Looking for some green gift ideas for Christmas? There are a number of resources online to help:

• TreeHugger.com has their annual holiday gift guide with 12 categories and over 100 gifts. Everything you can think of is covered here from gifts for the Foodie to the DIY’er in your life.
• Porter McConnell writes a blog called “Slow Christmas” where she writes about how to do things like skipping the craziness of the mall and actually enjoying the holiday season. Take a look at the about page of her blog — I couldn’t agree with her more!
• Yahoo has a product-centric green gift guide for the holidays. While there are a number of questionable so-called green gifts here (especially the green gadgets), Yahoo does try to explain themselves with a blurb on each product on “Why it’s green”. Yahoo’s guide is an aggregator of sorts - a number of products they list are recommended by well known green Internet sites (which they link to).
• There are a number of great social networking pages such a the Facebook Group pages “Green Christmas” and “Lets have a GREEN CHRISTMAS” that have ongoing discussions and user contributed posts
• For the green geek in your life check out CNET’s Holiday Gift Guide which highlights super efficient tech gadgets. However, watch out for the gimmicks like the solar clad Samsung Blue Earth phone.

Here’s a couple interesting ideas I came across:

• If you are sending a gift to someone this Christmas consider using UPS carbon neutral shipping. Essentially UPS estimates that carbon emission of your shipment and purchases carbon credits to offset them (passing the costs along to you of course). Even better, through 2010 UPS will match the carbon offsets purchased for the first one million dollars.
• I’ve seen a few articles on renting a live Christmas tree lately. An example is RentXmasTree.com which Rents out live Christmas trees to folks in the central coastal California area. The company grows potted pine, cedar, redwood and cypress trees which are dropped off at your door to be rented for the holiday season. Afterwards they are picked up and tended to during the year until the next Christmas.

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If you’re about to decorate your home with lights this holiday season I’d like to remind you to use Energy Star labelled products.  Energy Star light string for your tree or outdoor lighting are made up of LEDs (Light emitting diodes) which are very efficient as compared to the old incandescent bulbs we have traditionally used.  LED light strings have been around for number of years and have been shown to be quite durable and reliable - not to mention good for the planet.

In fact, energy star light string typically use 90% less energy than incandescents producing the same amount of light and often pay for themselves in energy savings over the lifetime of the bulbs.

Some other benefits of LED decorative lighting include:

• They can last up to 10 times longer than incandescent bulbs (25,000 hours or around 10 years of use) - no more trips to the hardware store to buy replacement bulbs
• Because they are encased in hard plastic instead of glass they are more durable
• LED light strings are much more shock resistant than incandescent light strings due to the lack of a filament
• LED light strings are cool to the touch making them easier to handle and reducing the risk of fire
• LED lights can be strung together safely.  Whereas with a typical 50-light string of incandescent bulbs you can safely connect 3 strings end-to-end, with LED light strings, according to the Consumer Reports Safety Blog, you can safely string together as many as 50

According to the EnergyStar.gov website, “If all decorative light strings sold in America this year were ENERGY STAR qualified, we would save over 2 billion kWh per year and reduce greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to nearly 300,000 cars!”

Many local energy utilities and some retailers (such as Home Depot) provide incentives for trading in their incandescent holiday lights for LED holiday lights — be sure to try and take advantage of these incentives to help offset the typically 20-30% premium that LED holiday lights command over incandescent ones.

Take a look here for a selection of LED Holiday lights.

Green toy maker Sprig has teamed up with Amazon.com to exclusively offer the Sprig Eco Recycling Truck in Amazon’s ‘Frustration Free Packaging’. The truck features 2 distinct dump mechanisms, a recycling garbage can, and a fold open truck cab.

The toy, made in the Czech Republic (Sprig toys are made in North America or Europe) out of Sprigwood - a mix of recycled plastic and sawdust - contains no paints and is dishwasher safe on the top shelf.

In an interview on the Amazon Toy Whimsy blog, Sprig Toys co-founder Chris Clemmer suggests that the recycling truck fits the message behind the toys Sprig makes. Clemmer goes on to say that “Sprig was born from our desire to create toys that energize children with active, engaging play using smart sustainable design solutions. We want to let kids fill in the blanks instead of paint. We want them to be the batteries. We want to get them off the couch. Ultimately we want kids to play like we used to.”

The minimal shelf packaging - using Amazon’s ‘Frustration Free Packaging’ branding meaning its also easy to open - is another important aspect of toy design for Sprig.  Clemmer goes on to note that “During the holiday season, 5 million pounds of paper packaging waste is thrown out every holiday season on top of our regular waste load in the US”

To check out the Sprig Toys Eco Recycling Truck at Amazon.com click here

An interesting piece in the NY Times written a little over a month ago, titled ‘Boycotts Minus the Pain‘, that discusses the ethical consumption.

Last week marked the release of Newsweek magazine’s inaugural environmental ranking of the top 500 largest corporations in America.

The article accompanying the rankings states that “For more than a year, the magazine worked with leading environmental researchers KLD Research & Analytics, Trucost, and CorporateRegister.com to rank the 500 largest U.S. companies based on their actual environmental performance, policies, and reputation”.

Newsweek acknowledges that ranking corporations for sustainability accross different industries is a huge challenge, suggesting that “there’s an inevitable apples-and-oranges element” to it.  For example, the best run mining company is still likelier to cause more environmental damage than the dirtiest financial-services company.  Additional, there is no uniform standard for reporting environmental data, nor is there a requirement to do so.

While discrepancies in available data may make this list more of a rough estimate of green corporate citizenship than the authorative source, Thomas Kuh, managing director of KLD Research (who worked with Newsweek on the rankings) defends the project by suggesting that “One of the purposes of this is to improve the transparency of corporations…and encourage them to provide an even higher level of disclosure”.

The top corporation on the list, Hewlett-Packard, was given high grades for being the first IT company to report GHG emissions associated with its supply chain.  Second place Dell scored well  by becoming carbon neutral in 2008 and leading the industry with product take-back and recycling programs.  Rounding out the top five are Johnson & Johnson, Intel and IBM.

While looking through (of all places) my wife’s ‘O’ (Oprah) Magazine I came accross a short snippet about ‘Eco-Font’ a new true type font that uses less ink by containing little holes in the letters.  The font is the brainchild of a Dutch company called Spranq who were looking for ways to reduce the environmental costs of printing.  The swiss cheese-style font uses 15-20% less ink and perfectly readable when the font size is kept to 12pt or below.  The fonts designers recommend using a font size of 9 or 10 and using the font anytime you are printing draft documents or internal memos

Ecofont is free to download at Ecofont.eu and is compatible with Windows (Vista and XP), Mac OSX and Linux (the website provides installation instructions).  Eco-font is based on an open source font, and Spranq is inviting developers to improve the font further.  Other language character sets are under development.

I recently read an article from the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) saying that Health Canada (sort of an FDA equivalent) has begun testing compact fluorescent bulbs to measure potentially harmful UV radiation and electromagnetic-field exposure levels. Their impetus for conducting the study was an October 2008 warning from the United Kingdom’s Health Protection Agency over “open” or “single envelope” bulbs (those having a corkscrew-like or tube-like design). The Agency’s research showed thatsome CFLs can emit UV radiation “at levels that, under certain conditions of use, can result in exposures higher than guideline levels.”


As a result of these finding the Agency is recommending that “bare” CFLs not be used in close proximity (closer than 30cm or 1 ft) for over 1 hour a day. “Bare” CFLs are those that are not encapsulated (double envelope). The outer glass container of the double envelope CFLs (easily recognizable as they look more light an incandescent light bulb) absorbs ultraviolet radiation and therefore no precautionary measures are needed.


Health Canada says that their own study will show results sometime in late summer or early fall and commented that “If the tests establish that there are reasons for concern, actions will be taken to force manufacturers to correct the situation.”


Personally, I am surprised that this is an issue all of a sudden. I would have thought that manufacturing standards for CFLs would limit the amount of UV and electromagnetic radiation emitted. It’s incredible that this potential risk was previously unknown. So how serious are the risks? In my opinion, in the majority of situations CFL bulb are contained with a fixture that contains glass or cloth that would provide an adequate shield for UV radiation. In those instances where your light fixture is exposed or you are using a CFL in a desk lamp I would suggest removing it an replacing it with an encapsulated CFL. Additionally, try to purchase only encapsulated CFLs in the future - so you don’t have to worry at all.


Unfortunately, this new potential heath risk for CFLs (regardless of how minor the risk is) combined with fears over their mercury content may delay the demise of the energy inefficient incandescent bulb and will likely delay the implementation of future energy saving innovations.

Continuing on from the previous post - while the holidays are around the corner there is still some time to find some “Green” (in design or function) gifts.



For the David Bach fan, his new “Go Green, Live Rich“, privides some practical easy ways to go green and some some money to boot! You might even be able to deftly gift this to one of your more skeptical, less environmentally conscious friends and get nary a complaint.



For frugal or budget conscious person on your list, I recommend a plug-in electricity usage monitor - such as the P3 International Kill-a-Watt. It’s not a glamorous gift by any stretch, but you will be suprised how much its appreciated. Your frugal friend or relative will be able to track the energy consumption (and thus operation cost) of their various plug-in home appliances and devices.



For you’re Boss, try pruchasing GreenPrint - software that eliminates unwanted pages saving, ink, money and trees. In these days of companies tightening their belts, you’re Boss will appreciate any way to improve the bottom line. Also, if you’re Boss is a golf fan take a look at EcoGolf’s biodegradable golf balls and teas (it’s more of a green gesture - but it’s something).



For the teen set - Forget video games this year and get a tween or teen a quality bike like the Mongoose Maxim 24-Inch Dual-Suspension Mountain Bike. Green Transportation and an active lifestyle will set them on right course.



For the tyke - A great idea is a recycled rubber wood toy such as the Plan Toys Sports Car. It’s made from abandoned rubber wood trees, colored using vegetable dyes and coated with a non-toxic finish. Or how about a gift from Blue Orange Toys such as Bendomino - Blue Orange Toys plants two trees for every tree used to produce their games.



Lastly, a less personal (but meaningful!) gift idea is to get someone on your list a DriveNeutral Certification - meaning their driving emissions for a year will be offset (and it only costs about the same as a tank of gas).

I was talking to a friend a couple days ago about green gift ideas and, despite Christmas being only a week away, thought I would share some thoughts and suggestions.  Green gifts can be thought of in a couple ways:  The function of the product can be green in nature, or the life-cycle design of the product is green in nature.  In an ideal world a “green” gift could be both those things - but practically speaking those are hard to find.

For a coworker or neighbor I could see a nice digital tire gauge like the Accutire MS-4350B as a nice choice. It’s a very inexpensive gift that has a real green benefit (by reducing fuel consumption through maintaining properly inflated tires) as well as a safety benefit. I admit that it’s more of a stocking stuffer or secret Santa type of gift however.


A neighborly gift that’s a little more expensive is a hand crank radio such as the American Red Cross FR250 Emergency Radio. These devices are green in operation (being crank powered radio’s/lights/cellphone chargers) and are obviously safety devices as well. These devices will really fly with camping and hiking aficionados.


Finally, to end part one of this post, a thoughtful gift for a green thumb neighbor, friend or family member would be a selection of organic or heirloom seeds. Heirloom and organic seeds are not genetically modified and if native to your location (and planted appropriately) will grow well without the need for excess water or fertilizer. Why not pair some heirloom/organic seeds with an organic gardening handbook such as “The Organic Gardener’s Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control”. Better yet, buy it used.

Stay tuned for part 2.

I came across an interesting new mashup the other day, RoofRay, which uses google maps and solar array modeling to help consumers evaluate solar solutions for their home or business.


You start by typing in your address, whereby RoofRay displays a google map view of your home or business location zoomed in. You then can draw an appropriately shaped solar grid on your roof and enter the approximate roof slope (in one or multiple segments), whereby RoofRay will calculate the array performance. Roofray then gives you the ability to conduct a financial analysis on your proposed array - including installation costs, upkeep costs and ROI based on your utility bills (which you can enter).

RoofRay is one of the best mashups I’ve seen in a while - to find out your home or business’ solar potential check out RoofRay.com. Also check out Sungevity.com, which uses similar technology and will give you an installation quote from their network of installers.