Green Store News: 10% Off At Nigel’s Eco Store, New Products From Green People and Get Ready For Festival Season With Ecotopia

Our good friends at Nigel’s Eco Store have got a nice offer on with 10% off eco gardening products below. Get in quick before April 19th and enter the code SpringEco at the checkout to save on things like the Paper Potter, Organic String on a stand, Potting Shed Collection and 100% Biodegradable Leaf Sacks. Remeber we’re giving away an Eco Office pack from Nigel’s Eco Store in our competition - the Great Green Giveaway.

And we’re also giving away stuff from Green People which I’ve learned was founded by Charlotte Vøhtz after she started making natural and gentle organic formulations for her daughter Sandra, who suffered from severe skin irritations. Anyway in May it’s got four new products:

Body Bliss Lotion - a rejuvenating lotion works to pamper the skin with Jojoba and Green Tea offering instant hydration for a super soft feeling.
Foaming Face Wash - a soap-free face wash for all skin types bringing added benefits with its unique anti-blemish formulation, helping to reduce breakouts.
Foaming Hand Sanitizer - a unique and highly effective organic formulation designed to provide immediate, natural antibacterial protection wherever you are, the perfect alternative to soap and water for those on the go.
Baby Foaming Cleanser - a multi-purpose cleanser in a handy pump dispenser formulated to be super mild and gentle on baby’s delicate skin.

And Ecotopia (another prize giver) has launched a green survival kit to help festival goers reduce their carbon footprint at events. The kit, which contains 10 essential items, costs £59.99 and includes everything you need to have a happy, healthy and eco friendly festival. All packaging for every item is either biodegradable or recyclable (which is a personal bugbear of mine so makes me happy) and includes:

Freeloader Solar Charger
Condomi Condoms
The Freeplay Kito LED Lantern
Badger Tangerine Breeze Lip & Body Balm
Kingfisher Toothpaste
Preserve 100% Recycled Toothbrush
Tushies Baby Wipes
Degradable Refuse Sacks
Natracare Organic Feminine Wipes
Toms of Maine Deodorant

All good stuff.

Do You Get Green Employment Benefits?

The excellent Sustainablog recently mentioned that “renewable energy companies are adding green benefits to their employment packages to align the company’s stated values with their company culture and to attract talent from traditional industries to the renewable energy industry.”

They fall into the categories of work related; transportation; residential; personal/well being; and financial. Take a look a the Sustainablog article for more information.

Students Go Green with Paperless Payment

Adam has previously writtern about how to be a green student, and now there is another way that can help. According to a recent survey, UK students favour going green with paperless payments, with more than half saying they would prefer to pay for goods, services and tickets using their mobile/cell phone.

The research, published in late August by LUUP (a mobile payment solution first launched in Norway in July 2002), reveals that over 60% of UK students surveyed would prefer to use paperless payment methods such as via mobile because they are more environmentally friendly. The research shows that as environmental concerns grow there will be more consumer demand for “environmental technology”.

The online survey, was answered by 395 students from more than 70 universities across the UK. It was conducted in order to gauge interest in mobile payments and examine factors that influence the motivation for choosing this type of payment.

Conventional payment methods and ticketing processes pose an unnecessary threat to the environment. Tickets are frequently made using non-biodegradable magnetic strips and laminate, and most transactions usually result in multiple paper receipts. Mobile and online payment systems minimise these wasted resources by making transactions entirely electronic. The results of this survey suggest that as environmental awareness increases, mobile payment systems such as LUUP will make their way to the forefront of preferred payment methods.

LUUP is a mobile payment system enabling consumers to send and receive payments on their mobile phones or online. Payments can be made from credit/debit cards, bank accounts and the digital cash in account holder’s ‘LUUP Wallet.’ Since all elements of LUUP transactions are electronic, the need for paper receipts or non-biodegradable tickets is eliminated, making the payment process far more environmental. For more information or to sign up, visit LUUP and select your country.

Get Paid To Recycle

It’s reasonably well known that in some states in the US you get paid for recycling. Glass bottles and aluminum cans often have a return value on them, which is why a lot of homeless people collect them to earn some money. However Philadelphia based RecycleBank go even further.

They provide you with a barcoded recycling container that is collected each week. The truck weighs the container and the barcode is scanned, and you are paid based on the weight, up to $35 per month. Like the recycling I do, you can put everything (glass, plastic, paper, metal, vegetation etc) into one container (”single stream recycling”) to make it easier, however unlike me, you get paid to do it.

The site provides some great stats.

1 Ton of Recycled Paper Saves:
17 Trees (35′ Tall)
7,000 gallons of water
2 barrels of oil (enough fuel to run the average car for 1260 miles or from Dallas to Los Angeles)
4100 kilowatts of energy (enough power for the average home for 6 months)
3.2 cubic yards of landfill space (one family sized pick-up truck)
60 pounds of air pollution
4.2 MWh of energy (enough energy to power a computer for almost a year)

1 Ton of Recycled Aluminum Saves:
1,663 gallons of gasoline (amount of fuel needed to provide a typical home with electricity for a period of 10 years)
14,000 Kwh of energy
238 million BTUs of energy
10 cubic yards of landfill space

1 Ton of Recycled Glass Saves:
42 Kwh of energy
5 gallons of oil
714,000 BTUs of energy
7.5 pounds of air pollutants from being released
2 cubic yards of landfill space

1 Ton of Recycled Newsprint Saves:
601 Kwh of energy
71 gallons of oil
10.2 million BTUs of energy
60 pounds of air pollutants from being released
4.6 cubic yards of landfill space

1 Ton of Recycled Office Paper Saves:
4,100 Kwh of energy
380 gallons of oil
54 million BTUs of energy
60 pounds of air pollutants from being released
7,000 gallons of water
3.3 cubic yards of landfill space

1 Ton of Recycled Plastic Saves:
5,774 Kwh of energy
685 gallons of oil
98 million BTUs of energy
30 pounds of air pollutants from being released

1 Ton of Recycled Steel Saves:
642 Kwh of energy
76 gallons of oil
10.9 million BTUs of energy
4 cubic yards of landfill space

Rewards can be used at a whole host of stores such as Borders, Bed Bath & Beyond, Whole Foods, Starbucks and 250 other national and local stores. In tests, the amount recycled per household lept from 5lbs per week to 35lbs. Let’s hope they just weren’t eating more…..

[Via Springwise]

Help Us Cut VAT On Fruit Juice

From our friends at Innocent. If you’re a UK citizen you can help petition to remove VAT on fruit smoothies and juices.

“Help Us Cut VAT On Fruit Juice. Let’s get it down to 5%.

Some things just aren’t right. Tartan jeans for instance. And the fact that the government charges VAT on healthy fruit juices and smoothies. Seems wrong to us. Especially when other foods, like hotdogs and chips, remain tax free. Not quite encouraging healthy eating, is it?

That’s why we’ve set up a petition on the Prime Minister’s website to tell the government that they could help more people get to their five a day by removing this daft tax. To sign up go to

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/fruitjuiceVAT

It only takes 30 seconds to type in your name.

Thanks for your support,

Everyone at Innocent.”

If you’re bored, you can also check out their (amusing) label museum.

10 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

Your “carbon footprint” is a fancy name for measuring how much carbon dioxide you, er, produce. Whether or not you believe carbon dioxide is the cause of global warming or not, it is harmful to the environment and reducing your carbon footprint is a great idea.

Step 1: How Big Is Your Carbon Footprint?

Before you can reduce it, you need to know how big it is. The average person in the UK causes the emission of 13,000kg of carbon dioxide equivalent gases per year. The global average is 5,800kg, in India it’s around 1,300kg. There are various ways of measuring your carbon footprint. Usually they’re made up of a series of scores, such as Transport score, Energy score, Food score, and Waste score. Try this carbon footprint calculator, or this one, this one, or finally this one.

Step 2: Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

1. Turn down your thermostat. Turning your thermostat down by one degree centigrade could save a typical home £49 a year.





2. Close and/or line your curtains to keep in warmth. Setting your heating to turn off one hour before you leave the house and come on half an hour before you get home could save you £51 a year.
3. Turn off lights. Switching off four unnecessary lightbulbs and you could save £32 a year.
4. Turn off standby. Leaving your TV and all accessories attached to it on standby all the time could cost you £46 a year.
5. Turn down and use the half load setting on washing machines and tumble dryers. Washing laundry at 40 to 60 degrees centigrade in your washing machine could save you £12 a year.
6. Don’t boil more water in the kettle than you need to. If you always boil the amount of water needed for one cup rather than boiling a full kettle, you could save £30 a year.
7. Fix leaks as these are not only wasting water but also energy if they’re from a hot water source.
8. Use energy saving lightbulbs to save even more money and energy.
9. Recycle more!
10. Fly less. Train travel is up to 10 x more energy efficient than plane travel. Of course, not travelling at all is even more effective…

Step 3: Save Money and Feel Smug

Other ideas welcome. If you want some other great suggestions, try our free 100 quick and easy ways to save the planet. If you have less time, try our top 10 tips to reduce your carbon footprint.

Sources: The Independent and Daily Telegraph

Europe to Ban Old Style Lightbulbs

It has been reported (see here) that the European Union is to ban old style lightbulbs in the next couple of years. Instead you will only be able to buy low energy (or energy saving) lightbulbs.

Incandescent lightbulbs, whilst cheaper than their fluorescent counterparts, use much more electricity and obviously therefore create more carbon dioxide.

Whilst this can only be a good thing, it’s currently difficult to find energy saving versions of some kinds of bulbs, and if you do they can be expensive. A lot more details can be found here.

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