Eco Worrier - Times Online - WBLG

Eco-Worrier takes an ethical holiday...

...just for one week and I’ll be back. Worlds might crumble without my regular posts, I know. I hope. In the meantime, if you're craving green banter, can I recommend my top blogs of the moment
thegreenguy
ethicurean
frugalforlife

And of course, master blog, Treehugger

Tell me your own green blog/website favourites and then I’ll put together a list on my return. Now there’s something to look forward to.

When beer collides with recycling it is a merry union indeed. I love these glasses from Totally Funky (£10.99 for two). I want hundreds of them lined up in my kitchen cupboards.

Especially as I'm currently obsessed by how important it is to buy recycled products. Only recently has it really sunk in that there is little point being obsessive about filling up your green bin unless you close the loop by buying the products made from its contents.

Bit shameful, really, that it's taken me so long. Better late than never; and now I'm banging on about it all the time...

Green tip of the week: what to do with free newspaper posters

As I agonized over what to do with this week's posters that bulked out my daily reads, my friend Kate, who is an emblem of eco-worrying virtues, passed this on this. "Save them and use them as wrapping paper," she said. "Bright, cheery and made from good quality paper, they're ideal." Genius. Or do some people actually put them on their walls?

Dear Leonardo, I forgive you everything...

...you must be, like, the most environmentally conscious movie star in the whole world. Oh my god, I’m overwhelmed. It’s not just your portrayal of tough-but-lovable gangster in The Departed that has me swooning (I admit it helped; none of that Titanic slush now). Nope, it’s your planet-saving antics that put the rest of Hollywood’s good-for-nothings to shame. On your website are two movies (Global Warming and Water Planet) in which you lay out the threat to our planet, Al Gore style.

Then, there’s your Eco Site and plans for a new environmental reality TV show, called E-Topia, made by your film company Appian Way. Transforming a grim U.S. town into a haven of eco-virtue? Wow, you’re just so…green. I’m even willing to forget the accusations that you ruined half of Thailand in the making of The Beach, which should obviously have been played by an Englishmen anyway.

Kettle versus hob debate

Last week in Body&Soul Eco-Worrier column, I did my utmost to answer a query about whether it is more energy efficient to boil water in a kettle or on the hob. Readers, I am no scientist. Talk in watts and you've lost me. I turned to the Energy Saving Trust and Donnachadh McCarthy for eco-advice. But the best stuff came from a reader, Andrew Steer, who conducted a home experiment after the column was published. I may be easily impressed but this stuff is science in action. Click continue reading for his conclusion.

Lord Linley take note...

 

There is another way – so you don't have to advertise the whites of your daughter's knuckles as you ship her to school balanced on your bicycle rack.

It comes in the form of the Christiania bicycle, named after the hippy community in Copenhagen. It has been voted 6th best design of all times in Denmark. A school-run God send, it can also be put to the test by sprog-less folk for carrying shopping.

London bike shop Velorution now stock them.

Should we trust GAP?

What? After all that fuss in the Nineties about its reliance on sweatshops in the developing world? Well, yes, according to the campaign group Labour Behind the Label. It's transparent approach to supply chains and progress on monitoring wages and conditions for workers makes it a leader in the high street leader. Maybe not yet time to bear-hug your local store manager and go for a decidedly preppy, All-American twist to your Autumn wardrobe, but it could be worth reassessing long-held grudges.

Take a look at the social responsibility section. The Frequently Asked Questions section tackles such things as why Gap doesn’t pay more to its workers and how it ensures child labour is not employed. New Consumer have just brought out an issue devoted to the debate about ethical fashion listing 101 ethical companies and guest edited by fashion designer Katharine Hamnett.

Green giggle of the day

Thank you to Frugal For Life for posting up this cartoon.

And on the same theme, here's a green car glossary provided by Treehugger - the website often referred to as Green Blog God.

WebCameron's product placement

A bottle of Ecover washing up liquid plays a starring role in this week's WebCameron. By chance? Not likely. As if hearts weren't already warmed by the sight of the Conservative leader with his sleeves rolled up, child yelping in the background, a planet-saving touch is just the trick to reassure us that this man is for real. Whatever next? Will the webcam follow him changing an energy-saving lightbulb? Or heaving out the green bin, perhaps?

Green tips sent to your email

Looking for a constant supply of innovative green tweaks to your daily life?

Can I recommend Friends of the Earth's Tip of the Day email service. I've been receiving these nuggets of eco-information for almost a year. As a result, I have experimented with all sorts of strange greenery in my life. Usually, I start dumping daily email bulletins in my deleted items by the second week of subscription - know what I mean? But I'm still not bored of these. Try it by clicking here