Tag Archives: Sustainable city

Visitors Want Milkweed And Gift Shops

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Huge Gift Shop

Maria Rodale visits the monarch sanctuary, searches real hard to blame something that’s not organic for the decline. Besides, isn’t it the caterpillars someplace else that munch the milkweed?

I arrived around 10 a.m. and saw…nothing. OK, I saw one tiny monarch flitting about like it was a bit drunk. The sanctuary itself is also kind of…sad. Its entrance is between a motel and some garbage cans. It’s very small, and surprisingly, there was no gift shop! I thought back to when I researched the place on the Web and recalled that it was very hard to find. Hmmm…

Undaunted, I drove downtown to the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History, where I asked what was going on. “Oh, they are there. If you go back at noon there is a docent who will show them to you. They can be hard to see.” But, I asked, was the population declining? “Absolutely,” she said. The current population was only a quarter of what it was just 10 years ago, she added. I asked what she attributed it to and she said “urban growth, habitat loss, lack of milkweed.” What about agricultural chemicals? I asked. “Oh, that’s more of an East Coast problem,” she said.

Visitors Want Milkweed And Gift Shops

Huffington Post

Got Solar Panels On Your Home?

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If a fire starts, they may just let it burn rather than risk firefighters’ lives.

In a fire, seconds count, and that was why firefighters were speaking out Saturday about the consequences of an added obstacle sprouting up on Bay Area rooftops: solar panels.

Solar panels covered part of the roof of a Piedmont home that was destroyed by a 2-alarm fire on Tuesday.

The cause of the fire was still under investigation Saturday, but Piedmont Fire Chief Warren McLaren was clear with reporters after the blaze was extinguished that the home’s solar panels made fighting the fire that much more difficult.

“Oh absolutely, it made it hard on the roof,” said McLaren.

Concern over solar panels prompted a 2010 report from the Fire Protection Research Foundation that said that the panels were not only potential hazards for tripping or slipping, but the additional weight from the panels contributed to the possibility that the roof would collapse.

KTVU News
Got Solar Panels On Your Home?

Sustainable Practices Leads To House Burning Down

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I’ll keep putting my potato peels down the disposal thank you

Brevity Comic Hippie 080609

A fire destroyed a home at 15 East Rounds Ave. Saturday morning after a compost pile spontaneously combusted.

The compost pile was located next to a deck that was attached to the house.

“Once that organic material reaches a certain temperature, it ignites,” said Franklin County Fire Investigator John Bashaw. “Something like that needs to be kept away from a house.”
No one was injured in the blaze.

Adirondack Daily Enterprise
Sustainable Practices Leads To House Burning Down

P.G. Businesses Oppose Bag Ban

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Shoplifters love reusable shopping bags.

California Bag Ban

In a “face-to-face” survey of 51 businesses, 64 percent asked said they are not in favor of a plastic bag ban that would also require patrons to buy a paper bag.

But 75 percent of shop owners said they wouldn’t mind a ban on plastic bags if customers didn’t have to pay for a paper bag to replace it.

P.G. Businesses Oppose Bag Ban

Smart Meters True Purpose – Controlling What You Plug In

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To all the alarmed people that only complained about EMF radiating from the PG$E meter, how do you feel about the REAL threat of so called ‘Smart Meters’ now?

Plans to control the energy use of appliances in British homes have been criticised for being ‘Big Brother’-esque.

The National Grid wants to be able to switch off new appliances such as fridges and freezers remotely via sensors, to avoid power cuts if there is too much demand for the country’s electricity supplies.

The technology has been backed by the EU’s European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E).

Over the weekend Viktor Sundberg, energy strategy manager of appliance manufacturer Electrolux complained to several European news outlets that this is “Big Brother technology on a grand scale.”

Smart Meters True Purpose – Controlling What You Plug In

Gun Buyback Weapons Are Being Data Mined

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Turn In Your Weapons

Hope that the gun you gave up was not used in a crime, they know where it came from.

The firearms will eventually be test fired to record ballistics details.

Though there is no evidence that buybacks reduce violent crime, that’s not the only goal of the events, Myers said.

“They increase community and public awareness and gun safety,” she said. “They remove the availability of weapons … for potential accidental shootings and thefts or (from) those with mental health problems.”

Gun Buyback Weapons Are Being Data Mined

PGPD: Bring Your Drugs To Us

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Bummer duude, it’s not a drug buy back program.

“The goal of the program is to allow citizens to deliver all of their unused, unwanted or expired medications to law enforcement officials who can in turn dispose of these controlled substances in a safe, secure and non-hazardous manner, potentially saving lives and protecting the ecosystem,” according to PGPD Cmdr. John Miller.

The program is anonymous, and medications may be dropped off in their original containers or deposited directly in the disposal bin. Liquid products should remain sealed.

PGPD: Bring Your Drugs To Us

Good News For Shoplifters, P.G. Banning Plastic Bags

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Shop elsewhere for full service.

California Bag Ban

Monterey Hear-Old

The City Council on Wednesday will take its first look at a proposed ordinance that would ban retailers from giving customers single-use, carry-out plastic bags.

The proposed measure also would require retailers — after six months when the law would take effect — to charge 10 cents for recycled paper bags. The charge would go up to 25 cents after a year.

The report says the crackdown on non-reusable bags would “reduce the amount of litter generated by the use of plastic bags” and keep the city’s land and waterways cleaner.

In addition to loss of convenience and cleanliness there are reports about the increase of theft by users of reusable shopping bags –

Seattle Post-Intelligencer

“I think we’ve gotten to a place where it’s really going to work for the environment, businesses and the community in general,” Councilman Mike O’Brien said at the time.

But the bag ban is contributing to thousands of dollars in losses for at least one Seattle grocery store, and questions have been raised about the risk of food-borne illness from reusable bags that shoppers don’t often wash.

Mike Duke, who operates the Lake City Grocery Outlet with his wife, said that since the plastic-bag ban started last July, he’s lost at least $5,000 in produce and between $3,000 and $4,000 in frozen food.

Smart Meter’s True Goal

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Charge your more $$ when you use energy the most.

The first goal of the smart meter program is to reduce overall energy usage. “Tiered pricing,” currently in effect, means you are charged more per unit of electricity or gas if your household uses more than its monthly allotment. Under current rules, there’s no financial benefit for using power in the middle of the night instead of the middle of the day.

But before too long, you’ll be charged a much higher price for a kilowatt hour at noon than one at midnight. And that means you’ll want to lop off the tops of the bars on your energy usage charts at peak times of day, and move them to the evening — by doing laundry or washing dishes after 8 p.m., for example, or on the weekend.

“If peak demand could be reduced a mere 5 percent, the national savings on power plant construction, energy and transmission costs would amount to $3 billion per year,” Marshall said.

Smart Meter’s True Goal