bags of sand, twelve buckets of glue and nineteen cans of polyurethane foam. So, they collected enough spit to fill a bucket? Whoa.

Well, props to Benjamin Verdonck for getting a lot of people to think, “huh?”

You can see the YouTube video clip here.

Link [Neatorama] + [The Great Swallow]

Americans, Quit Your Bitchin’: Gas in Sierra Leone Costs Over $18 a Gallon

Americans are whining and complaining about gas prices like never before. Gas hitting $4 per gallon is considered absolutely crazy – an all but insurmountable obstacle to going about our daily lives. We here at EarthFirst have professed our beliefs about gas prices and the need for Americans to start thinking differently about transportation before. Now we bring you the reality of gas prices throughout the world: Hello, Americans! We’ve been enjoying artificially low gas prices for decades!

The average in many other countries, including the Netherlands, Greece, New Zealand, Japan, Switzerland and England is around $7/gallon. In Denmark, Eritrea, France, Finland, Germany and Iceland, it’s close to $10. People in Sierra Leone, Africa undoubtedly find other ways to get around considering that gas costs a whopping $18.43 per gallon there.  People in these countries actually (gasp!) take public transportation! The horrors!

Want to pay less for gas? Perhaps you should consider moving to Venezuela, where it costs just 17 cents a gallon. Venezuela is known for its highly polarized political climate, evil overlord dictator and ever-rising violent crime, though you will likely enjoy the food and the view from the plane as you fly in and out. Some of the other oil-rich countries with low gas prices include Egypt, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iran.  I’m sure they’ll welcome you with open arms. Good luck, and send us a postcard.

Link [Wikipedia]
Photo credit: Flickr user Payton Chung

McCain Campaign Advisors Paid to Stop Cape Wind Renewable Energy Project

Some people out there still seem to need evidence that McCain is just Bush 2.0, and luckily for all of us, McCain’s camp keeps on delivering. Surprise, surprise: two high placed advisors in the McCain campaign worked with lobbyists to stop the Cape Wind renewable energy project.

From The Sietch Blog:

Charlie Black, Senior Political Adviser to McCain: Senate lobbying disclosure documents reveal that lobbying firm BKSH & Associates was retained in January 2008 by the Alliance to
Protect Nantucket Sound to “Defeat the proposal for 130 wind turbines” and “promote alternative means to meet energy needs without sacrificing Nantucket Sound.” Charlie Black was the chairman of BKSH until March. [Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act database]

Tom Loeffler, McCain’s Campaign Co-chairman: The Loeffler Group received $380,000 from the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound from 2003 to 2005 to lobby against Cape Wind. The Loeffler Group was founded by former Republican congressman Tom Loeffler, who remains its chairman. [Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act database]…

In addition to these two jokers, McCain also recently had advisors quit after it was revealed that one was actively working for Myanmar and one had ties to the Saudi government. McCain tries to play himself as an honest guy who’s more moderate than the Bush administration and open to new ideas. Too bad “Mr. Straight Talker Reformerman” is thick with lobbyists who have anything but the best interests of the American people in mind. Taking money to help corporations, organizations and foreign governments tighten their grip on American society. What else is new?

Of course, that doesn’t mean that all of the people who plan to vote for McCain have two brain cells to rub together and are therefore able to process this information. For them, there is no hope. However, perhaps those still on the fence will take it into consideration. There has been a haze of corruption over the White House for nearly 8 years, and McCain taking office will only make it more ominous.

Link [The Sietch Blog] + [Cape Wind]
Photo source: Flickr user Hot Rod Homepage

Holy $#@%! The Average American Family Wastes 122 lbs of Food Every Month

Being freegan never looked like such a good idea. The average American family of four produces 122 pounds of waste each month, and most of that goes straight to landfills. That total doesn’t count food wasted by farms, processors and wholesalers. It adds up to a whopping 1,464 pounds per year. That waste includes lots of stuff that’s perfectly good, and the rest could at least be composted. Remember that the conditions in landfills prevent things from biodegrading like they would out in the open. This kind of waste causes our landfills to pile up, fast.

Christ on a bicycle, this is insanity. I knew we were a wasteful culture, but, wow. Most of us can recall our mothers telling us to eat up because there are starving children in Ethiopia, but damn, clearly what we really need to be doing is buying less in the first place – or giving the stuff we can’t eat to those in need. It’s truly sad to see so much waste when there are so many people struggling for a morsel of food every day.

Click here to see a higher resolution copy and read the details. Crazy!

Link [Groovy Green]
Photo credit: The New York Times

‘Jackass’ Steve-O is Actually Serious about Animal Activism

So, maybe Steve-O is for real about this animal rights stuff. When he became the latest celeb to get naked for PETA’s anti-fur campaign last fall, a lot of people scoffed – I mean, this is the dude that was on the Jackass spinoff ‘Wildboyz’. Goat rodeo, anyone? I, for one, didn’t know anything about Steve-O’s animal activism – I’ve sat through countless hours (my husband is a fan) watching him intentionally harm himself as part of the cast of Jackass, CKY and Wildboyz, so it’s hard to take him seriously. Um, he used Tobasco sauce as eyedrops, and that’s a very mild example.

I was surprised to read Ecorazzi’s write-up about Steve-O rocking a PETA anti-fur shirt at the Maxim Hot 100 Party in Hollywood, California last week:

Daredevil Steve-O arrived to the Maxim Hot 100 Party in Hollywood, California last week rocking a PETA Anti-Fur shirt. No stranger to activism, the Jackass star has participated in many campaigns for the animal rights organization. You can check out some of his work here.

Since ‘Wildboyz’ seemed to make it clear that Steve-O wasn’t too concerned about the welfare of animals, I did a bit of digging before reposting this news, and was again surprised to find this on his personal website, posted on April 5th 2008 after he went to rehab and decided to clean up his life:

I want to make this world a better place and have chosen to do so by living what I consider to be a good life. I wish to lead by example, which is why I no longer contribute to the suffering of animals. I will not eat or wear any parts of the bodies of dead animals (correction: I eat fish). I could make a list of the things I choose to do, but, rther than do that, I will just leave you with the following statement: I am hopeful that I will make you all proud.

Perhaps we should all take this as a lesson: being so incredibly goofy that you would get a huge tattoo of your own face on your back doesn’t necessarily make you a douchebag. Also, crack is whack. Here’s hoping Steve-O stays clean and continues the animal rights work.

Link [Ecorazzi] + [Steve-O]

The Simpsons Go Green(ish) for the Krustyland Ride at Universal Studios

As if the Simpsons could get any cooler. The new Simpsons-themed ride at Universal Studios is going to be green less polluting due to the installation of 27,675 LED lights, which will save 662kWh a day (about what an average house uses in a month).

From underwire:

Universal Studios Hollywood’s new Simpsons Ride celebrates the carnival-barker-style commercialism you’d expect from an attraction named after a greedy capitalist clown, but there’s more than meets the eye: Krustyland is engineered to echo the eco-friendly sensibility dramatized in The Simpsons Movie last summer, which found the city of Springfield encased in a giant bubble after Homer dumps garbage in the lake.

According to Universal officials, the Simpsons Ride boasts the largest lighting installation of LED lamps in theme park history. The ride’s 2,582 energy-saving LED lights expend 27,675 watts per hour. That’s less than a third of the 82,909 watts that would have been consumed by standard incandescent lighting used by the conventionally powered attraction previously on site, according to Universal.

End result: energy savings of 662,796 watts per day. As Homer might say in between donuts: Mmmmm, kilowatts!

No matter how you slice it, theme parks aren’t green. Typically, natural areas are clear-cut and wildlife is displaced to make room for fantasyland attractions where tons of electricity is used and people generate trash like nobody’s business. And, let’s not even go into the fact that we remove real wildlife to replace it with a cleaned-up version of it that lets us ‘enjoy it on our own terms’. However, at least having LED lights is trying, right? It’s better than what they’ve been doing so far. Baby steps are better than the status quo.

Link [underwire]

Next Page »