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Happy Cactus – DK

by Myrna Posted on August 16, 2018

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Happy Cactus

Cacti, Succulents, and More

DK

Genre: Nature

Price: $1.99

Publish Date: May 15, 2018

Publisher: DK Publishing

Seller: PENGUIN GROUP USA, INC.


In-depth profiles, care tips, and display inspiration for more than 50 popular cactus and succulent varieties. Your cactus might be surviving, but is it happy? There's so much more to these little green plants than just keeping them alive. Get right to the point with practical advice from potting to propagating. Unearth the secrets of different cacti and succulents, with profiles on more than 50 popular varieties–from the cute, flowering pincushion cactus to the wacky prickly pear, discover what makes your plant unique and how it might behave when treated with a little bit of love. Find out where to put it, when to water it, what to feed it, what to look out for, and how to encourage its distinctive traits, from flower stalks to fast growth. Find inspiration for creating a showstopping cactus display. Whether you're seeking a stylish houseplant for your apartment but struggling to keep more temperamental plants alive, or you're a green-fingered cactus enthusiast determined to get your precious plant to grow and flower this year, Happy Cactus is here to answer all your questions.

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Happy Cactus – DK

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How to Throw a Trash-Free Barbecue

by Carissa50X Posted on July 26, 2018

We all know that barbecues produce a whole lot of garbage?? a lot of laughter, connection, and full bellies, of course, but a lot of garbage all the same. Seeing those stacks of paper plates, plastic wrap, aluminum foil, and piles of disposable?cutlery going into the trash bin can make even the most blissfully unaware of us uneasy.

It doesn’t have to be this way! There are so many creative ways to enjoy a cookout with friends without creating three enormous bags of garbage. Simply embrace the package-free, the homemade, the reusable, and the compostable, then?let your imagination do its work.

How to Host a Zero-Waste Barbecue

1. Prepare in advance.

As soon as you know you’re hosting the gig, plan out your menu. Consider the list: what can you make ahead of time? Think you can whip up some burger buns? Why not spend a lazy weekend afternoon mixing up some vegan mayo? Many favorite condiments and toppings can be made at home, no problem.

2. Greenify your shopping trip.

When you shop for ingredients for your black bean burgers, plus all the summery sides you can imagine, work to avoid any excessive, non-recyclable packaging. Look for fresh, non-deli options like watermelon and blueberries, buy?snacks in bulk, and bring your own reusable?bags to the store. In addition, it’s a great idea to ask guests to bring their own reusable containers for leftovers at the end of the event!

3. Eliminate single-use items.

Plastic cups, paper plates, and disposable napkins should be a thing of the past ? they’re such a waste of cash! Instead, put out a nice pile of cloth napkins or bandanas, a collection of reusable cups, mason jars, and plates, and various silverware. Host events like this often? Consider investing in a cohesive set that you really like. Otherwise, thrift your stash and roll with the eclectic vibe!

4. Avoid single-serve beverages.

Rather than buying a large selection of canned and bottled beverages, consider making something at volume yourself (we especially love iced tea and fresh lemonade). Still want to offer additional choices? Purchase?those you know can be recycled locally ? say, drinks in glass or aluminum.

5.?Simplify clean-up for yourself and others.

For informal events, request that your guests scrape food scraps into the compost bin (don’t forget it!) and bring their dishes and cloth napkins inside for washing. For larger or more formal events, put out bins for dirty dishes, napkins, compost, and recyclables. Just make sure they’re clearly marked to avoid confusion!

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 to Throw a Trash-Free Barbecue

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EPA’s new environmental justice adviser is not down with its coal ash plan.

by HermineBeatham Posted on March 15, 2018

The legendary Stephen Hawking passed away early Wednesday in his Cambridge home.

Later in his life, Hawking channeled his famous intellect into averting Armageddon. “We face awesome environmental challenges: climate change, food production, overpopulation, the decimation of other species, epidemic disease, acidification of the oceans,” he wrote in an op-ed in 2016. “Together, they are a reminder that we are at the most dangerous moment in the development of humanity.”

While he predicted humans would need to find a new home on another planet to survive, he also wrote that “right now we only have one planet, and we need to work together to protect it.”

Hawking reportedly wanted his tombstone engraved with the famous equation for black hole entropy that he developed with colleague Jacob Bekenstein. “Things can get out of a black hole, both to the outside, and possibly, to another universe,” he said in a 2016 lecture. “So, if you feel you are in a black hole, don’t give up. There’s a way out.”

Doctors didn’t expect Hawking to live past 25 after he was diagnosed with ALS as a young man. He surpassed their expectations by 51 years. So if he beat the odds on his own, maybe the rest of us can take inspiration from him. As Hawking once said, “Climate change is one of the great dangers we face, and it’s one we can prevent if we act now.”

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EPA’s new environmental justice adviser is not down with its coal ash plan.

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How the mainstream media got played by Trump

by AntoineEichmann Posted on February 20, 2018

The media spent a ton of time in 2017 puzzling over whether President Trump thinks climate change is real. That was a ton of time wasted. His stance has long been clear, thanks to more than a hundred tweets and loads of comments dismissing or denying climate change.

The fact that Trump has called global warming a “hoax” was mentioned in nearly a quarter of all segments about climate change on the nightly news and Sunday morning programs on ABC, CBS, and NBC in 2017 — and in more than a third of those instances, the networks didn’t push back by affirming that human-driven climate change is a reality. Network journalists did numerous interviews asking Trump administration officials for clarity on the president’s stance. And outlets from Time to CNN cited the hoax claim and tried to make sense of Trump’s nonsensical climate views.

This misfire by mainstream media follows on the heels of a different sort of failure in 2016. That year, broadcast networks spent way too little time on climate change overall and completely failed to report during the campaign on what a Trump win would mean for climate change.

Now the networks are covering climate change but squandering too much of that coverage in trying to read Trump’s Fox-addled mind and divine whether he accepts climate science. That’s crowding out reporting on other, more critical climate-related news, from how the Trump administration is aggressively dismantling climate protections to how climate change makes hurricanes and wildfires more dangerous.

It’s bad enough that outlets waste all this time on old news about Trump’s climate views. But what makes it even worse is that they too often get the story wrong.

Consider this example: Last June, Trump’s U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, did the rounds on TV news to defend her boss’ decision to pull the U.S. out of the Paris climate agreement. When asked to clarify Trump’s views on climate change, she said more than once that he “believes the climate is changing” and “he believes pollutants are part of that equation.”

Haley was employing Republicans’ favorite obfuscation technique on climate change — what savvy observers call “lukewarm” climate denial. The obfuscators try to sound reasonable by admitting that the climate is changing, but then get all squishy about why it’s changing or how it will play out or what we could possibly do about it. (In fact, there is overwhelming scientific consensus that human activity is the primary cause of climate change, a fact that U.S. government experts again confirmed just three months ago.) You’d think that journalists who’ve been covering national politics would be thoroughly familiar with this gambit by now. Trump nominees made liberal use of it during confirmation hearings last year, and other Republicans have been employing it for longer still.

But ABC News completely fumbled the story. Splashing the words “BREAKING NEWS” and “CLIMATE CHANGE FLIP” across the screen, ABC’s World News Tonight made Haley’s comments seem like big deal.

Anchor Tom Llamas reported that her remarks represented a “dramatic switch” and “major concession” with “the administration saying the president does believe that the climate is changing.” Correspondent Gloria Riviera described Haley’s remarks as “a stunning reversal.”

There was no reversal. There was just a stunning incident of ABC falling for Trump administration spin.

Other networks and outlets have made similar mistakes, failing to properly identify the Trump team’s lukewarm climate denial and put comments in context. Like when The Associated Press declared, “Trump changes his tune on climate change,” though in fact he had done no such thing, as Grist pointed out at the time.

Instead of continuing to fixate on (and misreport) Trump’s personal views about climate change, journalists should offer more reporting on the consequences of having a president who disregards climate science and opposes climate action. Those consequences include: Policies that encourage dirty energy instead of clean energy. Less innovation. Fewer jobs in renewables and energy efficiency. Diminished national security. More destructive storms and dangerous wildfires, and communities that are less prepared to cope with them.

Topics like these got dramatically less coverage last year than they deserved, in large part because so much climate reporting was centered on Trump. A new Media Matters analysis found that when corporate broadcast TV news reported on climate change last year, they spent 79 percent of the time on statements or actions by the Trump administration — and even that included little coverage of efforts to roll back the Clean Power Plan and other climate regulations. Issues like how climate change affects the economy or public health got even less attention. And in a year when hurricanes and other forms of extreme weather hammered the U.S., the networks hardly ever mentioned climate change in their coverage of those disasters.

Instead of trying to analyze Trump’s well-established refusal to accept climate science, media should be telling stories of how climate change is happening here and now, how it’s affecting real people, and how the EPA and other agencies are ripping up climate regulations. When they chase Trump around and let him set the agenda, the hoax is on all of us.

Lisa Hymas is director of the climate and energy program at Media Matters for America. She was previously a senior editor at Grist.

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How the mainstream media got played by Trump

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Queen Elizabeth has no patience for plastic.

by KirkPJHixoknucv Posted on February 13, 2018

Here’s how humanity could all but ensure its own demise: Dig up all the coal we have left and burn it, warming the planet 4 to 6 degrees C.

But that worst-case scenario doesn’t match up with what’s really happening in the world, Justin Ritchie, lead author of a new study published in Environmental Research Letters, told Grist.

That’s because money spent on climate change measures goes further than it did 30 years ago. Plus, baseline trends show greenhouse gas emissions are on the decline. Most studies underestimate the effect these factors have on global decarbonization.

The study indicates that the goals outlined in the Paris Agreement are more achievable than previously projected — but that’s not to say humanity isn’t in deep trouble.

It’s not “4 to 6 degrees bad,” Ritchie says. “It’s 3 degrees bad. You can’t say we don’t have to worry about implementing policies, we do. But it’s not going to reach the truly catastrophic scenarios.”

Another recent study published in the same journal shows that if all the coal plants currently planned actually get built, humanity could blow past the Paris goal of limiting warming to 2 degree C above pre-industrial levels.

Ritchie said his research doesn’t counteract that finding. “There’s a whole range of scenarios that can occur,” he says. “What our paper is trying to do is look at that whole range and how can we design policies that are more robust.”

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Queen Elizabeth has no patience for plastic.

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Oregon is about to get a big, $48 million pile of solar panels.

by FatimaPenington Posted on February 7, 2018

Here’s how humanity could all but ensure its own demise: Dig up all the coal we have left and burn it, warming the planet 4 to 6 degrees C.

But that worst-case scenario doesn’t match up with what’s really happening in the world, Justin Ritchie, lead author of a new study published in Environmental Research Letters, told Grist.

That’s because money spent on climate change measures goes further than it did 30 years ago. Plus, baseline trends show greenhouse gas emissions are on the decline. Most studies underestimate the effect these factors have on global decarbonization.

The study indicates that the goals outlined in the Paris Agreement are more achievable than previously projected — but that’s not to say humanity isn’t in deep trouble.

It’s not “4 to 6 degrees bad,” Ritchie says. “It’s 3 degrees bad. You can’t say we don’t have to worry about implementing policies, we do. But it’s not going to reach the truly catastrophic scenarios.”

Another recent study published in the same journal shows that if all the coal plants currently planned actually get built, humanity could blow past the Paris goal of limiting warming to 2 degree C above pre-industrial levels.

Ritchie said his research doesn’t counteract that finding. “There’s a whole range of scenarios that can occur,” he says. “What our paper is trying to do is look at that whole range and how can we design policies that are more robust.”

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Oregon is about to get a big, $48 million pile of solar panels.

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3 Green Goals Worth Setting in 2018

by violahoff1699 Posted on January 5, 2018

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The start of a new year is traditionally the time to reflect on the past and set goals to improve in the future. As you do so, consider setting some personal environmental goals to help you on your path to living a greener, healthier, more sustainable life. The three goals below are a great place to start.

Reduce Your Food Waste

According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, the average American household throws away $2,200 worth of food each year. Clearly, cutting back on food waste is something most of us could work on. Shopping smarter is the first step in reducing your food waste. Walking into the grocery store with no plan can be a big mistake. Without a plan, it’s easy to buy far more food than you’ll actually eat, or foods that you won’t eat all of, during a given week.

By planning effectively, you can buy exactly what you need without getting too much excess. Finding good recipes is a key component. Often, recipes will call for a small portion of something, such as half a bell pepper. As you plan your meals for a week, find recipes that use many of the same ingredients, so you won’t be left with extras. Don’t forget to visit the bulk bins, where you can get exactly the quantity you need of certain ingredients. And make sure you actually eat the leftovers, rather than watching them grow mold in the back of your refrigerator.

When you do have leftovers that don’t get eaten, a backyard composting heap can be an excellent way to reuse them. Composting can be done regardless of your yard size, and can even been done when you live in an apartment.

Decrease Time in the Car

Cutting back on time in a car can be a daunting task, especially if you’re one of the many people that has to commute to work each day. But there are a number of things you can do to reduce the mileage.

One, you could switch to public transit a few days each week if this is available in your area. Riding the train, subway, or bus may not always be convenient, but by doing it just a couple of days per week, you’ll make a significant impact over the course of a year.

Two, carpool with a coworker. I get it, carpooling can be a bit of a pain. You’re forced to work on someone else’s schedule and there’s no “swinging by the store” on your way home. But instead of carpooling every day, why not do it a few days each week? If you carpooled every Tuesday and Thursday, you’d reduce your driving and get to know your coworkers better.

Carpooling is cool! Photo: Adobe Stock

Three, work from home more. While not every employer is open to the idea of remote workers just yet, why not try easing your boss into it. See if you can work from home just once a week or even one day every other week. As they see your productivity unchanged, they may open up to letting you do so more often.

Cut Back on Consumption

The last goal I’ll list here for you to consider setting this year is to consume less. Every new item you buy requires resources to manufacture and transport. In many cases, these items will be used a limited number of times before ending up shoved into a closet or, even worse, in the trash.

When considering a purchase, first think about how much you’ll actually use it. If the answer is rarely, consider borrowing it from a neighbor or friend. You may not need a power sander regularly, but your neighbor may be willing to let you use his. Participating in the sharing economy can be an effective way to reduce your consumption. There are also many services that rent out equipment and items for short periods of time.

If it’s something you will use often, first consider buying it used. There are so many great ways to shop for used items these days, you’re bound to find what you’re looking for in good condition somewhere. If you do need/want to buy new, always strive to buy quality items. This is especially important when it comes to clothes and shoes. You may have to pay a bit more, but in the long run, it’s absolutely worth it.

While these three green goals are a great place to start, there are many more out there. What are some of your green goals for this new year?

3 Green Goals Worth Setting in 2018

The start of a new year is traditionally the time …Brian BrassawJanuary 5, 2018

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Whether you’ve resolved to be a better environmentalist or to unleash your inner …Lauren MurphyJanuary 3, 2018

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3 Green Goals Worth Setting in 2018

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Drawdown – Paul Hawken & Tom Steyer

by Myrna Posted on September 30, 2017

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Drawdown

The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming

Paul Hawken & Tom Steyer

Genre: Science & Nature

Price: $13.99

Publish Date: April 18, 2017

Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group

Seller: Penguin Group (USA) Inc.


•  New York Times  bestseller  • The 100 most substantive solutions to reverse global warming, based on meticulous research by leading scientists and policymakers around the world “At this point in time, the  Drawdown  book is exactly what is needed; a credible, conservative solution-by-solution narrative that we can do it. Reading it is an effective inoculation against the widespread perception of doom that humanity cannot and will not solve the climate crisis. Reported by-effects include increased determination and a sense of grounded hope.” —Per Espen Stoknes, Author,  What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming   “There’s been no real way for ordinary people to get an understanding of what they can do and what impact it can have. There remains no single, comprehensive, reliable compendium of carbon-reduction solutions across sectors. At least until now. . . . The public is hungry for this kind of practical wisdom.” —David Roberts,  Vox “This is the ideal environmental sciences textbook—only it is too interesting and inspiring to be called a textbook.” —Peter Kareiva, Director of the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, UCLA In the face of widespread fear and apathy, an international coalition of researchers, professionals, and scientists have come together to offer a set of realistic and bold solutions to climate change. One hundred techniques and practices are described here—some are well known; some you may have never heard of. They range from clean energy to educating girls in lower-income countries to land use practices that pull carbon out of the air. The solutions exist, are economically viable, and communities throughout the world are currently enacting them with skill and determination. If deployed collectively on a global scale over the next thirty years, they represent a credible path forward, not just to slow the earth’s warming but to reach drawdown, that point in time when greenhouse gases in the atmosphere peak and begin to decline. These measures promise cascading benefits to human health, security, prosperity, and well-being—giving us every reason to see this planetary crisis as an opportunity to create a just and livable world.

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Drawdown – Paul Hawken & Tom Steyer

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Productivity Is the Key to Economic Growth

by LatishaTabor Posted on May 24, 2017

Mother Jones

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Mick Mulvaney says the haters don’t know what they’re talking about:

In his remarks Tuesday, Mulvaney mentioned that the economy had often grown in the past at rates of 3 percent and called people’s objections to the Trump administration’s expectation of growth rates that high “absurd.”

“It used to be normal. Ten years ago, it was normal. In fact, it’s been normal for the history of the country,” said Mulvaney.

Mulvaney is sort of right about this. But there’s more to it. The basic formula for economic growth is simple: Economic growth = Population growth + Productivity growth. Population growth has been slowing down for decades, and Mulvaney isn’t going to change that. We know exactly what the population of the country is going to be over the next few years.

So that leaves productivity growth, which the BLS estimates here. Here’s what all three factors have looked like since 1960:

In order to achieve 3 percent economic growth, we need productivity growth of about 2.3 percent. This is decidedly not normal for the history of the country—not in the past 50 years, anyway. With the brief exception of the unsustainable housing bubble era, we haven’t hit that since the end of 60s.

Productivity growth is a real problem, and it’s something of a mystery why it’s been so low lately. But it’s a mystery to Mulvaney too, and it’s certainly not due to punitive tax rates or heavy-handed regulations. Despite this, Mulvaney is suggesting that Trump can more than double the productivity growth rate of the past ten years, reaching a target we haven’t hit in a normal, healthy economy for the past half century. There’s simply no reason to believe this, and Mulvaney hasn’t even tried to explain how he thinks Trump can accomplish it. Not even hand waving. He’s literally said nothing about productivity growth at all.

Until he does, nobody should believe his growth estimates. It all comes down to productivity, and that’s what Mulvaney needs to talk about.

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Productivity Is the Key to Economic Growth

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Drunk Driving Followup: The Mystery Solved!

by VedaReiter Posted on May 20, 2017

Mother Jones

Yesterday I wrote about the mystery of drunk driving: if stricter laws and harsher punishments really are responsible for a decline in drunk driving, why is it that alcohol-related fatalities have only declined at the same rate as every other kind of road fatality? Is it possible that all those laws have been useless?

I got several good responses, which confirmed that there’s a bit of a mystery here but pointed out that my data only went back to 1994. This misses the significant drop in drunk driving during the 80s and early 90s. Then I got an email from Darren Grant, an economics professor at Sam Houston State University, pointing me to a paper that decomposes exactly what happened and when. Grant’s paper, which relies on a microdata-based model of traffic fatalities, concludes that it’s legitimate to use the percentage of all road fatalities that involve alcohol—which has been flat for many years—as a proxy for the amount of drunk driving. It also breaks down the reason for the decline in drunk driving during the 80s and 90s. Without further ado, here is his chart:

There are several takeaways from this:

During the 80s and early 90s, drunk driving decreased significantly.
By the mid-90s, the level of drunk driving flattened out and has been flat ever since.
The effect of laws on drunk driving has been pretty modest. That’s the red band in the chart. Stricter laws are responsible for only a small fraction of the total decline.

There’s potentially some good news here. Grant concludes that the biggest effect by far has been from social forces, namely the increased stigma associated with drunk driving. If you discount demographics, which we have no control over, social stigma accounts for about half the drop in drunk driving. This suggests that what we need isn’t so much stricter laws, but a revitalized campaign to even further stigmatize drunk driving. I’m on board with that.

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Drunk Driving Followup: The Mystery Solved!

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