A round-up of this week’s environmental, green and ecofriendly news and updates.
I love stories that show how one individual can make a difference. Zhou Yusong is known as the “Guardian of Dogs” in Zhengzhou, China. Why? In 2008 he noticed an injured stray dog by the side of a road – it had been hit by a car and was fighting for his life, but everyone just ignored it. He took it to a pet hospital and then a shelter – he lives in a tiny apartment so he couldn’t look after it himself. He was horrified by the large number of stray dogs there, so he started donating monthly. Then he convinced a friend to invest over $100,000 in a new animal rescue center.
Zhou now runs the centre – and even left his job so he could spend all his time looking after the dogs. He’s rescued over 700 animals – and such is his dedication that he hasn’t taken a holiday in 8 years. To save money he does all the maintenance as well as the caring and cleaning.
Although he didn’t seek it, he recently gained the admiration of millions, after photos of him and his hundreds of dogs went viral on social media last week. Wonderful!
Cocoa and cacao – are they just the same thing in different languages?
Definitely not!
There’s quite a big difference between the two food items – although they both taste pretty yummy.
Find out how they differ – and which one you should choose – here.
Straws. They used to be made of paper. Then the bendy-straw was invented – and plastic straws are everywhere now. Why? It’s possible to drink most beverages without a straw – so does that make the straw a testament to human laziness?
When I first read about the anti-straw movement, I wasn’t convinced. After all, some people not using a straw isn’t going to make a huge difference.
But perhaps it will.
A social media campaign has spread awareness of how much damage straws cause – to marine life, to litter, and to messing up our oceans. Using the #StopSucking hashtag, it has gone viral – and it’s helping to change the minds of consumers, because it’s such a simple message, and it’s also something that’s easy to change.
This month is “Strawless in Seattle,” where many Seattle institutions agreed to forego plastic straws, using paper straws instead, for this month of September. (I’m not sure why they didn’t just stop using straws altogether). And in July next year, Seattle will ban all plastic utensils.
What is your bedroom like?
Did you know that how you set up your bedroom, can have a big impact on how well you sleep?
Here’s a great list of things to look at, to see if your bedroom is just right to give you the perfect night’s sleep.
Global Green News:
Japan suffered terribly after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. They rebuilt – and now many cities and towns are no longer reliant on a traditional utility-based grid power system. Instead, they use renewables for local, resilient energy generation and storage. They are now better able to withstand climate change-induced extreme weather – and all at about the same cost as rebuilding the grid they had before. The government is no longer considering large-scale power plants – and residents are enjoying their local empowerment.
Dubai already has a massive solar park. Now it’s expanding it (again) and it will soon have the world’s tallest solar tower. In 2030, the solar park could cover 83 square miles, and slash carbon emissions by 6.5 million metric tons a year.
US Green News:
Thanks to the recent power outages after the extreme weather experienced in parts of the US, the national power grid is being evaluated, and some interesting facts have emerged. Did you know for example, that the US has more power outages per year than any other developed country — costing an annual $150 billion in lost productivity. And it’s likely to get worse – the average number of annual weather-related power outages doubled from 2003 to 2012.
One option is to bury power lines instead of having them above ground and subject to weather. Germany did this after WWII – they now have 12 minutes of blackout per customer per year, compared to the 244 minutes that plague Americans. But burying lines is very expensive.
So renewables seem to make more sense – and Florida is facing a “wholesale re-build” of much of its power grid after the hurricane. It is the Sunshine State after all – yet it has one of the lowest incidences of rooftop solar. (Perhaps because of considerable lobbying by the electricity providers).
It seems to me that it’s the perfect opportunity for renewables to shine – and solve a lot of problems along the way.
What do you think? Let me know in the comments below.
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