Green Links Whidbey Island starts the week with a story on sustainability and jeans. Did you realize that making one pair of 501’s requires almost 920 gallons of water and 400 megajoules of energy while expelling 32 kilograms of carbon dioxide? Here is the article by Amy Dufault in Ecosalon.

Britt Liggett writing for inhabitat talks about a new green living product. How about a water-filtering “Bobble” Bottle?

With Americans alone buying over $17 billion dollars worth of bottled water every year and using 1.5 million barrels of oil  to make those water bottles, a good alternative is desperately needed. The Bobble is perfect for your, “I drink bottled water because I know it is clean,” friends. The carbon filter on the Bobble is guaranteed to provide 150 liters of impurity-free water — which equates to about 250 bottles of water. Stick that in your Bobble and drink it.


Just click on the photo above; you’ll find out what and how the Deniers work. There is a must see video on the above photo link.

This weeks Green Links Whidbey Island begins with a slide show from CNBC. “Here Comes the Electric Car” gives you a view of some of the electric cars that are expected to hit the market this year or within a couple of years.

What Does Apple’s iPad Tablet Really Mean for Our Society? Jaymi Heimbuch writing for treehugger takes a look at the new technology and what it may mean for you.

Treehugger also has an article on Solar Powered iPods and iPhones. Bridgette Meinhold shows us what the future may hold in store for us.

Cotton fraud, genetically modified organic cotton? Sound interesting? Ecosalon has a post about the problems that are arising in India.

Lastly, Mike Sowden writing for ecosalon describes 10 Urban Eco Trends in his article about Where Cities are Taking Us.

I’ll start this weeks Green Links Whidbey Island with a post from Zachary Shahan at CleanTechnica. Zachary gives us a list the Top 10 Clean Energy Topics to Keep an Eye On.

Vanessa Barrington writing for ecosalon gives us some fun and easy ways to lower our meat consumption. Calling all Carnivores: 7 Painless Ways to Be an Almost-Vegetarian. “Conventional livestock production uses tons of grain, water, and petroleum. It’s extremely inefficient, has huge environmental impacts, and is cruel to animals.”

Every thought of building a tea house? Inhabitat blogger Diane Pham shows us a Tea House Heated by Compost.

Lea Bogdan’s article, also in inhabitat, focuses on green kitchens. She shows us some of the imaginative work of designer Faltasi’s vision of the Eco Kitchen of the Future.

Lastly, we can thank the National Park Service and The Nature Conservancy for there actions on behalf of Ebey’s Landing.The land around one of the most iconic buildings in Ebey’s Landing Historical Reserve will maintain its rural character for generations. Here is a link to the announcement.

This weeks Green Links Whidbey Island starts with a post from Jerry James Stone writing for CleanTechnica. Jerry has an article about spray-on solar technology. This technology makes it possible to spray transparent solar cells on just about any glass surface. Sounds like quite a breakthrough.

In another article in CleanTechnica Tina Casey explains a new kind of hydropower; hydrokinetic power. The new technology uses underwater turbines and avoids the use of dams. This looks to be a fish friendly solution; very few fish are injured by the turbines.

Is the Republican Party going Green? It appears that Senator Lindsay Graham is. Zachary Sahan has posted this article in CleanTechnica.

Luanne Bradley has a piece in ecosalon about Costa Rica. She states that “Dutch sociologists who run the World Database of Happiness lists Costa Rica as the leader in happiness out of 148 nations. On a 10-point scale, Costa Rica earned 8.5, followed by Denmark at 8.3. The report says the U.S. ranked 7th at 7.4, while Togo and Tanzania trail at 2.6.

I am reading a book called The Blue Zones. The book explains some of the lessons that can be learned from other cultures; lessons that help us live longer lives. One of those lessons is about reducing the stress in your life.  guess being happy is right up there. You can find out more about The Blue Zones by clicking here.

Green Links Whidbey Island starts this week with a post on Clean Technica from Tina Casey. Mission Viejo, California has become the latest in a string of cities to try out a new sustainable street-scale solar powered trash compactor called the BigBelly Solar Compactor. The city hopes to cut trash pickups from street containers by up to 80%, which in turn would help cut greenhouse gas emissions, reduce fuel use, and shave some costs off the city’s waste hauling budget.

Vanessa Barrington, writing for ecosalon, has a review of the film “The End of the Line.” The movie has been called “The Inconvenient Truth” for the oceans.

“It takes 5 kilos of anchovies to produce 1 kilo of farmed salmon. This practice takes protein directly out of the mouths of poor people in distant countries that depend on this fish for their nourishment – all so middle class people can treat salmon as an everyday commodity food, instead of as the special treat it should be.”

Vanessa indicates that some of the stories in the film will shock people; maybe that is necessary. “The best part of the film is the point it makes that, unlike many environmental problems, this problem is eminently solvable. We just need to give the fishing stocks a break and allow them to recover.”

Click the above photo to see the trailer of the movie “The End of the Line”.


Yuka Yoneda writes a post in inhabitat about bicycle helmets. Just a short piece entitled “Bike Helmets That Don’t Make You Look Like a Dork”. I guess it’s all in the eye of the beholder. Should anyone really care?

Finally a  slide show from treehugger of The Best and Worse of 2009 – The Year in Water. Just click on the photo to view the show.

This weeks Green Links Whidbey Island starts with a view to the future of flight and fuel efficiency. The article written by Lora Kolodny is relevant to us on Whidbey Island since the new Boeing Dreamliner is discussed. If you click on the photo below it will take you to a video on the new Dreamliner.

Lora also tells us about the SpaceShip Two; private enterprise does have a way with these types of innovations. There is a great video, as well, on the new spaceship just click the photo below.

Back to Green Links

You might find it comforting to know that NASA has just launched a Solar Powered Asteroid Detecting Telescope a couple of weeks ago. Inhabitat writer, Ariel Schwartz, gives you some photos and discussion as to what it may be able to do to protect the Earth.

Michael Graham Richard reports in treehugger that you will find a few environmental themes in the new movie Avatar. There is nothing in the article that you can’t find in the movie trailer; no scene spoilers.

Green Links Whidbey Island starts with an article posted in treehugger from Mathew McDermott. This link will provide you with a slide show of the Demonstrations in Copenhagen. The photos are from Mathew McDermott.

Continuing in the same vane is an article again from treehugger from Sami Grover. You’ll find a video on how climate change is effecting snowboarding. As cold as it may seem here on Whidbey there are some things going on that we need to think about.

Susan Kraemer writing for CleanTechnica talks about the New Manhatten Project. The Clean Energy initiative is being driven by the Obama administration and is something that we haven’t seen since the Carter administration. Click here for the link.

Inhabitat’s Evelyn Lee shows us the top 5 Green Cars at the LA Auto Show. The designs they are a changing; here’s  a look at what’s new.

The last link comes from Katherine Butler and Eco Salon. Want to take care of those wrinkles organically? Here is the link.