Travel tips to ease the environment and your wallet.

Posted on January 20, 2015 by Naima

I was on the road yet again this weekend and judging by my packed plane headed home to Dallas, I’m not the only one. The Dallas Fort Worth Airport is one of the top ten busiest airport in the world so we know many of us in the area are making use of this opportunity to travel from Dallas to anywhere, as the billboards across the city tempt us to. This Sunday, I sat crammed into my airline seat like a sardine thinking about how many of us were making little choices to keep our travels green.

Traveling comes with stress and urgency that makes thinking about your environmental impact the last thing on your mind. But, with a few tips and a tiny amount of preparation you can make your travels for business or pleasure, less stressful, easier on your pocket and better for the environment.

It all starts at home before you leave.

Research the city you are going to. Does it have a public transportation system that can get you to the places you need to go? If so, you can save money and gas by not getting a rental car. If you must get a rental car take this opportunity to try out some of the hybrids on the market. That way you can use less gas on your trip and see how you like the car. Who knows you may find your next vehicle purchase.

Find a place to stay with a kitchen. The less you eat out the better for your wallet, your health and the environment. Make one big trip to the grocery store or better yet find a local farmers market and load up on food to last your entire stay. Find great apartments, houses and condos to rent in every city on VRBO.com (Vacation Rental By Owner) or a similar site. Often times the cost per night is the same or cheaper than a regular hotel room!

Next step is packing.

  • Pack light. Wether you are traveling by air or car the less weight equals less energy used to move the vehicle.
  • Pack a reusable water bottle but leave it empty if you are traveling by airplane. You can bring an empty water bottle through security and easily fill it up at a fountain inside saving thousands of plastic bottles.
  • To stay awake while driving pack a reusable coffee cup. Fill it up at gas stations for less money and no styrofoam or paper.
  • Bring your own snacks from home. Pack up some bulk items that can last for days without refrigeration and you can resist the urge to splurge on items on the go.

Eighty nine percent of travel throughout the year is done by personal vehicles. Before you head out on the road check the air pressure in your tires to maximize fuel efficiency. Get an oil change and ensure you have a clean air filter to keep your car running as efficient as possible while on the road.

Will you be hopping on a plane a few times this year? The DART Orange line now runs to DFW airport. Take the train for $2.50 and save on gas and parking. Book a non stop flight if possible as a significant portion of plane’s emissions are from takeoff and landing. Over 35 airlines have a carbon offset program you can invest in as well. As a passenger you can offset your share of a flight’s emissions by investing in carbon reduction projects that generate carbon credits. You can make your flight carbon neutral (sort of)!

Ok now that you’re all packed up and excited to get on the road, take five minutes running around your house. Unplug electronics from the wall including TVs, lamps, wifi modems, everything except for essentials such as your refrigerator. Adjust your thermostat to a temperature just warm enough to keep the pipes from freezing or just cool enough in the summer to keep it dry inside. These small moves will significantly reduce the electricity your home will use while you’re out of town. You will be happy to come home to a lower electric bill.

With a little bit of preparation you can stay one step ahead while traveling, save some money and decrease your impact on the environment. Every little bit counts to keep our environment in mind as you make your way around the world this year.

And now for a bit of pictures from my family visit to Detroit!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Turning towards seafood for your 2015 diet resolution? Better check this out.

Posted on January 12, 2015 by Naima

Many of us will start off the new year with exercise and diet resolutions to get our health on track for 2015. If you follow a diet plan, health blog or weight loss system most suggest replacing your chicken and beef with fish a few times a week. Fish has a valid reputation of being high protein with good fats, those sought after Omega 3s we hear about.

But, as we all flock to the local seafood markets to increase our fish there are a few things we need to keep in mind. Some seafood is better to buy than others. Not for health reasons but for the fact that in a few years they may not even exist anymore. Scientists estimate about 75 percent of the world’s seafood stocks are being harvested faster than they can reproduce and replenish their populations. Studies estimate that 90 percent of the oceans top predators are gone. Species like the Atlantic bluefin tuna, a highly prized fish, scientists say, may be eliminated from the ocean in less than three years unless catches are decreased.

Overfishing is just one of the major concerns in the seafood industry. Another problem is aquatic habitat destruction by harvesting seafood. Trawl ground gears and shrimp dredges can penetrate into the ocean floor redistributing the tiny organisms that reside there and modifying overall habitat. Bycatch or the capturing of non target species remains a big issue today. Bycatch results in the discarding of a valuable living resource or the sale of the unintended species causing further depletion. Farming has it’s major shortcomings as well. Fish are held in small tanks creating point pollution that effects the surrounding water supply. There are some recirculating systems that aim to reduce the environmental impacts of seafood farming, but these techniques are not widely used.

With so many factors to consider it is complex to research and understand the impact improper fishing has on our aquatic environments to be able to make wise decisions at the seafood market. Luckily, we can rely on scientists to put this data into somewhat easy to understand material to guide our decisions in the grocery store.

There are several certification programs out there designed to evaluate the sustainability of each species. Quite frankly, there are too many. In one day in the store I ran across five programs: Marine Stewardship Council certified, Aquaculture Stewardship Council Certified, Canadian Organic Certified, Naturland certified, and Friends of the Sea Certified. As a consumer this is confusing and it’s hard to tell what you should buy.

Here is my suggestion: Download the free Seafood Watch app on your phone (they also make printable cards if you don’t have a smart phone) done by the Monterrey Bay Aquarium in California. The Seafood Watch program collaborates with several of the other certification programs, utilizes scientific research, adjusts seafood choices for your region in the United States and has a simple green (good), yellow (ok) and red (don’t buy) system.

I stopped by a few local fish markets this week to see how easy it was to determine the most sustainable options in each store utilizing the app and the fish market staff.

seafood

Central Market (off Lovers Lane) was by far my best experience. It had the largest selection and most knowledgeable staff. The guy behind the counter wasn’t thrown off by my questions regarding seafood sustainability or where each item specifically came from. Cooking with fish for the past 15 years, he was definitely interested in making sure my meal was going to taste good as well.

When I asked which item is purchased the most, he replied emphatically with “By far salmon” which showed in the five different choices of salmon offered. It is important to make sure you find the specific type of salmon offered in the store with the rating in the app. It is also very important to ask questions beyond the label that is on the counter to find out if it’s a “green” choice or not. Where exactly in the US was the fish caught or farmed? How were they caught?

Don’t rely on the seafood counter to have all of your sustainability knowledge. Go in with your own tools to help guide your decisions to support the health of our oceans. And lastly… price. Sustainable fish is not cheap but paying a little extra to ensure that species is around in the future is worth it.

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Add a green goal to your new year!

Posted on January 6, 2015 by Naima

I wasn’t going to make a list of goals for this year. Then I realized, how could I not?! The goals remind me what I’m working towards and what I need to work on. I made my list of seven items and hung them over my desk. I’m ready to make 2015 successful in every way!  If you are lacking an environmental goal to add to your list here’s the article for you:

How many times have you heard “I can’t believe it’s almost 2015?” I hear it from people everyday but it’s a thought in my own head as well. I struggle being present in every moment which causes time to fly by year after year. The new year is a great time to remind yourself of the years past issues and plan for small changes in your everyday life to make a difference for you and our city.

Dallas had a year of environmental issues brought to the forefront of our doors. In January 2014, we saw the Dallas Safari Club auction off a rhino hunting permit in Africa for $350,000. This enraged people on both sides of the argument and brought light to the steep decline of wildlife in Africa. Drought dropped lake levels to record lows and continues to threaten the health of our Trinity River. The City of Dallas hired a new bike coordinator, implying large efforts would be made to increase pedal transportation in the area. The DFW area has been bombarded with earthquakes in 2014 with 26 earthquakes documented on earthquaketrack.com this year. Maybe the biggest news of 2014 was the passing of the plastic bag fee to be implemented at the start of this January.

We set the ground in 2014 to make steps towards becoming a more sustainable city. Now it’s our responsibility to keep our momentum moving forward. We, as humans, are the major contributors of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere with an estimated 37 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide released every year. NASA reports that carbon dioxide levels are at their highest in 650,000 years. Change can start small. The more small changes we make, the more pressure we create for large changes to improve our environmental health.

Here are a few simple resolutions to decrease your carbon footprint in 2015.

  1. Lose the paper towels. Earth911.com estimates Americans send about 3,000 tons of paper towels to the landfill every year. Replace your paper towels with a fabric towel or rag. You can wash the rags and reuse them over and over. Get a few that you don’t care about stains on and use them for every mess.
  2. Drop the phantom power – save money and energy. Many of the electric products you own pull electricity from the wall even when they are in the off position. This includes televisions, lamps, computers, phone chargers and everyday items. The easy fix is next time you turn something off, unplug it. Don’t believe me? Feel your electronics in the off position – if they’re warm they are wasting energy.
  3. Help offset the drought by using less water. Fix leaky faucets. The Environmental Protection Agency says, “A leaky faucet that drips at the rate of one drip per second can waste more than 3,000 gallons per year. That’s the amount of water needed to take more than 180 showers!” Is your toilet running extra, this is the time to fix it.
  4. Check off your fitness resolution while helping the environment. Winter in Dallas is a great time to give biking to work a try. The cooler weather won’t cause you to immediately break it out in overwhelming sweat so you show up to work more put together than a hot sweaty mess. The more you use it, the more it will be supported and our new bike coordinator needs you.
  5. Finally, bring your bags and save your change. Let the bag fee challenge you to bring your bags and not spend the cash on the plastic bags.

The new year always brings feelings of excitement and willingness for change. I’m inspired to reflect on what I accomplished in the past year and how I can improve in the new year. If you’re looking for bigger challenges than the five listed think about greening your cleaning supply and making your own, eliminate plastic or canned drinks, or volunteer for a local environmental project. This year I’ll be watching my phantom power sharper, reviving my compost bin and getting back on the meatless Monday plan.

It’s important to make a plan that works for you and your family and tackle a little at a time. You can be successful with little steps towards larger goals. Good luck and let’s make 2015 our greenest year yet!

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Plastic bag fee starts today in Dallas!

Posted on January 1, 2015 by Naima

This article ran last week in the Katy Trail Weekly but today is the day the plastic bag fee starts in Dallas! Does your city have a plastic bag ban or fee? Mine now does, and I’m excited for change in 2015. Find out the plastic bag scoop:

January is quickly approaching and in Dallas the new year is bringing an environmental everyday change for all of us. The five cent plastic bag fee will go into effect at most stores beginning in 2015. Are you ready? You may have already noticed signage in your stores preparing you for the change in just a few short days.

bags dallas target

A plastic bag charge or ban is already in effect in many cities around the country (ex: Los Angeles, Washington DC, Palm Springs) and state (ex: Brownsville, South Padre Island, Fort Stockton). Cities are taking action to encourage citizens to use less resources by using less plastic bags. Every year the United States uses about 100 billion single use plastic bags (263 million per year in Austin) which costs retailers an estimated $4 billion a year (reuseit.com). In just four trips to the grocery store the average family accumulates 60 plastic bags!

Before you get angry in line at the grocery store on January first, let’s remember why we are doing this:

  • Plastic bags are a petroleum (oil) derived product that take up to 1000 years to degrade, and if they end up at the bottom of the ocean, they may never degrade.
  • Most are made overseas. Transportation has high monetary and environmental costs (increasing carbon emissions and global warming).
  • Studies show only between 0.5-5 percent of all plastic bags are recycled. Some are reused in the home as trash can liners, some to pick up dog droppings, but most end up in the landfill, on the streets or in our oceans. “Every square mile of ocean has about 46,000 pieces of plastic floating in it.” (reuseit.com)

The five cent charge is more of an awareness nudge. Paying five cents reminds you that these bags come at a cost. Paying a small bag fee will encourage you to think about how many bags you actually need and what you will do with the bags. It will deter customers from taking unnecessary bags destined for the trash can. If you can carry an item in one hand, you don’t need a bag. If you are doing a weeks worth of groceries, bring your reusable bags.

Reusable bags don’t come worry free either. Many are also made overseas, using virgin materials and have high environmental costs. According to a study done by the Environment Agency of the United Kingdom, a cotton reusable bag would have to be reused 131 times to ensure it has a lower environmental footprint than the conventional plastic bag. If plastic bags are reused as a trash can liner at home 40 percent of the time, the reuse number of the cotton bag jumps to 173 times. If plastic bags are reused 100 percent of the time, the number jumps to 327 times for the cotton bag (wrap.org).

The best option is to use bags you already have at home. Start keeping an eye out for bags that can be used to bring store bought items home. The next best option is to purchase a reusable bag that is made from recycled materials. You can also reuse the plastic bags you have at home or my favorite: the grocery cart. Whatever bag you choose, use it until it falls apart and recycle the remnants.

The hardest part will be remembering your bags. Keep a stash in your vehicle or you can try my rule: If you forget your bags you must carry out your items bagless. Fumbling out of the grocery store with a stuffed purse and armful of groceries is a great consequence that reinforces you to remember bags the next time.

The overall goal is to produce less plastic bags, recycle more bags, and have less plastic pollution. A study done by the Department of the Environment in Ireland found a 93.5% drop in plastic bag usage after placing a tax on plastic bags in 2001. I’m hopeful the Dallas plastic bag fee causes citizens to use less bags. The optimist in me sees the bag fee as opening people’s eyes to other unnecessary one time use items in our lives. Next up, the produce plastic bags. Do you need those?

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pull over, I need a better look at that bird!

Posted on December 18, 2014 by Naima

If I am ever a passenger in your car, expect me to yell at you to pullover when wildlife catches my eye. This past Sunday, I did that to a non-expectant driver as we made our way south on Highway 114. I caught a glimpse of what I thought was a super rare bird for the Dallas area and quickly begged the driver to pull over for a closer look. Unfortunately, my relentless pleas went unnoticed, and I missed the opportunity. I’m easily distracted by what wildlife lives around us, especially since this is becoming the perfect time of the year for quality sightings. 

When the weather turns colder, it becomes easier to view wildlife. Without leaves on the trees, your eyes can travel farther and notice slighter color differences. The crisp, cool air is a better sound conductor; giving you a sharper ear to hear rustles in the grass or a birds’ song more clear. Sundays and the holidays are great days for wildlife viewing, as animals are more active when less people are.

The trouble is, you have to turn your mind on to look and listen for what’s around us. I can walk the Katy Trail with headphones on jamming out to my music and not see a single bird unless it slams me in the face. But when I take out my headphones and pay attention, the woodpeckers are hilarious to watch dive bomb through the trees.

Next time you’re outside around the city, listen in and take a second to see what’s around you. The city isn’t just home to rock doves (aka pigeons), but we also share our city with a healthy variety of bird species just outside your back door. The thousands of birds in the area are important for our ecosystem as pollinators, seed dispersers, pest management and nature’s recyclers. Understanding bird populations across their range monitors biological trends that support decisions to protect the environment. 

First we need the data. Scientists can’t be everywhere at the same time and have come up with a solution that involves relying on us to take data for them. That means you in your own backyard can contribute scientific data that helps track abundance and distributions of bird species.

It’s called citizen science, and it’s a growing scientific tool that utilizes the general public to identify and record what they see and report it to scientists. There are thousands of projects you as an individual, your child’s class or group can get involved in from a cloud project that helps scientists georeference what they are actually seeing on their models to a plant bud project, which tracks seasonal changes in plants. 

One of the founding citizen science projects is Feeder Watch: a project that started in the 1970s in Canada to identify winter ranges of birds. FeederWatch.org has grown to include all of North America and has become a proven tool for monitoring the distribution and abundance of winter bird populations. 

Feeder Watch 2014-15 began just a few weeks ago and runs through April. You can participate for as few or as many days as you’d like. It’s a great way to force yourself to take a second, take out the headphones and focus on your surroundings. The participant list has several dots around the DFW area but none in our Katy Trail Weekly area. If you live downtown, don’t think you’re out of bird luck, I’ve seen two red tailed hawks hanging out near the convention center overpass. You can find out if they are nesting for us! 

If you are looking for a little variety in your birds, Chris Jackson from dfwurbanwildlife.com suggests hitting some birding hotspots in the area such as, “White Rock Lake, the Village Creek Drying Beds and John Bunker Sands come to mind first as great places to bird in the winter, but rare waterfowl can show up at any lake or pond around the metroplex.”

It probably was not the super rare snowy owl that I caught a glimpse of speeding down the highway this past Sunday. You may not find the snowy owl either, but you will begin to marvel at the deep blue hue of the bluebirds, be creatively inspired or help out science! 

“We never noticed the beauty because we were too busy trying to create it.” — Unknown  

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly. 

A picture I snapped of a red tailed hawk in downtown Dallas:

red tailed hawk

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Green your decorations.

Posted on December 5, 2014 by Naima

The decoration season is upon us. For some, the moment the turkey is lifted off the table, it’s time to start setting up the holiday decorations. I live with one of those types. He’s ready with the Frank Sinatra holiday music immediately following Thanksgiving. I obliged this weekend and we set up our minimalistic decorations with some environmental conscious decisions.

We as Americans throw away 25 percent more trash during the holiday period (from Thanksgiving to New Year’s) than any other time of year. That amounts to 25 million tons of extra garbage (epa.gov)! This holiday season let’s keep the trash out of the landfill and think about what we’re buying and where it’s going when we’re done with it.

The general rule is to keep it simple. There’s no need to go big on holiday decorations. The more you put up the more demand on our natural resources. Here’s some tips to keep your holiday spirit yet still make good decisions for our planet.

  • The tree. Real or fake? This by far is the biggest controversy in environmental holiday decor. There are positives and negatives to both.

The fake tree can be reused year after year but is made from a petroleum derived plastic. Fake trees are often manufactured overseas increasing shipping distances and carbon emissions. Fake trees do have a life span as well, and at the end most end up in a landfill.

Real trees have the negatives of being a farmed agricultural product which destroys natural habitat for the space to grow the trees. Many tree farms also utilize pesticides and fertilizers increasing water pollution. Real trees can’t be grown in all climates so they also face the issue of traveling long distances increasing carbon emissions from shipping.

However real trees have one large advantage over fake trees: they can be recycled and turned into mulch. The City of Dallas will be collecting used real trees at several different drop off locations around town. Call the waste diversion office at (214) 670-4475 for more info on where.

It’s a tough choice with no great answer except you could buy a potted tree that you can plant after the holidays or make a fake tree out of leftover objects around your house.

  • The lights. Less is more. A few lights go a long way and we don’t need to all have Clark Griswold homes. The less we put up, the less energy we use. If you do put up lights, make them LED and use them year after year.
  • The ornaments. Make your own! A fun project to have the kids join in on. They will love seeing their artwork up on the tree. From salt ornaments, lightbulb snowmen to paper snowflakes the opportunities are endless. Check out theartofupcycling.com for some great holiday ideas.
  • The garland. Try making newspaper chains or popcorn and cranberry strings to hang on your tree. Add a few orange slices for some pop of color and amazing smell! Use last years leftovers to make this years garland – cut up old christmas cards and wrapping paper.
  • The stockings. Stockings are the beginners craft dream project. They are a simple shape and leave room for creative personalization. Utilize whatever fabric you have – cleaning out your closet and have some old shirts or pants? Cut them up and make a stocking. If you don’t have a sewing machine no worries just grab a needle and thread, fabric glue or velcro!
  • The cards. 2.6 billion holiday cards are estimated to be sold each year. If you’re going to print cards choose recycled paper products and remind your recipients to recycle them when they’re done. Or go waste free and be creative with a designed email or make a short video to send to your friends and family! We could save 50,000 cubic yards of paper if we all sent one less card. Just one. Imagine if we all sent fewer.
  • The wrapping paper. Start collecting now. Newspaper, comics, and scrap paper that can be sponge stamped with Christmas trees. Need some bows? Pull out your cereal boxes and make some absolutely stunning bows (olderandwisor.com for pictures and directions).
  • The presents. Think outside the box this year. Instead of heading to the mall, be creative with experiences, local made gifts, battery free and packaging free items.

I’m excited for the early start to the holiday season.Take this time to make some of your decorations and think twice before buying more items that are destined for the landfill. Not only will every bit you save help the environment but it will also help your wallet.

Need more ideas, check out a list of 42 ways to save waste during the holidays at use-less-stuff.com

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly December 12-18.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

How far will your Thanksgiving meal travel?

Posted on November 25, 2014 by Naima

1500 miles. That is about the distance from Dallas, Texas to Los Angeles, California. That’s about a 20 hour car drive, a three hour flight or according to google, a 19 day walk. Any way you put it, 1500 miles is a big distance. 1500 miles is also the average distance your food travels before it gets to your dinner plate.

That number is an average taken from a study done in Chicago in the late 1990s. Yes, the number has changed, and yes it’s different in every city, but the important issue is food miles. Food miles are the distance our food travels from farm to table. And our food travels.

Thanksgiving is a perfect time of year to think about food miles. With many people traveling themselves to be with family imagine your food up on a plane or in a big truck next to you cruising down the highway. Our food is traveling the distance not only across the country but across the world. The US trades food commodities with many other countries. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) estimates “the typical American prepared meal contains, on average, ingredients from at least five countries outside the United States.”

Even Texas and California, two states known for their fruits and vegetable production, are importing food crops. “In 2005 alone, approximately 3 million tons of fruits, vegetables, cereals, nuts, and wine were imported from overseas into California by ship, airplane, and truck.” In 2009, the US as a whole consumed 654 billion pounds of food (or 2100 pounds per person) and 17 percent or 358 pounds per person was imported.

We import food for several reasons. Some items we can’t produce here such as coffee, tea, olive oil and cocoa, some products we prefer the quality from elsewhere and labor can be cheaper in other countries decreasing costs. Perhaps the biggest reason we import is our growing need to have access to every type of produce all year long. Gone our the days of only buying strawberries when they are in season, we can now grow them in greenhouses or import them from warmer weather climates.

We can now see that the food travels far distances. Most shrimp we find in our grocery stores and restaurants came from across the world in China where labor is cheap and shrimp are farmed with high environmental impacts. But beyond the environmental impacts of the non sustainable farming, the traveling in itself creates problems. The raw crop is often shipped to a processing plant, from there on to a packaging plant and depending on what it is, it could go on to a bakery or other manufacturing facility before finally being shipped to the store. Each traveling step comes with its own concerns:

  • Traveling long distances requires the use of artificial additives and preservatives to keep food from spoiling.
  • Most food is picked green and then artificially ripened upon arrival at the store.
  • Transporting the products by truck, plane or ship all have high emission rates increasing global warming. Planes generate more CO2 than boats but shipping is slow.

This Thanksgiving is a great time to start sourcing your food locally. Buying local reduces the environmental impact of transporting items 1500 miles from farm to table. Read your labels and find out where your food is coming from. The closer to your home the lesser the impact on the environment. Check with your local health food stores (Sprouts, Trader Joes, Green Grocer, Whole Foods, etc) to find a locally grown turkey for this holiday feast.

Accept the “100 mile Thanksgiving challenge” which challenges you to create one dish or your entire Thanksgiving meal using only ingredients sourced from within a 100 mile radius of your house. If you succeed during Thanksgiving think about giving the “100 mile diet challenge” a go!

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly Thanksgiving week 2014. 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

What the Fracking?

Posted on November 18, 2014 by Naima

Lately, you can’t read a newspaper or watch the news without seeing something about fracking. Even a nearby city, Denton, made some big moves this past week passing a fracking ban with 59 percent of the votes. Areas in California and Ohio joined in on fracking bans but the ball swings the other way as well, Illinois recently approved fracking in their state.

Even with all the fracking media, it’s common for people to lack an understanding of what fracking is, why we do it and it’s effects on the environment. Here’s the lowdown on fracking and how it relates to you:

Fracking is simply a drilling process used to remove as much oil and natural gas from the Earth as possible. It has opened up an area of drilling that otherwise would be very time consuming and expensive to do. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracking, is the process of pumping massive amounts of water and chemicals into geological formations to “fracture” and create new channels in the rock which can increase the extraction rates and ultimate recovery of fossil fuels. They are basically pulverizing rock formations to extract natural gas. The fracking solution used is a blend of water, salt, sand and infused with a wide range of chemicals (up to 345 different chemicals used in some cases), including acids, alcohols and hydroxides, which aid in breaking the shale and coal formations.

What’s the big deal?

Fracking isn’t free and there are environmental and health impacts. Fracking uses a lot of water, a vital resource especially in Texas, in the actual process. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimated that 70-140 billion gallons of water was used in fracking in 2010.

The use of chemicals leads to water quality issues. When the solution of water and chemicals is drawn out of the well after fracking, the solution is left to sit in a retaining pool, either above ground or cemented closed underground. The retaining pools many times are found to have leaks and chemicals are released into our environment. Chemicals also seep into our water supply from the leftover solution that was not able to be extracted back out of the rock.

Fracking plants also emit methane pollution, a known greenhouse gas along with other volatile organic compounds (VOCs). These environmental impacts lead to local communities being concerned about water and air pollution affecting their health. According to the endocrinedisruption.org (an organization that focuses primarily on the human health and environmental problems caused by low-dose and/or ambient exposure to chemicals) over 78% of the chemicals they found in fracking solutions are associated with skin, eye or sensory organ effects, respiratory effects and gastrointestinal or liver effects. A recent study published in Environmental Health Perspectives surveyed people for health issues residing at different distances to a fracking well and concluded that the “proximity of natural gas wells may be associated with the prevalence of health symptoms including dermal and respiratory conditions in residents.”

How are you connected?

Soon you will be very connected to natural gas. As the weather turns colder we will rush to our thermostats and crank on the heat. Many North Texas homes are heated by natural gas. In 2013, Texas was the top producer of natural gas accounting for about 29% of the US natural gas production (US Energy Information Agency). Texas is also the leading user of natural gas among all the states.

We rely on this energy source but the energy source comes at a cost. The more we conserve and less we use the less fracking and it’s impacts will effect us. Don’t forget to turn your heat down when you leave for work in the morning, try setting your thermostat a little lower and throw a sweatshirt on instead. This winter is forecasted to be a cold one, which relates to high gas usage and more fracking. Let’s cut down on the fracking and the harmful impacts. Remember your connection to fracking as the cold weather comes in.

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly November 14-20, 2014. 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The election and its paper waste is over… for now.

Posted on November 13, 2014 by Naima

I am happy election day is over. Not only because we all had our chance to voice our opinions but also to reduce the amount of paper waste in my mailbox. In an ever-growing electronic world our political system still relies heavily on paper products for election season, from posters to flyers to multiple page letters. In the United States we use about 69 million tons of paper and paperboard per year, according to the EPA. In 2012 we recycled about 65 percent of that amount.

Much of the election paper waste can be recycled in our city but the process of creating, printing, delivering and recycling these products is wasteful in itself. Not all election waste, such as some yard signage, is recyclable here in Dallas. In Denver, Colorado a local recycling company found a way to recycle the political yard signs to keep them out of our landfills.

This October there was another unique ways to tackle the election season waste. In Brazil, some of the political waste (which is mostly non recyclable there) was reused by a graffiti artist, Mundano. He made a big statement utilizing all of the political election waste to make a his art piece “Lixeira Eleitoral” (“Election Waste”). The piece was a large trash bin made to looked like a voting booth stuffed full of the same political messages.

The frustration with the amount of unwanted and unneeded waste in my mailbox came at an ironic time as well. In the last few weeks, two huge reports in regard to biodiversity and climate change have come out. These reports are shouting for a seriousness in the reduction of our carbon footprints. Meanwhile, loads of paper flies into our mailbox causing our carbon footprints to soar.

In case you missed it here’s the info on the two studies:

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) released the 2014 Living Planet Report with some shocking statistics. The report says between the years 1970 and 2010 populations of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish around the globe dropped 52 percent. The trends for the last 40 years show a decline in terrestrial (land) and marine wildlife by 39 percent and a 76 percent decline of freshwater wildlife. That is an alarming loss of wildlife. These trends stem from the growing demands of our human population. The more people there are consuming natural resources, the more forests are cleared for agriculture, more fish are taken from the oceans and more pollution occurs.

This past week, the United Nations published the most comprehensive assessment of climate change which was produced by over 800 scientists. The assessment finds that human caused emissions of greenhouse gases has caused global climate change. This global climate change is seen in the large reduction of ice, increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, rising sea levels, and more. The report urges the world to lower emissions by 40 to 70 percent globally between 2010 and 2050.

These new reports shed light on the urgency at which we should be tackling climate change. The urgency needs to translate into everyday decisions by businesses, individuals and electoral candidates.

Do politicians need the paper waste for a successful campaign? Is it even read? That’s a tough question to answer and not a lot of data out there on what is actually read. Most people in the marketing industry accept a general 2% response rate on direct mailings. A marketing company, Ask Your Target Market (AYTM) surveyed 400 online people to determine the effectiveness of direct mailing and of those 400 people only 6% said they always read printed mailings. I know I never read the printed political mailings. I prefer to get my election information elsewhere.

All of our actions impact the larger earth. I hope whoever you and I voted for on election day, printed the fewest amount of unnecessary paper items possible.

As seen in the Katy Trail Weekly (week of November 6-12th). 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

The GoPro’s first adventure.

Posted on November 10, 2014 by Naima

I finally have a GoPro! The best part is it was paid for by one of my side projects.

This past weekend I visited my parents in Amarillo and the GoPro had its first adventure. We took the horses to my old research grounds of Palo Duro Canyon State Park. By the end of our ride/hike we had exhausted the GoPro battery with loads of video and pictures. We have lots of photography 101 to learn, such as “shoot away from the sun” but are excited for improvement on our next adventure.

Check out Beaker’s perspective of running through the grass right at the heels of Apache, the creek crossing on horseback and more in the quick less than 2 min video compilation:

If you don’t see the video above click here to watch the adventure: youtube.com/watch?v=D651mxcX-sA

Cheers to more GoPro adventures!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment