A great story on AZSustainability today tells the story of L. Kevin and Donna Philippe-Johnson who successfully from a typical $24,000/yr urban lifestyle to one requireing only $6,500/yr.

It was at this point that I realized something was wrong. The life strategy I had grown up to believe in was no longer working and there didn’t seem to be any answers. Obviously, no one was going to get me out of this, so I decided I needed to take matters into my own hands and figure out a way to redefine my basic approach to living.

Click Here to read the article.

In his State of the City Address, Gordon outlined a proposal for the Valley’s first solar power plant in Buckeye, plans for the city to power its buildings from the sun and incentives for homeowners to use solar energy in their homes.

Click Here to read the article

RiverWired has a great article today containing some great tips for apartment-dwellers who want to live green:

Click Here to read it.

With the switchover to digital TV, thousands of analog televisions are being abandoned (I have three myself). Recognizing the potential for thousands of old TVs ending up in the landfill, Sony is holding a recycling event for Silicon Valley residents on March 28, 2009 from 9am to 4pm at the Shoreline Amphitheater.

They will be accepting electronics from any brand.

I found this very interesting article on CleanTechica.com about a different, faster way to make compost. It’s called Bokashi, relies upon fermentation, and produces usable compost in a matter of days.

The other difference is that it is anaerobic, relying upon the lack of oxygen to do it’s job. Which in turn means no odor. Making bokashi compost is simple. You need a couple of big containers with tight-fitting lids (to keep the oxygen out), some kitchen scraps, and bokashi mix. The mix contains wheat bran, molasses, and EM’s – the efficient microorganisms that drive the process.

Click Here to read the article.

Here is a link to a supplier of Bokashi kits and a sully of the mix.

Greg Peterson will be giving a seminar at the West of Western Culinary FEstival, March 13 and 14, located at the phoenix Art Museum.

Click Here for more information

EcoRenovator brings us part 1 of this multi-part article on the realities of generating your own electricity from wind power:

Click here

MIchael Davis has built his own fully-functional wind-powered generator, complete with turbine and electronic control system. He has written a web page showing you how to do it too:

Click Here to read it.

This 10-minute video describes how Cuba survived its own peak oil and moved from petroleum-based agriculture to organic farming./

The WTVQ blog published this great list of 101 tips for going green:

Click Here

Now here’s a great idea.

Almost every bill you receive comes with a return envelope.  What if the original envelope could re re-used as the return envelope?

That’s just what EcoEnvelopes have done: Created a reusable 2-way envelop, .manufactured exclusively with FSC and SFI certified papers, contain up to 100% PCW content (post consumer waste), and use environmentally responsible inks and window films. ecoEnvelopes are US Postal Service approved, they work with existing high-speed insertion, remittance and postal processing equipment

Read more on EcoEnvelopes website

<object width=”480″ height=”295″><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/MqbXxhEzjug&hl=en&fs=1″></param><param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”></param><param name=”allowscriptaccess” value=”always”></param><embed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/MqbXxhEzjug&hl=en&fs=1″ type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” allowscriptaccess=”always” allowfullscreen=”true” width=”480″ height=”295″></embed></object>

There’s a recent story in Forbes who makes a very nice living dumpster-diving for high-tech garbage and then reselling it.

When he travels overseas, he is always sure to carry over a suitcase with a thousand or so British power cables (server manufacturers include both U.S. and U.K. cables with their products, so every data center regularly throws away the foreign leads). He sells them in London for a pound each, financing his round-trip airfare and hotel with his e-waste arbitrage.

Click Here to read the Forbes article.

I don’t have it.

My HOA prohibits clotheslines. Yours probably does too, yet electric clothes dryers account for 5.8% of all electricity used in the home.

There’s a movement afoot to bring back the clothesline and the LA TImes has an article about it:

Click Here to read the article

In places where the practice is banned as an unsightly nuisance to neighbors, right-to-dry activists and blogging eco-moms are forming an alliance. Their cause: to reduce energy consumption and to call upon sunlight rather than bleach to get those whites even whiter.

There’s even a blog: laundrylist.org.

Great article in Energy Boomer about reducing the energy use of your waterbed:

Click Here to read it.

Great article in EcoGeek about the growing use of wind and other renewable energy sources in Antacrtica.

Belgiums’s Elizabeth research station hopes to be the first to rely solely on wind and solar power, England’s Rothera base is installing solar thermal panels for heating water and air, Japan’s Syowa base is already using solar power and Australia’s Mawson station has been using wind turbines since 2003.

Click Here to read the article.

Our Renewable Nation is possibly the most adorable project ever conceived to advocate renewable energy. It’s an eco-video project helmed by the McCullough family, who are traveling across the country in a vegetable oil powered VW Beetle. They’re visiting wind farms, solar installations, talking to companies developing sustainable technologies, and documenting all their interviews and travels on video.

Click Here to read more.

When I was a little kid I made a lot of things from cereal boxes. My favorite cereal was Wheaties and when the box was empty I always found a use for it.

I found this great little tip on Lighter Footstep today:

 

ure, a lot of breakfast cereal comes out of bags these days. But don’t toss those cereal boxes when you have them — they make sturdy (and free!) mailing envelopes. Just cut them apart, turn them inside out, and use a little tape. You’re off to the Post Office. Thanks toTwitter user Lydia Krupinski of Pierogi Picnic for today’s tip.

From the online edition of The New York Times:

In 2005 H. Scott Lee, Walmart’s CEO, challenged a roomful of Walmart executives. “Tell me why I should care about an endangered mouse in Arizona?”, he asked. He presented his colleagues with a radical option — the “choice” that gave the meeting its name — encouraging them to adopt a sustainability program to remake the entire company, from the materials used to build stores to the light bulbs stocked on its shelves. Although participants were conflicted, a vote on the initiative was unanimous: Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer and biggest buyer of manufactured goods, would go green.

Under Mr. Scott, who is retiring this month at the age of 59, the company that democratized consumption in the United States — enabling working-class families to buy former luxuries like inexpensive flat-screen televisions, down comforters and porterhouse steaks — has begun to democratize environmental sustainability.

Today, the roughly 200 million customers who pass through Wal-Mart’s doors each year buy fluorescent light bulbs that use up to 75 percent less electricity than incandescent bulbs, concentrated laundry detergent that uses 50 percent less water and prescription drugs that contain 50 percent less packaging.

Click Here to read the entire story.

I found an article on Elephant Journal entitled

21 Things You’re Not Recycling

Except that most of those things we are: Things like appliances, batteries, and cardboard boxes.

The article does provide a way to recycle Tyvek envelopes, which I was not aware of.

You can always go to Earth911.com to find the nearest recycling center for almost anything.