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The team at MoreEco have just sent BeMoreEco their latest newsletter with the latest Eco Shopping Offers currently running on their site. So if you want to;

• Shop for great ethical, eco, green and organic products.
• Save Money with great % off deals.
• Receive free eco gifts.
• Receive 500 FREE points (for new members).
• Earn MoreEco points on every purchase.
• Earn FREE carbon offset with every 10 points earned.

Founded in 2006, Sustained is a printed magazine and online community. It’s an independent, upbeat, fun, cool-but-not-trendy, light-hearted and non-pretentious group, covering all the topics that surround sustainability - and what’s more it’s FREE! 

The printed magazine is distributed via local networks of organic vegetable boxes and shops, farmers markets, libraries, venues and events across the UK.

The latest issue of Sustained is out now. In Issue 9 and has been sponsored by ‘The Converging World” and is a Carbon Special addition.

They’re always on the lookout for new stockists so if you know an independent vegetable box scheme, organic shop or market trader, they can send FREE copies of the publication for all of their customers!

All you need to do is ask your local wholefood shop to order copies of Sustained for you from their suppliers with their next food order (they are delivered free of charge and come in bundles of 50).  National wholefood suppliers that distribute Sustained are the Suma, Essential and the Rainbow Wholefood co-operatives. If your local shop chooses to order from Suma there’s a catalogue code they can use – BK820.

Then just return a few days later and collect you copies. And if you have an event where you’d like to give them out just get in touch.

To view the magazine online and have a quick read before you order go to www.sustainedmagazine.com.

Sustained: small change - big difference…

Global warming is mainly the result of CO2 levels rising in the Earth’s atmosphere. Both atmospheric CO2 and climate change are accelerating. Climate scientists say we have years, not decades, to stabilize CO2 and other greenhouse gases.

To help the world succeed, CO2Now.org makes it easy to see the most current CO2 level and what it means. So, use this site and keep an eye on CO2.  Invite others to do the same. Then we can do more to send CO2 in the right direction.

Check out the BeMoreEco side bar to view the CO2 Widget or the big one below. The CO2Now.org widget displays the current concentration of atmospheric CO2 as measured at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. Measurements are taken with high precision instruments at a remote location where CO2 is well mixed in the atmosphere, more than two miles above sea level.

The atmospheric air samples are analyzed and reported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) from a laboratory in Boulder Colorado, also in the United States.

Think of CO2Now.org as the most direct connection with the most important greenhouse gas of the present century.  It is your link to the heart of the global warming problem and the key to the solution.  There are no filters.  The data is not processed or adjusted.  There is practically no time delay.  There are no words and no spin doctors between you and what is happening in the atmosphere.   Pure and simple, the data is an objective measurement of atmospheric reality, virtually in real time.

When CO2 is rising in the atmosphere, we can expect the global warming and climate trends to worsen. When CO2 stabilizes and declines, we will know that humanity is actually on track to solve the related problems of global warming and climate change.  It is not enough for the data to be speaking, people need to pay attention and know what is going on.   

LONDON (Reuters) - Google Inc is soon to roll out free software which allows consumers to track their home electricity use and improve energy efficiency in a bid to help mitigate global warming. Dan Reicher, Director for Climate Change and Energy Initiatives Google, told Reuters it was in talks with utilities companies in the United Sates, Europe and Asia to make the product available shortly to general consumers.

As part of its efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Google said in February it would use its software skills for the program that will show home energy consumption in real time on a user’s computer or a telephone.

“It will get rolled out very soon to regular energy consumers,” Reicher said, without providing exact timings.

“When I began getting information about my own home, I discovered that I had a 35-year electric motor running for my heating system. That was using huge amount of electricity. I did not realize that’s the change I need to make in my home.”

The company cited studies showing that access to home energy information typically saves between 5 percent and 15 percent on monthly electricity bills.

“The beauty of the tool we are developing is that is going to be an open source,” Reicher said.

(Reporting by Nao Nakanishi; Editing by Keiron Henderson)

While Disney is taking the well-worn path to corporate environmentalism, its business model still depends on enticing visitors to fly halfway round the world to shake hands with Mickey Mouse and ride a rollercoaster or two.

Experts say only a fraction of the Sahara, probably the size of a small country, would need to be covered to produce enough energy to supply the whole of Europe. Written by David Adam at the Guardian.

European countries could transform their electricity supplies within a decade by investing in a giant network of solar panels in the Sahara desert, an expert told a global warming conference in Copenhagen.

Dr Anthony Patt of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Africa said some £50bn of government investment was needed over the next decade to make the scheme a reality. That would convince private companies that power from the Sahara was both feasible and an attractive investment, he said.

In the long term, such a plan, combined with strings of windfarms along the north Africa coast, could “supply Europe with all the energy it needs”.

He said technological advances combined with falling costs have made it realistic to consider north Africa as Europe’s main source of imported energy.

“The sun is very strong there and it’s very reliable. There is starting to be a growing number of cost estimates of both wind and concentrated solar power for North Africa….that start to compare favourably with alternative technologies. The cost of moving [electricity] long distances has really come down.”

He said only a fraction of the Sahara, probably the size of a small country, would need to be covered to produce enough energy to supply the whole of Europe.

The results are the first findings of a major research effort, together with experts at the European Climate Forum and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, to judge whether such a Sahara solar plan is realistic. Patt said the team was looking at questions of security and governance, as well as ways to pay for the technology. The full results will be presented to governments later this year.

He said sunshine in the Sahara is twice as strong as in Spain and is a constant resource that is rarely blocked by clouds even in the winter. The scheme would use mirrors to focus the sun’s rays onto a thin pipe containing either water or salt. The rays boil the water or melt the salt and the resulting energy used to power turbines.

Unlike wind power, which usually has to be used immediately because of the cost of storing the electricity generated, the hot water and salt can be stored for several hours. Trials of such concentrated solar power plants are planned for Egypt, Morocco, Algeria and Dubai, but Libya and Tunisia could also be considered.

Patt said that starting such a scheme would not be all plain sailing though. There would likely be opposition from local communities across Europe who unhappy about transmission cables installed near their homes. Piecemeal national transmission networks could also pose a problem.

The findings were revealed at the Copenhagen Climate Congress, a special three-day summit aimed at updating the latest climate science ahead of global political negotiations in December over a successor to the Kyoto treaty.

One is a fruit drink made by a boutique company with a clutch of foodie awards and an impeccable ethical brand, which even boasts a halo on its logo. The other is a fizzy pop, famous for rotting teeth, made by a corporate giant almost synonymous with globalisation.

But when it comes to the environmental issue of the moment - the carbon footprint of their products - the bottle of Innocent smoothie comes off worse than a can of Coke. At least at first glance.

Coca-Cola today becomes the biggest global brand to publish the greenhouse gases produced by making, packaging, transporting, chilling, and disposing of their most popular products. The study, done with the government-funded Carbon Trust, shows a standard 330ml can of Coke embodies the equivalent of 170g of carbon dioxide (CO2e), and the same sized Diet Coke or Coke Zero 150g.

Coke’s UK business follows Innocent, which helped the Carbon Trust pioneer its footprinting, and whose 250ml bottle of mango and passion fruit smoothie has a carbon footprint of 209g.

Source and full article: The Guardian

French President Nicolas Sarkozy chalked up almost as many miles as Britain’s Gordon Brown and Germany’s Angela Merkel put together in 2008 but produced less greenhouse gas than either, a magazine reported 2nd March.

The distance Sarkozy traveled last year was the equivalent of flying round the world eight times, Terra Eco magazine said, basing its emissions calculations on his itinerary and the type of aircraft used. Sarkozy flew 324,595 kilometers (201,600 miles) and produced 7,100 metric tons in CO2 emissions, using a more fuel-efficient plane than the two other heads of government, the magazine said.

Britain’s prime minister produced the most carbon dioxide of the three, traveling 157,962 kilometers by plane and train and generating 8,429 metric tons of CO2 emissions, it said.

Chancellor Merkel, who made more than half her official trips within Germany last year, traveled 174,440 kilometers and emitted 7,395 metric tons of CO2, the magazine said.

Brown traveled mainly by Boeing 347, 357 and 777 and took the Eurostar train for visits to Paris and Brussels, while Sarkozy used an Airbus A319 and Merkel an Airbus A310, Terra Eco said.

Aviation and shipping make up 5 percent of mankind’s carbon dioxide emissions, as cheap flights and rising incomes have led to a boom in air travel, and the increasing globalization of manufacturing means more goods crisscross the world’s oceans.

Source; PARIS (Reuters)

Reports made in January suggested that recycling adds to global warming, rather than tackling it, are misleading and factually incorrect, said Dr Liz Goodwin, CEO WRAP.

“Around two thirds of households now recycle as a way of life. The message to householders is that recycling is delivering great environmental benefits and there is absolutely no reason for them to stop,” said Dr Liz Goodwin.

They Say Can Use Human Waste, Too

Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine Professor Junichi Takahashi and the Sumitomo Corporation research group (both in Japan) have jointly developed technology to produce hydrogen from cattle dung and urine for use in fuel cells. They say the same can be done with human waste.

The researchers say the process allows for the production of hydrogen without producing unwanted carbon dioxide. Given its potential utility with human waste, the idea also may open pathways to household toilet technology: “toilet generators.”

Yomiuri Shimbun in Japan reports:

“Cattle dung and urine first need to be fermented under oxygen-free conditions to extract ammonia, which is then electrolyzed into hydrogen and nitrogen. The hydrogen is then fed into a fuel cell along with oxygen, where the two react to produce electricity.

Takahashi and the group spent about 2 million yen [approx. 22,000 USD] to build an experimental apparatus, which measures 2 meters by 1 meter, that produces hydrogen from fermented animal waste. Using the device in conjunction with a fuel cell, they successfully produced 0.2 watt of electricity from about 20 kilograms of cattle waste.

It is estimated that, by increasing the power generation efficiency, six to eight tons of cattle waste, equivalent to the average amount of cattle waste produced each day at a cattle farm in Hokkaido, can produce enough hydrogen to generate electricity to power an average household for three days.”

Source; sustainablog.org