screen saver vs. sleep

Quick quiz: What should you do with your computer when heading out to lunch?

This question proved to be a hot topic at my old place of employment. Turn it off, leave it on, put it on screen saver mode, put it to sleep?

The answer, in short, put it to sleep, but if you’re leaving for longer, turn it off.

I’ve heard time and time again from multiple people and sources that screen savers can actually use more energy (such as some of the neat graphic ones). Even if you don’t have a fancy screen saver, putting your computer to sleep is still better if you’re just ducking out for lunch or a meeting. I found this website which I like because it compares the amount of electricity each of these options take. Turns out a screen saver doesn’t actually save any energy.

While looking up some other info, I found some really good info on the Energy Star page.  Another source I found claims leaving a computer on for 24 hours is equivalent to leaving a light bulb on for one day. Yikes!

Long story short:
1) Laptops use less power than desktop computers
2) Skip the screen saver and go straight to sleep if leaving briefly
3) Turn your computer off if leaving for longer
4) Always turn off that computer at night!

oh canada!

So you’re familiar with Cash for Clunkers (CARS) here in the US, but did you know our northerly neighbors have a similar idea that I like better?

The idea for CARS was threefold: remove fuel hogging cars off the road to reduce the amount of gasoline (oil!), get these older cars recycled properly, and bolster the economy by giving out incentives for consumers to purchase a more efficient car. My issue with the structure of the program is sort of the whole point why it was founded– your reward for getting rid of a bad car was an incentive toward another car. If you are driving your clunker around until it dies and weren’t planning on buying another car, you don’t have much of an incentive to get rid of your guzzler (there is also Goodwill but this option also keeps the car on the road). CARS works best on those not ready to give up the idea of automobile ownership.

Canada started Retire Your Ride around the same time as CARS, and appears to be still going on. Like CARS, the government gives you something in return for your old car but instead of offering only credit toward the purchase of a new car you get your choice of either credit toward a discounted bike, discounted car sharing memberships, discounted mass transit passes, among many other things. I love all the options that Retire Your Ride offers besides simply replacing your car. It gives those who are ready to make the move away from automobile dependency some help (I recently bought a new bike and am shocked at how pricey they can be!)

life in the backcountry

So as promised, I’ll tell you a little bit about hut life. For two months I lived and worked  in a “hut” on the shoulder of a mountain, serving up to 48 guests a night. It’s a back country facility, meaning the only way to get there is to hike, and that because it’s off the grid we had to generate our own electricity. A hut is actually more of a lodge, if you will, equipped with triple bunk beds, a dining room, composting toilets, and a kitchen/crew room.  We served a full dinner and heaping breakfast every single day, along with having baked goods/light lunch available for the gazillions of day hikers passing by.  In early October, the hut looks like this:

Here’s the two-minute green tech tour:

Electricity in the hut is needed for lights, the fridge (the fridges are the same ones, apparently, that they are now giving to third world counties because of how efficient they are), the radios/walkie talkies, the one tiny outlet we had to charge our phones and ipods, and the water pump. The main source of electricity is the solar panels, as shown above (covered by ice and snow). Our secondary power source is the small wind turbine, also shown above (and also covered in rime ice).  So what happens when the ice hits? Normally we would turn on the back up generator (extremely loud) which runs on a small propane tank, however, it turns out when this photo was taken our propane tank was out, meaning we used our headlamps as lights and didn’t listen to music (by then the hut was closed for the season). One of the guys went up on an icy ladder with a broom trying to knock and sweet the ice off the solar panel.

Propane tanks run the stove/oven and freezer. These are flown in by helicopter (thank goodness). Empty ones are flown out at the end of the season.

The composting toilets were we referred to as Clivus and utilize no water or chemicals. In two years, the waste is reduced to 5% of it’s original volume, with help from wood chips and every-other-day stirring. Stirring the Clivus meant one of the crew members went down below the hut, put on a giant apron and gloves, opened the door to the chamber, and raked the deposits. Oh, the glamors of sustainability!

Trash and recycling, long story short, gets carried out on the crewmembers backs. Most food prep items are bought in bulk, helping reduce the amount of waste, but there were still tons of wrappers from cans, dead batteries, packaging, and other miscellaneous items guests left we needed to take down. Also, thee was always tons of recycling between the amount of cans, glass, and paperboard/cardboard we went through. Guests are asked to pack out their trash, as leaving it at the hut is pretty much the same as littering to us.

Water is pumped up from a well. Just to be safe, and because the food service requires it, we add some chlorine to the water.

i’m baaaccck

After three months away from Portland, you think I would have many stories to tell. Oh, the horrors of Styrofoam containers in Canton, Ohio, the green initiatives in super-cool Burlington, Vermont, our frozen wind turbine at the hut I was stationed at that caused us to briefly live in the dark without music when the rime ice hit…but not yet. For now I am here to share with you a page from the Continental Airlines magazine that I resorted to reading on my way back from Boston when the suduko puzzle on the back page got too intense for me.

The article was about greening parks, which seems like a duh statement at first. Aren’t parks inherently sustainable? Shouldn’t they be the champions of environmentally-friendly features? Well, yes, but anywhere the masses visit inevitably creates waste, requires restrooms and facilities to be built, etc.  Case in point, the National Park Service (NPS), which Ken Burns and I both agree is one of America’s best ideas. As much as I sometimes wish I could have every park to myself, I’m super pumped by the amount of visitors (approximately one jillion) the parks get a year. Some of these folks don’t get a chance to get out much, so getting away from the city helps them appreciate the awesome spaces in this country that should be preserved, and not turn into victims of environmental impact. While visitors are out and about enjoying the parks and nature when their minds “are much more open to hearing an environmental message” why not kill two birds with one stone and show off some easy sustainability practices and cool green tech features? The NPS is starting to do just this by implementing solar power, recycling stations, gray water use in the restrooms, and myriad other features.

The most heartwarming quote of the article was not about what the park is doing for itself, but rather how the park hopes to influence its patrons to make sustainable decisions once they leave the park. “The NPS’ goal is to have 10 percent of visitors reduce their carbon footprint by 10 percent…we have a powerful brand that enables us to convey important climate change information to visitors, specifically about their behavior.” Ding ding! That is awesome. I assume that the 10% figure would be a hard figure to collect accurate data on, but I think a great part of any sustainability plan should include inspiring others to make changes in their own lives.

The article mentioned a few initiatives that different park services around the country are taking, my favorite being NPS’ Climate Friendly Parks Program, launched as a pilot in 2002. The website offers an action plan for other parks (including your local ones, I assume?) guiding them to become a climate friendly park. I thought for sure Portland Parks and Rec would be all over this, but upon checking out their website I didn’t see much mention of sustainability. After searching for the term, I found a Sustainability Plan from 2007. That’s good that we (Portland) were on this then, but where are the updates? Why don’t we (me?) work on some updates and work to become official Climate Friendly parks?

Perhaps these are questions to explore as I am Professionally Unemployed and am itching for a new project…

http://www.nps.gov/climatefriendlyparks/index.htm..l