Tag Archives: cities

How ‘Green’ is Your State?

by TrishaWoodall32 Posted on April 27, 2016

How green is your state?

To find out, surf on over to WalletHub.com and check out their 2016 analysis. The group compared all 50 states in terms of 17 key metrics that look at the health of the current environment as well as the environmental impact of people’s daily habits.

They grouped the metrics into three specific categories:

Environmental Quality: Researchers took stock of how muchsolid waste was generated per capita as well as the quality of the air, soil and water.

Eco-Friendly Behaviors: WalletHub measured the number of LEED-certified green buildings per capita, as well as the state’s transportation infrastructure and number of alternatively-fueled vehicles, as well as consumption of energy, gasoline and water.

Climate Change Contributions: This category focused on the amount of carbon dioxide emitted per capita, along withemissions of other greenhouse gases, including methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated greenhouse gases.

The research team then cruncheddata from a variety of sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau, American Chemistry Council, County Health Rankings, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, the U.S. Green Buildings Council, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the U.S. Geological Survey and the World Resources Institute.

Their findings?

The ten greenest states were primarily in the Northeast, with the exception of one midwestern outlier and two states in the Pacific Northwest. Interestingly, California did not make the top ten greenest states list, coming in at number 12. On the other end of the spectrum, you might have expected a state like Texas to be the least green, but it was ranked #36in the lower half of the country, definitely, but not the worst.

Greenest States

Vermont (greenest overall)
Washington
Massachusetts
Oregon
Minnesota
Maine
Connecticut
New York
New Hampshire
New Jersey

Least Green States

Idaho
Arkansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Oklahoma
Nebraska
West Virginia
Montana
North Dakota
Wyoming (least green overall)

Perhaps not surprisingly, states considered politically “blue” are almost three times more environmentally responsible than red states.

Citizens of Missouri throw away the least amount of trash while Hawaii citizens throw away the most! And Maine recycles the most at 48 percent while Louisiana recycles only 1 percent, the least.

What value is this if you’re trying to improve the environmental quality of your own state? You can use WalletHub’s approachto compare counties in your own state and identify opportunities for improvement. (Cities might be too difficult to compare because they share so many county services, whereas county services do vary quite a bit.)

Of the 17 metrics WalletHub used, these five might be a good starting point for more specific analysis in your state:

Municipal Solid Waste: How much trash are citizens in each of your state’s counties throwing away? What enables people in a particular county to throw away less trash and recycle more? Are there plastic bag fees that encourage people to take reusable bags to the grocery store? Do curbside recycling programs make it easier for citizens to divert trash from the landfill? Have bans been put in place to prohibit use of polystyrene foam at fast food restaurants?

Gasoline Consumption: The amount of gas citizens use may vary widely from county to county. In WalletHub’s study, people living in New York consumed the least amount of gas of any state, which should be no surprise, given how densely people in the 5 boroughs of New York City live and how comprehensive the mass transit system is there. On the other hand, people in North Dakota consumed the most gasoline per capita, a reflection of the long distances folks drive from one part of the state to the next. Comparisons may be similar in rural vs urban counties in one state.

Energy Consumption: This comparison could be highly informative and might indicate the level of awareness people have one county to another when it comes to using electricity and natural gas. For example, some electric utilities might be particularly aggressive in educating consumers about the importance of energy conservation. The utility might also offer a package of incentives to get its customers to replace energy-wasting appliances with newer models. Knowing what strategies encourage residents of one county to save energy could be very valuable to managers of other counties as they strive to cut energy consumption and the carbon dioxide emissions that go along with it.

Water Consumption: The WalletHub analysis examined water quality, not consumption. But like energy consumption, analyzing the amount of water consumed in some counties compared to others in the same state could provide valuable insights into how to motivate people statewide to use water more wisely.

Number of LEED-Certified Buildings: Any time a new building is built, it should be able to meet at least the basic criteria for saving energy as established by the U.S. Green Building Council. Once a tally is made of all LEED-Certified buildings in a county, counties could start a friendly competition to see which ones build the most new LEED buildings over a certain period of time.

If these categories don’t correspond to the most pressing environmental challenges your state faces,choose some other categoriesthat are more relevant.The key is to use comparisons both to take stock of where things stand, and to use those comparisons to make things better. The comparisons will create useful benchmarks to measure its own progress over time, making both the planet and the people happier and healthier.

Related
6 Urban Green Space Projects That Are Revitalizing U.S. Cities
10 Greenest Cities in North America

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How ‘Green’ is Your State?

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Officials face criminal charges for the first time in Flint water crisis

by CarleyHannan Posted on April 20, 2016

Officials face criminal charges for the first time in Flint water crisis

By on Apr 20, 2016commentsShare

Three city and state officials are now facing felony and misdemeanor charges in the wake of the Flint water crisis, almost two years to the date after the drinking water catastrophe began.

The employees in question, according to the Detroit Free Press, include Michael Glasgow, the city’s laboratory and water quality supervisor. Glasgow faces multiple charges, including tampering with evidence to hide tests that showed dangerous levels of lead in the water supply. The other two officials, Michigan Department of Environmental Quality official Michael Prysby and Steven Busch, a district coordinator for the DEQ’s Office of Drinking Water and Municipal Assistance, face charges of misconduct in office, tampering with evidence, and violating the Michigan Safe Drinking Water Act, among others.

In an effort to save an estimated $5 million over two years, in 2014 the city began supplying its water from the contaminated Flint River instead of Detroit’s municipal water system, which it had used for the past half-century. Flint leaders continued to claim that the water was safe to drink, despite residents’ complaints about the smell and taste. In September 2015, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) publicly acknowledged the problem for the first time, promising to take action in response to the higher-than-average lead levels seen in children’s blood.

Gov. Snyder is not facing any charges, criminal or otherwise. He will be drinking Flint’s tap water, though, in a show of solidarity for a month — well, when it’s convenient.

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Michigan governor attacks PR crisis by drinking Flint water for a month

by PhilomenaPhillip Posted on April 19, 2016

Michigan governor attacks PR crisis by drinking Flint water for a month

By on Apr 19, 2016commentsShare

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder has faced scathing criticism over his response to the Flint water crisis. Now, in an effort to prove that the filtered water is safe, Snyder has committed to using Flint water for the next month, both for cooking and drinking at home. The governor will not, however, be using Flint water while traveling, according to aides, drawing further criticism from some local residents, who don’t get travel breaks from their contaminated water supply.

In a statement, the governor said, “Flint residents made it clear that they would like to see me personally drink the water, so today I am fulfilling that request.” His wife will be joining him on this journey, and the couple will fuel up on visits to the city. The governor and his wife will be taking their water from the home of Cheryl Hill and Todd Canty, Flint residents who volunteered their taps for the governor’s use.

Snyder, as the New York Times pointed out, is not the first politician to take this approach to a PR crisis. In the 1980s, New York Gov. Hugh Carey offered to drink a glass of water from a contaminated office building, Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne moved to public housing project to demonstrate its safety, and Colorado’s Gov. John Hickenlooper once drank fracking fluids. It wasn’t “tasty,” Hickenlooper said, but “I’m still alive.”

As to whether or not Gov. Snyder will still be alive by the end of the month, stay tuned.

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Meet the black activist who derailed a big polluting project before ​graduating college

by LavadaCritchfie Posted on April 18, 2016

Meet the black activist who derailed a big polluting project before ​graduating college

By on 18 Apr 2016commentsShare

Destiny Watford was a 17-year-old student at a south Baltimore high school when she asked a roomful of students if they suffered from asthma. To her dismay, every single hand went up.

That was three years ago, when Watford was in the middle of a fight to stop Energy Answers International from building a solid-waste incinerator in the Baltimore neighborhood of Curtis Bay. Her mother, along with many friends and family members, had asthma, and her neighbor died from lung cancer. The culprits seemed obvious to Watford: the medical-waste incinerator, coal pier, and slew of chemical plants surrounding Curtis Bay that foul the air. A proposed solid-waste incinerator, the biggest of its kind in the United States, was poised to move in a short walk from her high school.

Watford, along with other young people from Curtis Bay, decided to fight, largely by pressuring public officials. Last month, they scored a victory when state regulators pulled the incinerator project’s permit. For her efforts, the Goldman Environmental Foundation named the 20-year-old Watford one of six winners of this year’s Goldman Environmental Prize on Monday.

The award is fitting for Watford, who works with Free Your Voice, a human rights committee of United Workers. In 2015, the Goldman was presented to six people, including Berta Cáceres, an activist for indigenous rights who was killed in Honduras last month. It’s a prize for people who bring attention to the consequences that environmental inequities bear on their communities.

Watson, for instance, drew a connection between Baltimore’s environment and riots following the death of Freddie Gray, an unarmed, 25-year-old black man who died in police custody after getting arrested for no good reason. Residents rioted while officials fumbled to bring charges against the officers responsible for Gray’s death; Maryland’s governor declared a state of emergency, imposed a curfew and deployed the National Guard on Baltimore. Watford wondered why reporters weren’t asking what she called deeper questions about the environment in which the riots were taking place.

When I interviewed Watford, I asked her how she felt about winning. Her response was about winning the fight against the incinerator, not about winning the Goldman and its $175,000 award. A 20-year-old who’s more excited about stopping a waste incinerator than about winning a pile of money? Meet Destiny Watford, a young person who puts her community first. Here’s an edited portion of our recent conversation:

Q. Early on, you linked the death of Freddie Gray, the Baltimore riots, and the environment. Why?

A. Before we even learned about the incinerator, we were learning about our basic human rights. When we found out the incinerator was proposed to be built in our community, it violated every single value, belief, and basic human right that we had. When it come to the death of Freddie Gray, when it comes to incinerators, when it comes to the crisis in Flint, Michigan, those issues are different, but they’re not separate. They’re all issues of injustice — of systematic injustice, which we’ve been fighting against.

Q. What about environmental justice in particular? What do you think grassroots activists should understand about winning campaigns against big polluters?

A. When polluting developments are proposed, they’re usually in poor neighborhoods. They’re proposed in places where it’s perceived that our voices aren’t very strong, that there won’t be a public outcry, or that there isn’t a lot of power and so there won’t be a lot of pushback or resistance. And a lot of times, those are communities of color. It always comes down to who or what has power. When we’re resisting against an established system that creates developments like the incinerator, it’s really important to have power in communities if you are to win.

Q. You won a big victory against the proposed incinerator, but your community continues to be plagued by toxic pollution. What’s next for you?

A. As it stands now, all the air quality monitors have been removed from our community, so we don’t even know how much worse it’s gotten for us. As far as pollution goes, and how to even begin to figure out how to deal with it, I’m not completely sure, but there needs to be some sort of accountability. For instance, we’ve been working to bring in air quality monitoring to issue health impact assessments about the existing pollution in Curtis Bay. We need to measure and know what kind of specific pollution there is, how it’s affecting people, and how to deal with it.

Q. Yours is hard work. What gets you up in the morning to do it?

A. Just knowing an incinerator was going to be built in the community where I grew up, where my family grew up attracted me to working against it. Watching my nephews and other small family members grow up here, and watching neighbors and schoolmates — I mean, Curtis Bay is my home. I want to protect my home and the people that I care about. And the more I worked on the campaign, the more I came to realize that places like Curtis Bay have been taken advantage of and used for so long, and it’s really important to me that does not become our fate. That’s what gets me going.

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The Top US Cities for Urban Farming

by LuellaCorin476 Posted on April 18, 2016

There is so much to love about growing your own food its cheap, its lack of travel requirements and packaging make it sustainable, you know what was used in its creation, and then of course, its literally as fresh as it can be. There is simply nothing like plucking a tomato off the stem and eating its still-sun-warmed self from a hand scented with tomato-leaves smell. And all of that is not lost to legions of urban farmers who have taken over scruffy back plots and rooftops and vacant lots, giving them new life with gardens, greenhouses, coops and even hives. Little House on the Prairie has given way to little house on the subway line.

Every city has different regulations in terms of what urban harvesters can and cannot do, but what cities are doing the most in terms of urban farming? Researchers sifted through thousands of listings in the database of real estate brokerage Redfin and collected data on keywords like greenhouse, garden and chicken to see which cities (with populations greater than 300,000) have the most of these features per capita. Granted this list is based on homes for sale not homes in total, but it nonetheless gives an indication of where people have invested in agricultural accouterments. And maybe better yet, where the best place to buy a home with a chicken coop might be!

Holding the number one spot is Eugene, Oregon. Its not uncommon for homeowners in Oregon to have chickens or honey bees, said Matthew Brennan, a Redfin agent in Portland. The city of Portland allows homeowners to keep up to three animals, including chickens, ducks, doves, pigeons, pygmy goats and rabbits, without permits. Oregonians have a hankering for that sustainable lifestyle and Eugene is more affordable and has more space than Portland.

Below is a summary of the findings, visitRedfinfor more on each city.

Redfin

1. Eugene, Oregon
Listings with Chicken: 1.4%
Listings with Garden: 17.8%
Listings with Greenhouse: 1.29%
Median Sale Price: $256,000

2. Burlington, Vermont
Listings with Chicken: 0.9%
Listings with Garden: 16.7%
Listings with Greenhouse: 1.25%
Median Sale Price: $243,000

3. Santa Rosa, California
Listings with Chicken: 0.7%
Listings with Garden: 15.0%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.5%
Median Sale Price: $475,000

4. Greenville, South Carolina
Listings with Chicken: 0.5%
Listings with Garden: 15.5%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.15%
Median Sale Price: $159,000

5. Orlando, Florida
Listings with Chicken: 0.1%
Listings with Garden: 14.9%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.12%
Median Sale Price: $178,000

6. San Francisco, California
Listings with Chicken: 0.1%
Listings with Garden: 14.4%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.22%
Median Sale Price: $1,150,000

7. Albuquerque, New Mexico
Listings with Chicken: 0.4%
Listings with Garden: 13.7%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.28%
Median Sale Price: $219,000

8. Columbia, South Carolina
Listings with Chicken: 0.1%
Listings with Garden: 13.7%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.20%
Median Sale Price: $125,000

9. Tampa, Florida
Listings with Chicken: 0.1%
Listings with Garden: 13%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.06%
Median Sale Price: $176,000

10. Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina
Listings with Chicken: 0.2%
Listings with Garden: 12.7%
Listings with Greenhouse: 0.11%
Median Sale Price: $223,000

Written by Melissa Breyer. Reposted with permission from TreeHugger.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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The Top US Cities for Urban Farming

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Could you be Grist’s newest fellow?

by KelleDeBernales Posted on March 15, 2016

COME WORK WITH US

Could you be Grist’s newest fellow?

By on 15 Mar 2016commentsShare

Are you an early-career journalist, storyteller, or multimedia wizard who digs what we do? Then Grist wants you!

We are now accepting applications for the fall 2016 class of the Grist Fellowship.

Once again we’re inviting writers, editors, and online journalists of every stripe to come work with us for six months. You get to hone your journalistic chops at a national news outlet, deepen your knowledge of environmental issues, and experiment with storytelling. We get to teach you and learn from you and bring your work to our audience. You won’t get rich — but you will get paid.

You’ll work closely with our editors in Seattle on reporting and executing stories for Grist. Our primary subject areas are food, climate and energy, cities, science and technology, pop culture, and environmental justice. If your skills extend into realms like video, audio, and data visualization, all the better.

Our fellows have been up to some stellar work of late. Clayton Aldern brought you the brainy Climate on the Mind series while Raven Rakia explored the environmental quagmire that is Rikers Island. We’re proud of ’em.

For fellowships that begin in August 2016, please submit applications by May 2, 2016. Full application instructions here.

Good luck!

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Here’s how major cities measure up on climate change spending

by SofiaStout Posted on March 1, 2016

Here’s how major cities measure up on climate change spending

By on 1 Mar 2016 5:07 pmcommentsShare

This story was originally published by Mother Jones and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

The headline negotiations during the Paris climate summit in December were between national governments: What would China, the United States, and other big emitters be willing to do? But just outside the spotlight, some of the most optimistic commitments to curb greenhouse gas emissions, ramp up clean energy, and invest in adaptive measures were being made by cities.

A new analysis from social scientists at University College London sheds some new light on the money behind those municipal efforts — and the results paint a highly uneven picture. The researchers compared spending on climate adaptation in 10 major global cities — that is, investments in infrastructure, public health, water systems, etc., aimed at making them more resistant to climate change. All 10 cities are members of the Compact of Mayors, an initiative that came out of Paris to hold cities to a high standard of climate action.

On average among those 10 cities, spending on climate adaptation accounted for one-fifth of one percent of GDP in 2015, or about $855 million. Not surprisingly, cities in wealthier countries such the U.S. and the U.K. spent far more than cities in African countries and Southeast Asia:

Nature

Cities in developing countries also lag behind on spending on a per-capita basis. (The Paris figure is so high in part because the study counted population just within a city’s official boundaries, not the surrounding metropolitan area, and Paris’ boundaries are relatively small) …

Nature

… and as a share of GDP:

Nature

The findings illustrate that spending on climate adaptation is more a function of wealth, and the value of local real estate, than the size of a city’s population or its relative vulnerability to climate impacts. The researchers conclude that “current adaptation activities are insufficient in major population centres in developing and emerging economies.”

That may not be very surprising — of course New York and London will be better able to rally funds for climate readiness than Addis Ababa. But it’s an important snapshot of the uphill battle developing countries face in confronting climate change.

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New York lost billions with fossil fuel investments

by Ingrid13L1986 Posted on March 1, 2016

New York lost billions with fossil fuel investments

By on 1 Mar 2016 4:27 pmcommentsShare

Investing in fossil fuels is becoming a liability — not only for the planet, but for the portfolio, too.

The industry garnered a staggering $5 billion loss for the New York State Common Retirement Fund (NYS-CRF) over three years, according to an analyst estimate from the investment research firm Corporate Knights. The state’s $189.4 billion pension fund, the third largest in the country, covers 1.1 million members across the state. The loss equates to $4,500 per person.

In order to measure what sort of impact fossil fuel holdings was having on the New York State Common Retirement Fund’s equity portfolio, Corporate Knights took the 100 biggest companies that the fund has shares in. Of those, the biggest fossil fuel companies, including coal utilities, were removed. Using data about the performance of the top 100 public coal companies provided by Fossil Free Indexes, the fund was then analyzed for how it would fare without these fossil fuel stocks, versus how it fared with them.

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“Our findings…indicate that the Fund would have made an extra $5.3 billion over the past three years had it shifted its investments out of fossil fuel stocks into companies providing climate solutions,” Toby Heaps, CEO and co-founder of Corporate Knights, told Grist.

Corporate Knights, a Toronto-based financial information company, has analyzed the fossil fuel holdings of several large funds in the past, in an effort to promote a message of “clean capitalism,” a market system in which social, economic and ecological costs are incorporated into prices of goods and services. It publishes both information on corporate responsibility, like the annual list of the “Best 50 Corporate Citizens in Canada,” as well as analyses of corporate sustainability performance, like the annual “North American Sustainable Cities Scorecard.”

Divesting in fossil fuels has been a hot-button issue for years, with pressure on major universities to scrub their portfolios. Right now, it’s unclear exactly what outcome divesting will have. One study, funded by the oil and gas industry, found that universities could lose millions if they cut their cut oil, gas and coal holdings. Harvard, it reported, would lose up to $108 million per year if it divested from fossil fuel companies. But a slew of other studies have contradicted that finding, suggesting that divesting in fossil fuels can save big money. One analysis by the investment firm Trillium Asset Management directly contradicted the industry-funded findings for Harvard, reporting that the university lost an estimated $21 million dollars over three years by ignoring calls to divest. One 2013 analysis commissioned by the Associated Press found that university endowments would have been better off had they divested a decade previous. Last October, after beginning to divest from all fossil fuels a year earlier, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund announced that its $850 million portfolio was not harmed by the decision.

According to one 2015 analysis by MSCI, the world’s leading stock market index company, investors who cut out holdings in fossil fuel companies outperformed those that had stakes in coal, oil and gas over the past five years. The analysis attributed fossil fuel holdings’ poor performance to both the fall in the oil price, as well as investors considering oil and coal to be risky investments in the long run.

The New York pension fund’s investments in fossil fuels have been questioned lately, both by climate advocates and by investors. Last week, Thomas DiNapoli, the New York State Comptroller who manages the pension fund, joined four other Exxon shareholders to demand that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission force the company to address how climate change mitigation policies would impact its bottom line. New York’s retirement system invests directly about $1 billion in Exxon, the world’s largest publicly traded oil and gas company. Exxon quickly challenged that resolution — but it seems that today, the Comptroller got his answer.

“The era of fossil fuels is coming to an end, and this report demonstrates very clearly why divestment is not only environmentally sound, but financially responsible,” New York State Senator Liz Krueger, co-sponsor of the Fossil Fuel Divestment Act, said in a statement. “By staying invested in fossil fuels over the last three years our state pension fund missed out on over $5 billion in potential returns. Investment in fossil fuels is a sinking ship, and it’s high time we headed for the lifeboats.”

Corporate Knights, working with other climate action groups, has found similar trends for other large shareholders that refuse to divest in fossil fuels. Last November, it launched “The Clean Capitalist Decarbonizer,” a tool to analyze the performance of 14 major funds, including Harvard’s endowment, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the pension plans of Canada and the Netherlands. Put together, these 14 funds would have been $23 billion better off had they divested from fossil fuels just three years earlier, in 2012.

For those looking to not make the same mistakes the state of New York and others have, there are easy ways to divest—but you may have to read the fine print to make sure there are no oil smears left on your money. Like many universities and corporations that have already pulled their stakes out of the grip of Big Oil, it’s an measurable way to contribute to the climate movement. What’s more, it may save you a whole lot of money.

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France Will Require Green Roofs and Solar Panels on New Buildings

by JaniceWakehurst Posted on March 1, 2016

France has passed a law that will require all new commercial buildings to be equipped with either green roofs or solar panels, according to The Guardian. The law states that any new building constructed in a commercial space must be covered halfway with either greenery or solar panelsbusinesses can decide which option to choose.

The benefits of green roofs

Green roofs are a solution to many urban and environmental problems and are popular among environmental activists and green-minded city planners alike. Covering a building with plant life insulates the structure, making it more energy efficient. In fact, green roofs can reduce the amount of air conditioning necessary to cool a building by up to 75 percent, according to Greenroofs.org.

Thats not all that these sky-high landscapes can do for cities. Like all plant life, these oases of greenery absorb carbon and keep the air cool, helping to mitigate the Heat Island Effect: a phenomenon that makes urban areas significantly warmer than suburban and rural communities because of human activities. Green roofs also provide sanctuary for birds, bees and other species that need spaces to call home in crowded, dense cities.

Green roof laws: An international trend

France isnt the first country to enact legislation encouraging rooftop greenery. Cities such as Tokyo, Toronto, Zurich and Copenhagen also require new buildings to have some or all of their roofs covered in plants. So far, U.S. cities have opted for tax breaks rather than legislation to address the issue.

Offering incentives such as tax breaks is better than making someone do something, Bradley Rowe of the MSU Green Roof Research Program told Yes Magazine in an interview last year. Building owners forced to put on a green roof may cut corners.

Solar panels as an alternative

Of course, French businesses arent being forced to cover half of their roofs in greenerythey can opt for solar panels instead. Solar panel use has grown rapidly in France, with 2014 figures showing 5,300 MW of solar energy production annually. Its a number that continues to rise as the country shifts toward more sustainable energy policies.

The green roof and solar panel legislation is expected to be a step in the right direction. Though activists had initially wanted mandatory green roof laws for every new building, government officials convinced them to accept the law as it currently stands. The next time you visit France, you may notice a little more plant life on the rooftops!

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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Which Cities Around the World Recycle the Most?

by Melody56Xyn Posted on February 18, 2016

Each city is known for something different. But which cities around the world are working hardest to make the Earth a little cleaner? This infographic from the Expedia travel blog goes into detail about which countries recycle the most for a greener lifestyle.

Infographic via Expedia

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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Which Cities Around the World Recycle the Most?

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