TerraCycle Upcycling Your Sharpie

Sharpie, Paper Mate and EXPO have formed a partnership with TerraCycle to repurpose used pens, markers and other writing instruments.

Terracycle is a New Jersey-based "upcycling" company that finds new ways to repurpose otherwise throwaway items like juice pouches, chip bags and the like.  According to the company, the partnership "will create the world's first program to collect and reuse pens, markers and other writing instruments while also helping raise funds for schools, charities, and non-profits nationwide."


Collection centers called "Writing Instrument Brigades" will be set up at participating locales, primarily in large corporations and schools where writing instruments are used most. For every writing instrument collected at a Writing Instrument Brigade collection center, two cents will be paid to a school, community group, charity or non-profit organization of the participant's choice. 


"Keeping one pen or marker out of a landfill may seem like a small contribution, but multiply that by the estimated $5 billion writing instruments sold in the U.S. each year and it is a big opportunity to reduce waste to landfills," said Ben Gadbois, President of Markers, Highlighters, Art and Office Essentials for Newell Rubbermaid Office Products, maker of Sharpie, EXPO and Paper Mate products.

The collected writing instruments will be dissembled and/or reprocessed to make new products.

TerraCycle is also working with other consumer goods manufacturers including 3M, Mars and OfficeMax, to collect and recycle their products.

Founded in 2001 by then 19 year old Princeton University freshman named Tom Szaky, TerraCycle started from Tom's dream to find way a new, more responsible way of doing business that would be good for the planet, good for people, and good for the bottom line.

NatGeo's Greendex Indicates Americans Less Green Than Consumers in India, China, Brazil

Americans are less green than consumers in India, China, and Brazil, according to a new study by National Geographic and the international polling firm GlobeScan, measuring and monitoring consumer progress toward environmentally sustainable consumption in 14 countries around the world.

Check it out here: Greendex

According to NatGeo, it's a "quantitative consumer study of 14,000 consumers in a total of 14 countries asked about such behavior as energy use and conservation, transportation choices, food sources, the relative use of green products versus traditional products, attitudes towards the environment and sustainability, and knowledge of environmental issues. A group of international experts helped us determine the behaviors that were most critical to investigate."

The National Geographic/GlobeScan "Consumer Greendex," a scientifically derived sustainable consumption index of actual consumer behavior and material lifestyles across 14 countries, will be tracked over time and will be comparable across the selection of countries representing both the developed and developing world.

"To provide context for the Greendex results," NatGeo says, "we developed a 'Market Basket,' an index of actual consumption in four areas important to environmentally sustainable behavior—energy, transportation, travel, and consumer goods. A Market Basket for each country was assembled using a set of independently collected macroeconomic indicators, gathered by the Economist Intelligence Unit, which mirror, in part, the consumer behavior measured by the Greendex survey.

"The purpose of the Market Basket is to provide an external estimate of the results of changes in consumer behavior over time. The Greendex, for example, measures things consumers are doing to save energy in a country; the Market Basket measures whether total energy consumption in the country is actually going up or down. The Market Basket will also establish a framework for comparing the relative environmental impact of each country's size and rate of growth, over time."

Poke around on the site and check out the Greendex survey results, calculate your personal Greendex score, measure your knowledge of some basic issues against what your fellow citizens know, at home and around the world, and learn how to take steps to change your behavior so you ARE making a difference.

Visit the Greendex

Innovation: Printing Green from Blogs and Docs

Fred Wilson pointed me to this new widget I've just added to my blog (see bottom of right sidebar) that will help you print or email pages from The Green Skeptic in a way that will save paper. Of course, not printing it at all will save even more.

As Fred described it in his post today: "It's called the ECO-SAFE merit badge. But I call it my blog printing widget. From it, you can email this page, email a pdf of this page, or download a pdf of this page. It's goal is to reduce the amount of paper that is wasted printing blogs."

Find out more at: ECO-SAFE.com

For the past few months I've also been beta-testing a program called GreenPrint World that allows you to reduce the number of pages you print when printing documents. It scans the pages before sending them to your printer and highlights extraneous pages or pages with very little print suggesting you may want to remove them from the print job. It also creates PDFs with one click.

The extra step is a bit annoying when trying to print that document on the fly between meetings, but I've already saved 103 pages or $10.40 since installing the program. And having a few extra clicks to make before printing has definitely made me more conscious of what I am printing.

(I do wish GreenPrint World allowed you to reduce the size of the document with one click like you can in Microsoft Word's "Print Preview" function. That would help save that widow on the last page so she doesn't take up an entire sheet of paper!)

Find out more about GreenPrint World and download the latest version of the program at: printgreener.com

Blogging & Media: Discovery Hugs TreeHugger

Discovery Communications acquired TreeHugger.com last week in an attempt to build its green new media offerings on the cusp of launching its Planet Green channel.

Discovery paid an estimated US$10M for the site, which "claims 1.4 million unique visitors a month and more than 50 writers around the world blogging about green news and products," according to the Washington Post.

TreeHugger is Discovery's first acquisition under chief executive David Zaslav, who began in January and is shifting resources into new-media products as part of "a housecleaning and reorganization that will end up cutting at least 25 percent of the company's workforce and closing the Discovery stores."

Nick Aster, one of the founders of TreeHugger, who now produces the Triple Pundit blog, wrote that the acquisition helps TreeHugger meet its goal of becoming "a real media presence and actually play a real role in 'mainstreaming' the basic principals of an ecologically conscious lifestyle."

Some of the principals, including Founder Graham Hill and COO Ken Rother, will continue to be involved. Certainly it will extend the reach of TreeHugger's audience (read more from Graham Hill.)

Personally, I've always found TreeHugger a bit cloying and precious, in spite or because of its award-winning design, my "booster alarm" sounds too often when reading its posts. (For more a more insightful critique of TreeHugger, see Bottleman's review.)

Still, it's a remarkable turn for the site, which started only three years ago. It certainly points to the growth in this space. What will this mean for green blogging and green lifestyle reporting? Only time will tell.

Social Entrepreneurs: TOMS Shoes - Buy One Pair, Give a Kid Some Shoes

The other day, Seth Godin pointed us to TOMS Shoes, an innovative shoe company with a social cause: Buy One Get One

“Inspired by a traditional Argentine shoe and challenged by continent’s poverty and heath issues, I created TOMS with a singular mission: To make life more comfortable,” says Blake Mycoskie, founder of TOMS "Shoes for Tomorrow."

For every TOMS shoe sold, the company sends a pair to a child in need. It's that simple.

TOMS was born in 2006 by Blake Mycoskie out of a commitment to produce stylish, comfortable, and practical footwear while improving the lives of children around the world.

Available in eighteen colors and combinations for both men and women, TOMS debut collection is inspired by Alpargatas, the trusted utility shoe of Argentine workers.

“I was overwhelmed by the spirit of the South American people, especially those who had so little,” Mycoskie says. “And I was instantly struck with the desire – the responsibility – to do more.”

The shoes are composed of high quality, durable materials including lightweight, breathable canvas, resilient soles and soft leather in soles for maximum comfort.

After losing on the reality show, "The Amazing Race," Blake Mycoskie "put his life on hold and took a well deserved extended vacation," according to a press release on TOMS web site. A whirlwind tour of South America ended in Argentina, where Mycoskie "immersed himself in Argentine culture: sailing, tango, competitive polo. Nice life.

But Mycoskie soon "became aware of the difficulties of the impoverished people in Argentina. He was challenged emotionally as he visited villages without fresh water and where few, if any, of the children had shoes. The lack of basic needs contributed to many health issues, infections, and in the most extreme circumstances, even death."

So, he came up with the idea to found a shoe company and give back by sending shoes to children from families who can't afford them. Last October, he returned with a bunch of volunteers to distribute 10,000 pairs of shoes.

Check out TOMS Shoes, enter their "design a shoe" contest, and buy a pair online at: TOMS Shoes

More on Blake from TIME Magazine.

And an interview: Quick Stop Questions

Global Climate Change: Take My "Live Earth" Poll

Do you think "Live Earth" was a success? Take my new poll and weigh in. See sidebar under My Twitter at right...

Innovation: Design for the Other 90 Percent

I'm looking forward to getting to New York to see the Cooper-Hewitt's "Design for the Other 90%" show, which runs through September 2007. The show features many of the design solutions, such as the Life Straw and others, that we've featured in the past in The Green Skeptic.

The brainchild of curator Cynthia E. Smith, Design for the Other 90% opened in May and will close on 23 September.

Here are some excerpts from the exhibition web site:

Of the world’s total population of 6.5 billion, 5.8 billion people, or 90%, have little or no access to most of the products and services many of us take for granted...Design for the Other 90% explores a growing movement among designers to design low-cost solutions for this “other 90%.”

...Designers, engineers, students and professors, architects, and social entrepreneurs from all over the globe are devising cost-effective ways to increase access to food and water, energy, education, healthcare, revenue-generating activities, and affordable transportation for those who most need them...

...More recently, designers are working directly with end users of their products, emphasizing co-creation to respond to their needs. Many of these projects employ market principles for income generation as a way out of poverty. Poor rural farmers become micro-entrepreneurs, while cottage industries emerge in more urban areas...

Some designs are patented to control the quality of their important breakthroughs, while others are open source in nature to allow for easier dissemination and adaptation, locally and internationally.

Encompassing a broad set of modern social and economic concerns, these design innovations often support responsible, sustainable economic policy. They help, rather than exploit, poorer economies; minimize environmental impact; increase social inclusion; improve healthcare at all levels; and advance the quality and accessibility of education.

...Design for the Other 90% demonstrates how design can be a dynamic force in saving and transforming lives, at home and around the world.

For more information, visit the Cooper-Hewitt web site: Design

In Memorium: Colin Fletcher, Inveterate Walker

Colin Fletcher died last week at the age of 85. For those of us who considered his book The Complete Walker a kind of bible, this news represents the end of an era.

I recall the first time I cracked open a copy of Fletcher's book almost 30 years ago. To a teenager interested in the outdoors, but for whom the Boy Scouts were too cultish and conservative, Mr. Fletcher's lyrical, funny, and practical way with dispensing advice about walking and backpacking was a godsend.

My pal Geoffrey Rule turned me on to Fletcher. Geoff was from British stock and Fletcher was Welsh. They both had an enthusiasm for walking, especially in wilderness, that was infectious and seemed cut from another time.

Mr. Fletcher wrote about his own experiences in the wilderness in such books as The Thousand-Mile Summer (1964) about his walk through the Mojave Desert and the Sierra Nevada range, The Man Who Walked Through Time (1968), which chronicled a two-month long trek along the length of the Grand Canyon, and River: One Man's Journey Down the Colorado, Source to Sea (1997).

But it was The Complete Walker that gave me advice about gear, what to take on various trips, and what to know about walking in the wilderness, which to Fletcher remained "a delectable madness, very good for sanity." Although the book was far too large to pack on a backpacking trip, I still won't leave for a multi-day trek without consulting it. Even today, I've turned to the book when planning for one of my 40-mile excursions in the Wind River range, the White Mountains, or Yosemite over the past few years.

It's an indispensable guide. And Fletcher was a companion who will be missed. Luckily, his book is still in print, in an edition updated by Chip Rawlins: The Complete Walker.

Here's a link to his obit from the Los Angeles Times: Fletcher

Innovation: Negroponte Updates on "One Laptop Per Child" Project

Worldchanging features an update from Nicholas Negroponte on his "One Laptop Per Child" project:

"Despite the enthusiasm of countries like Rwanda, Libya and Uruguay, all of which are entertaining the idea of providing laptops to every schoolchild, no country has yet written a check to the project. That includes Argentina, Brazil, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine and Thailand as well, all of whom Negroponte lists as first-stage adopters of the project. It’s a big check to write - nations are being asked to invest in the laptop one million at a time. That’s $176 million for the machines alone, at current pricing, plus money for distribution and Internet provision - the actual price tag could be closer to a $200 - 250 million investment. As the project scales up, the price drops - possibly as low as $100 per unit in 2009, possibly to $50 per unit in the next decade. Quanta, which manufactures the machine, is ready to scale to a million laptops per month by year’s end. That doesn’t sound like much, Negroponte tells us, but global laptop production is only 5 million a month."

Read the full article: OLPC

Read The Green Skeptic's original post on this project: Green Laptop

Innovation: GE Ecomagination Turning Green Into Green

Mary Milliken reports in Reuters/Planet Ark that GE's Ecomagination unit is beginning to pay off, proving that green can generate green:

General Electric Co. Chairman and Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt said his "green" ecomagination unit was gaining steam and it launched 11 new products and services Thursday, including a hybrid locomotive and a carbon offset company.


Arguing that "green is green" -- environmental technology can generate serious money for GE -- Immelt said demand for green products and services exceeded expectations as awareness about global warming and energy conservation snowballed.
"Green is now becoming pervasive. It is becoming universal," Immelt said at a event at his group's Universal Studios.

"Work on energy efficiency, working on emissions reductions, conservation, clean water is simply good business. In our case, it has always been about growing the company."

Ecomagination has backlog of orders worth over US$50 billion and chalked up US$12 billion in sales last year. Despite the expanding market, Immelt has stuck with his sales target of US$20 billion in 2010.

"We are on our way to US$20 billion and I am convinced we can exceed that number and expand as time goes on," he said.

Among the ventures launched Thursday was the carbon emissions offset partnership with energy company AES Corp. to produce offsets for 10 million metric tons of greenhouse gases a year by 2010.

With Union Pacific, GE unveiled hybrid locomotive that recycles energy and stores in in on-board batteries.

In the automotive sector, GE has also invested in the battery company, A123, which is working on the next generation of battery technology for hybrid and plug-in hubrid electric vehicles.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which says it is the largest private consumer of electricity in the world, has announced that more than 500 stores will use GE light emitting diodes (LEDs) to slash energy consumption in its refrigerated display cases.

And oil company BP Plc said it is forming a global alliance with GE to develop 10 to 15 hydrogen power projects that will cut greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation.

"This is no longer a fringe topic. This is a niche topic. This is a mainstream topic that is being driven across the broad economy," Immelt added.

Global Climate Change: Big (Green) Apple, Taxis Go Hybrid

Nothing says New York like a Yellow Cab, but soon the yellow cabs will turn green under a plan unveiled by NYC Mayor Michael Bllomberg yesterday.

Bloomberg plans to put 1,000 hybrid taxis on NYC streets by the fall of 2008 and replace the remaining 13,000 taxi fleet with hybrids by 2012.

Bloomberg estimates the plan will save cab drivers more than $10,000 a year in gas and other expenses.

The Big Apple is turning green.

Global Climate Change: More is the New Less

Seth Godin has a post this morning about the marketing behind global warming and reducing carbon emissions. We've had a dialogue on the subject before (see Global Warming & Other Misnomers...) and our opinion hasn't wavered.

"'Fight global warming' is a fine slogan," Seth writes. "Except it's meaningless. That's like dieters everywhere shouting, 'eat less' while they stand in line to get bleu cheese dressing from the salad bar."

I tend to agree with Seth on the point that we will always struggle if we try to convince Americans (and those who desire an American lifestyle) to do with less ("Reduce, Reuse, Recycle") or to limit themsleves. We just don't have such restraint. And, as I've argued before here, it's not about limiting growth, but encouraging a better kind of growth.

Seth uses as an example car dealerships, which list their wares according to decreasing horsepower. Or restaurants that offer increasingly huge portions for the expanding waistlines of Americans. (How about the practice of offering free dessert for every kids meal. No free lunch? Maybe not, but there's free ice cream!)

We crave more. That's why hotels are in competition now to see who can offer you the most free food: Hot all-you-can-eat breakfasts, free cookies with check-in, how about "lunch on us?" Even fast food chicken chain Chik-fil-a doesn't feature chickens telling you to eat less beef; they have cows exhorting you to "Eat More Chicken!"

So, if Americans crave more and environmentalists continue to ask us to want less and use less, what's the disconnect there? Everyone knows how hard it is to get people to change their lifestyle. How do we expect to be successful getting the herd to reduce its carbon footprint when its been supersized?

Better, Seth argues, to make it about doing MORE. "Let's figure out how to turn this into a battle to do more, not less," he writes, suggesting we "require all new cars to have, right next to the speedometer, a mileage meter. And put the same number on an LCD display on the rear bumper. Once there's an arms race to see who can have the highest number, we're on the right track."

Let's make this a campaign about more and maybe we'll get somewhere.

Every Day is Earth Day...

Global Climate Change: IPCC Report - No One Will Escape Impacts

The IPCC report last week was indeed grim, which is probably why I've avoided commenting on it thus far. It's too damned depressing to wrap my head around while I'm on vacation. The sobering fact is that billions of the world's poorest citizens are at risk of hardship and disease as a result of climate change.

But that's not all: everyone is at risk; everyone will feel the impact. Those most vulnerable live at or near sea level, many of whom are crowded into coastal cities already in danger. And say goodbye to those luxury coastal properties. You may want to start buying land along the "new coast," the perimeter of sea level rise to come.

Still, you can run, but you can't hide. You may move away from the areas of direct impact, only to be chased by drought, disease and extreme weather. All of this combines, in the IPCC future to threaten the livelihoods and the very lives of maybe millions more.

Depressing? Indeed. Too late to do anything about it? Not if we can finally put the science to rest and get to work reducing the impacts, adapting to the changes, and investing in the technologies and systems that will help us survive, if not thrive, in the world of change ahead.

Clean Tech: CNN reports on "Dirty side to clean energy investing"

Steve Hargreaves writes on CNNMoney.com about the increase in venture capital investments in the Clean Tech sector, which The Green Skeptic reported on last week: Investors. Hargreaves asks whether this is a good thing.

"Venture capital is sexy: The glamour of bringing a new business to market, the promise of big returns, the risk of losing it all," writes Hargreaves. "There's no doubt this fast money plays a big role in building the businesses of tomorrow - especially those in the burgeoning alternative energy sector, which has seen funding triple over the past four years.

"But venture capital investors often bank on a relatively quick payback, and have high expectations for the firms they back. Those expectations have sparked debate among renewable energy financiers: Is too much venture capital money a bad thing?" Hargreaves writes:

Venture capital flowing to renewable energy firms has surged to almost $3 billion last year from just over $1 billion in 2002, according to the data tracking firm Cleantech Venture Network.

"There's just a ton of money trying to invest in companies," said Matt Cheney, head of MMA Renewable Ventures, a San Francisco-based renewable energy finance company.

That's good for startups looking for cash, so long as they can become profitable relatively quickly.

The typical time frame for venture capital firms - which provide cash and provide management expertise usually in exchange for part ownership - is three to five years, according to one venture capitalist.

"Money doesn't have a lot of patience in general," said Cheney. "I'd say eight out of 10 of these operations don't go anywhere. And for those eight, it gets pretty ugly."

Read the full article here: CNNMoney

Innovation: "Zero is the New Black," Godin Says

Seth Godin notices when things are changing. Today, he's picking up on the buzz going around New York and "No Impact Man":

"The richest and best-educated people in our economy are shifting, and pretty quickly. They're just as willing to spend money as they always were, but now it's not focused on fancy organic stuff at the Whole Foods Market or giant bulletproof cars from Germany or private jet travel. Instead, the market is trying as hard as it can to spend time and money without leaving much of a trace," Seth writes. "I think this story has legs and is going to be around for a long time. Zero is the new black."

Read Seth's complete post: Seth Godin

Check out No Impact Man's blog

Blogging: Green Skeptic Included in Green Gamma Search Engine

I received word last night that The Green Skeptic is now featured in Green Gamma Search Engine. Here is a bit about them from their web site:

Green Gamma is a search engine for green products and information. It is also a sustainable community for green minded people. Welcome!

If you search "Gamma" wave on Wikipedia here's what you'll see:

"A gamma wave is a pattern of brain waves, associated with perception and consciousness" and " Gamma waves are involved in higher mental activity."

There you have the genesis of Green Gamma. Green thinking is perceptive and involves a higher mental activity.

This isn't pompous thinking, it's simply a statement that if you are in Gamma mode, then you are not thinking of self and are conscious of the world around you. That's a good thing!

You can check it out at: Green Gamma