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THE ENVIRONMENT
- APPRECIATION & ISSUES

Environment Blog

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                    Japanese Nuclear Catastrophe - Worse than Chernobyl

MAKING A DIFFERENCE AND HELPING TO PROTECT OUR PRECIOUS HOME WORLD

We live in a beautiful world, teaming with a diversity of amazing species and natural wonders. And here we all are, over 7 billion of us, trying to share one incredible home, we call Earth. 

Most humans are compassionate, caring individuals who would like to see justice, equality and respect prevail. So why then, is our world in such a state? Nearly every major catastrophe facing our world and our future has been caused by the accumulative damage of human action, and inaction.

Because we have, knowingly or not, created this mess together, the only way  these problems can be healed is if we all pitch in and help to solve them.

If you are sick and tired of witnessing acts of cruelty and atrocity towards people, animals, and the environment,  as a concerned, compassionate person, you may take part in the global solution to help heal our troubled world.

BE PART OF THE SOLUTION— or there won’t be one.

THE MOST IMPORTANT WAYS TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE

*            Exercise your purchasing power. Whether we like it or not, our society is influenced by the “almighty dollar”. Companies and governments are affected by the way you use your money.  Companies produce what sells, and remove those items that don’t. If you avoid purchasing products which you consider unethical, or environmentally-damaging, that company will be encouraged to stop producing it. What we purchase can destroy a rainforest, or wipe out a species (such as the near, and possible, extinction of the leopard due to the fur coat industry). On the other hand, what we buy can be an instrument for positive change. People who demand products that are not tested on animals, have reduced the number of animals suffering and dying from LD50 tests. Those who buy recycled or plantation timber are helping to protect what is left of old growth forests. Think before you spend!

*            If you are eligible to vote, exercise your democratic right to choose the people who will represent you and your concerns in government. Pay attention to the various political parties and government representatives standpoints and policies on environmental protection, animal welfare, and human rights. If a political party or politician has no policies on these crucial issues, demand that they divulge their actual policies. If they have no such policies to deal humanely with these vital issues, it will be time to look elsewhere.

*            Our lifestyle choices have the greatest impact on our world. What we eat, the amount of resources we consume, how we dispose of what we use, the companies we support, whether we show compassion to other people, display respect for non-human animals and the environment,  whether we are making an effort to contribute to a better society—all these lifestyle choices make a difference. We all need to ask ourselves how we can improve our habits and lifestyles to have the greatest positive impact for change.

What else can you do?

Whether you are concerned about one issue, or many, there are a few other valuable things you can do to help.

*            Don’t let yourself become overwhelmed by the scope of change needed to heal our world. Choose a small place to start. Select  the issues that strike the deepest chord in you, the topics that move you enough to contribute your time and attention.  Decide what you can do to help,  and DO IT! And do it regularly!

*            A few popular ways to help  include volunteering your services to particular charities and organizations; regular donations; staying informed and educating others about issues;  signing petitions and writing to governments, companies and newspapers. Share information on popular social media sites such as Pinterest, Twitter, Youtube, Google+, and Facebook. Even setting  up a special free site, blog, or social media page can make a huge difference to getting the information out there. Organizations have also used virtual marches to get success. There are many other ways to make a difference. You might even come up with your own great way to pitch in. If you have any suggestions how individuals or organizations can help, please note them in the comment section below.

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         The Greenbook - Open Planet Ideas

Greenbook is a clever idea for an application that matches local people with local projects.

Through using the latest geolocation and gaming technology, it will be designed to make volunteering quicker, easier and more social.

In doing so, it has the potential to bring many new people to volunteering and change our communities and environment for the better.

Congratulations to Siniuc and all his collaborators, evaluators and supporters for getting Greenbook chosen as the final concept for realisation!

It was a tough decision for the expert panel but it was felt that Greenbook had the most potential in today's "participation economy". Greenbook can bring volunteering and campaigning to the 21st century by attracting new audiences of creative modern users with a system that multiplies small chunks of time to generate a big environmental impact. Stay tuned to find out what happens next in realisation!

Greenbook- the magazine updated 9th of January-  GreenBook is an online magazine for green-minded community: a magazine that the reader is the Hero. News is broadcasted to member to inspire their participation to a local project. This news and project are related by tags that the project's founder attributes. News is distributed to user depending on the area, time and capabilities of the user. Different levels of difficulties in project keep user progressing. He never gets bored by doing the same task over and over again, he has the possibility to develop his skills and generate more benefit for the environment.

After each piece of news, the reader has different possibilities to find a local project, keep reading or discuss with other member. News is there to initiate, motivate an action. When we see that a little step can have an influence then we are motivated to do that little step and keep helping. Little step by little step, big things can be achieved.

The most basic level is receiving financial reward for buying environment friendly product. This scheme would be sponsored by shop. In return, shops will improve their image. After showing a repeated interest, user will be offered a new level where he receives news from successful project. The positive result will draw him to volunteer in many activities. The following levels will push him to become an educator, then a project founder and finally a negotiator with big entities such as large companies, NGO...High levels will be offered to organisation who are already making action. It will be granted by the community administrator.

The magazine propose other ways to find news and participate through a map browser. This map would display news and project in different colours. To find information you can scroll a button on the vertical axis to zoom in and out/ on the horizontal axis you can adjust the time span. Every piece of information from different organisation would be edited on the same level, helping user to search easily his next action to help the environment.

          
Perspectives On Innovation

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Can Open Innovation Save The Planet?

InnoCentive and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) recently announced a partnership aimed at accelerating environmental innovation in business. The article below was written by Gwen Ruta, Vice President of Corporate Partnerships for EDF.  This article originally appeared as part of FastCompany’s Expert Bloggers series.

Imagine if you could tap the brainpower of proven innovators from around the globe to help your company create its next business breakthrough and enhance its environmental record. Environmental Defense Fund (EDF)Eco-Challenge Series to accelerate green innovation in business.

Breakthrough ideas can–and often do–emerge from bringing a new and diverse perspective to a familiar problem. Having that “fresh set of eyes” is one way that EDF has been able to catalyze and spread environmental innovations like redesigned packaging with McDonald’s, hybrid trucks with FedEx, and next-generation solar technology with Walmart.

The folks at InnoCentive have taken this idea–that diversity of thought yields better outcomes–into the 21st century. Recognized as a global pioneer in Challenge Driven Innovation, InnoCentive’s web-based platform and methodology help organizations formulate their most intractable problems, and gives over 200,000 entrepreneurs, inventors and scientists around the world the chance to solve them. With the likes of Eli Lilly, NASA, Procter & Gamble, and The Rockefeller Foundation using the platform, it’s redefining the innovation process.

InnoCentive’s unique approach to innovation is already solving tough environmental problems. The Oil Spill Recovery Institute used it to find a way to keep oil and water on oil spill recovery barges from freezing into a solid blob. The solution came not from the oil industry, but from a chemist who once spent a summer pouring concrete. He realized that the vibrators construction crews use to keep concrete in liquid form might also do the same for the frozen oil and water mixture on the barges. And it worked.

Another organization called SunNight Solar used the InnoCentive platform to create a dual-purpose solar light that serves as both a lamp and a flashlight in African villages and other areas of the world without electricity. The solution came from an electrical engineer living in New Zealand.

Now EDF is joining its environmental expertise with the InnoCentive global innovation platform to find and tackle business sustainability challenges. We’re looking for companies to join us in launching a series of open innovation challenges designed to inspire new solutions that are good for both business and the environment. They could focus on a range of sustainability issues and opportunities including reducing water, energy, or other resource inputs, redesigning products, replacing materials, and creating new business or manufacturing processes. Successful solutions will also generate tangible business benefits like operating cost reductions or increased market share.

Our economy is global, our communications systems are global, and our environmental problems our global–so why do we look no further than our own R&D labs to solve them? Let’s bring together the collective intelligence of the world’s most creative thinkers–and get to work on solving our toughest and most important challenges.

This content was originally posted by Fast Company.

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    Are you changing your living habits
          to help the environment?

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Recently we ran an interesting poll asking whether you had made changes in your living habits over the past years to help the environment. We had some interesting insights and we decided to dig in a little bit deeper and share some tips we found!

Open Planet Ideas Facebook fanpage has held some lovely discussions around Greenbook, some interesting news in the greensphere and some intriguing polls. Early last week we asked you the following question:

Thinking about your living habits over the last couple of years, have you made major, minor or no changes to help the environment?
1. Major
2. Minor
3. No changes

We received a lot of responses and were positively encouraged by the responses. As you can see in the diagram below, 0% said they had made no changes while 50% had said they had made minor and the other 50% had made major changes in their lives to help the environment. Truly inspirational!


We also had a comment for choosing option "1.5" – asking "does changing minds about environmental impact count"? The response was most certainly yes as the mind comes to influence behaviour and actions in the long-term.

Following this we thought it might be nice to share some of the sites with the top tips on making environmental behavioural changes to encourage you further.

- WWF has their share of tips posted on their Living Planet page with advice ranging for footprint measuring to green shopping to travel tips to volunteering.

- Treehugger on the other hand has a whole page dedicated to “How to go green”. They are split into different interest areas so there is plenty to explore and you can choose your focus how you want.

- Do the green thing’s slogan says it all: “Seven things you can do to lead to a greener life.” They look like real specialists in the area with the aims of inspiring individuals like you by sharing some creative content!

Now I hand the challenge back to you. Have you got any other tips you'd like to share with the rest of the community?

Again, we were thoroughly impressed by your replies and hope you keep up your good work!

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.YOUR FEEDBACK

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