I guess too much of the wrong kind of green can throw you off.

So apparently the bank of Canada got some leafs mixed up and the new $20 bills have Norway Maples on them, not a native species.   Hum..


CLICK HERE to read the CBC article explaining the fiasco.

and P.S:


         NORWAY MAPLE,            NATIVE SUGAR MAPLE

PHILIPPE LAVOIE

Ok so i'm going to post three in a row...

Below is a link to a cool TED talk. In it Eben Bayer discusses his system reno, replacing plastics made from gas with mycelium. -julian



http://www.ted.com/talks/eben_bayer_are_mushrooms_the_new_plastic.html

No more windows in tall buildings

Today while we were discussing energy systems the topic of wind turbines killing mass amounts of birds and bats was brought up. I researched the numbers and was quite startled, not by the amount of birds killed from turbines(440,000 only an estimate)  but by the number flying into windows (1 billion pretty much confirmed). This only begs the question: Are we so convoluted by the death of a tiny percent of birds that we would throw away a life changing way of harnessing an infinite source of energy? And then by the same logic remove all windows and reflective surfaces from all tall buildings?
The bird stats are pretty recent and credible and i'll put the quotes underneath this.
julian

BACKGROUND
 Window glass has enriched man’s aesthetic, cultural, physiological, and psychological well-being for at least 16 centuries. Extensive observations and experimental evidence supports the interpretation that birds simply do not see clear or reflective glass as a barrier. Consequently, sheet glass as a source of bird mortality is predicted to have increased as the size and clarity of panes have increased with time.
THE FACTS
 The dead and dying victims of glass are most often hidden from view in vegetation surrounding human
dwellings. They are either killed outright, injured and struggling to recover, or quickly taken by predators and scavengers. Lethal collisions are possible wherever birds and glass mutually occur. Glass casualties have been recorded the world over at panes of all sizes in residential homes and single or multistory buildings. Fatal or injurious collisions occur when flying birds attempt to reach habitat visible on the other side of clear panes, or by attempting to reach illusions of habitat and sky reflected in the glass surface. Intensive studies at single homes reveal one out of every two strikes results in a fatality. Glass is an indiscriminate killer that takes the fit as well as the unfit of a species population. Attrition at glass is an additive rather than a compensatory avian population mortality factor.
 Researchers differ in their evaluations of the magnitude of the toll that glass exacts on individual species and bird populations overall. Before much was known, annual deaths attributable to windows were hypothesized to be 3.5 million in the 1970s. Since then, extensive studies over the past three decades have been used to estimate the annual toll to be between 97 million to 975 million birds in the U.S. alone. The wide-ranging difference among these figures attests to the complexity of attempting to determine accurate amounts from a source in which every individual bird is a potential victim and sheet glass of every size is a potential killing site in the environment. The roughly 100 million to 1 billion toll is based on the assumption that 1-10 birds are killed at one building in the U.S. each year. Another independent study produced similar results, and evaluated this current range of annual mortality
figures to be reasonable. This confirming study examined records of 5,500 volunteers who optionally recorded bird strikes at windows while they counted visitors to feeding stations at their homes. To put these numbers in perspective, annual U.S. bird populations are estimated to be 20 billion in the fall, and annual glass kills are estimated to be 0.5 to 5.0% of this figure. By comparison, each year U.S. hunters are estimated to take 120.5 million birds, and free-ranging domestic cats are suspected to kill hundreds of millions to over a billion songbirds. Some researchers suggest that the overall avian mortality attributable to glass is likely to be much greater than what is attributable to cats: reasoning that cats are active predators that most often capture vulnerable prey while sheet glass is an indiscriminate killer that takes the strong as well as the weak and is astronomically more numerous than cats. Minimally, from an ethical and moral perspective, any unintended and unnatural killing associated with human presence in the environment should be addressed and reduced if not eliminated. Guilt and anxiety are common
feelings among an increasing number of people who discover an accidental fatality beneath the window of their home, workplace, or any other structure.

"Wind energy developers, in California and West Virginia, are being sued by environmental groups. A growing number of groups contend that hundreds of thousands of birds and bats are being killed every year by wind turbines, mostly at night when bats and migratory birds fly around mountain ridges where many wind farms are located.  

 

Kelly Fuller, with the American Bird Conservancy, said, “In 2009, an expert at the Fish and Wildlife Service estimated 440,000 birds were being killed by wind turbines a year. That was before we had more growth of the industry.”

 

West Virginia, in the eastern U.S., is a migratory corridor for birds. It's also an important habitat for bats -- millions of which have been dying from White Nose Syndrome. The illness has brought some species to the brink of extinction.  Now they face another threat."

Linfen: On Santa's naughty list?

My new found inner environmentalist couldn't help but do a double take at the city of Linfen, it has not so recently been declared(by the World Bank) the most polluted city in the world. Woah. Aside from ruining its tourism the label opened the eyes of the Chinese government to make serious changes in it's environmental policy. I was startled at this impressive title and found out what is at the root of all the pollution, it's our favorite energy source and our good friend coal. Who can blame them? I mean it's probably the best solution for this formerly small town, now inhabited by 4million+ and the coal capital of China. I mean it's coal, it's affordable, readily available, and has provided economic growth for most of China. Only if it didn't cause mass health problems throughout Shanxi province, resulting in 1 out of every 2 deaths to be cancer related. Oh yeah, and did I mention that they haven't seen a blue sky in a bit. If 20 years was a bit. Linfen used to be known as the 'Modern Fruit and Flower Town', but I don't think that one has been on the postcards for a 'bit'. All the natural springs have dried up due to over pumping of the groundwater, and surrounding farmlands have also become desolate. Now, all that economic growth I was talking about earlier isn't  necessarily a bad thing. But if you consider all that growth is centered around coal and not much else, then the problems arise. Many villagers would open up private mines in attempt to grab some of that economic 'growth'. Power to the People, right? Wrong. Private mines are in the process of being destroyed or buried by the government, and are considered highly illegal. Why would the government get in the way of such a lucrative practice you ask? Well it turns out the peoples who owned these private mines didn't really know a whole lot about disposing the toxic by-products safely. Well I wouldn't say that, they did a good job of safely putting everything back into the water supply. Anyways the problems facing Linfen are innumerable but there is hope on the horizon (figuratively that is, you can't see the horizon through the smog usually). They have cut the numbers of mines drastically from around 390 cut down to 128, and have implemented renewable power sources such as solar water heaters on the roofs. This is all speculation of course, and we can't really be sure of what is the truth and what is a PR revamp. I hope we can see what a coal based energy system can lead to, in the small time frame of 30 years.

Julian
below are some links to a video produced by Vice profiling Linfen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4DtOhe2LfQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d-Ky7Se-v8

Snazzo Vetrazzo

Look at all of these beautiful countertops! Incredibly eye-catching and incredibly durable! Strong, antibacterial, scratch-resistent, and thermal-resistant, Vertrazzo surfaces can be cut on, won't be damaged if you put a hot pot on them and they can be cleaned easily. Oh, and did I mention that they are made out of shards of recycled bottles?!

Vetrazzo countertops are made up of 85% recycled glass and 15% modified Portland White Cement. These surfaces can be used anywhere that natural stone is used; countertops, tabletops, architectural cladding, basically anywhere you want it installed. According to Vetrazzo's website, Vetrazzo is composed of a patented (Patent No. US 7,771,539), proprietary formula that combines recycled glass with a binder of cement, additives, pigments and other recycled materials. This makes these surfaces one of the most environmentally-friendly surface materials on the market. Compared to the common surface materials such as granite, corian and quartz, Vetrazzo's glass countertops are the best choice due to it's high level of strength and durability. Costing around $125-$165 per square foot polished and installed, these countertops are no more expensive than other high-end surface materials.

Here's a little more information from the Vetrazzo website about the bottles used to create these unique surfaces. "All of the glass used in Vetrazzo is recycled, and it makes up approximately 85% of the final material. Our largest source of glass is the neighborhood curbside recycling programs. (See if you can spot last night’s Heineken bottle…) Other glass comes from post-industrial usage, windows, drinking glasses, stemware, automotive glass, stained glass, laboratory glass, reclaimed glass from building demolition, and other unusual sources such as decommissioned traffic light lenses. Because of the unique nature of the glass used in the production process, every Vetrazzo surface has its own history".

Be sure to check out Vetrazzo's website and let anyone interested in renovating their house about these wonderful green wonders.

- Sav

Foxxy Fox Facts

I was up at my cottage this weekend and noticed that a new phenomenon of foxes appearing frequently in my area has grown.  Ever since the beginning of last summer foxes have been seen around more and more, this fact is a little nerve racking considering my two pets, an orange cat named Marmaduke, and a over excited dog named Lulie.  


So I started searching for possible reasons of there new invasion into my turf, and found little specific info that helped me, I have come to a completely un factual answer of an abundance of their pray or other food source, that, or they just love me :p But searching through websites I found some cool facts about foxes that are pretty, foxxy.


First and probably the coolest one, the scientific name for a fox is Vulpes, and for those who didn't jump out of their seats in amazement like I did, there is a Pokemon (yes I know i'm 12) that is named Vulpix, this particular pokemon resembles that of a vulpes. 

Foxes belong in the Canidae family alongside dogs, but share many behaviour aspects with the cat.


This animal has been used successfully on fruit farms to control pests. Foxes help to get rid of rodents without really harming the fruits.


This animal is also known to play an important role to balance the ecological cycle of nature by killing rodents and helping to control an excess of their population.


The female fox is called a vixen but in case of humans, a vixen is used to describe an attractive but cunning woman.


Well after knowing these facts I feel a little better having them share the land with my pets, anyone else have common encounters with foxes?  Or has anyone actually called a attractive yet cunning women a vixen?

This foxxy post provided by Owen T




Here is my foxxy cat Marmaduke! :)

Your Biggest Enviro SIN

What up class, coming up with blanks on blog posts so I thought I would switch it up with a simple discussion question!

I would like to know what your most common environmental sin is, personally mine is turning lights off, I race outta' rooms and completely forget to flick off.

Hopefully if people comment/ get involved with this we can find out what our class's biggest sin is!

Anywhoo i'm goin' back to finding actual posts to post about, happy postin'!

Owen T.

In relation to my sin, here is a link to the flickoff site! Its in "hibernation" right now but if you dont know about the campaign DEFINITELY check it out!