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A lush crop of kids’ books celebrate Earth DayBy LEANNE ITALIE

associated press Writer

Praise dirt and hail a recycling superhero in a lush crop of kid books for Earth Day.

“Michael Recycle” (Worth-while Publishing, $15.99, ages 3-8) by Ellie Bethel and illustrated by Alexandra Colombo.

In the whimsical town of Abber-doo-Rimey, the “garbage was left to grow rotten and grimey.” Until a freckle-faced, green-caped cru-sader with a metal colander for a hat drops from the sky head-first into a trash can. Young Michael Recycle lectures in this frenetic and richly colored picture book: “You’ve got to recycle! You’ve got

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to act soon! Before all your trash reaches up to the moon!” When residents learn their lesson and clean up, they throw a big party and decorate with green toilet paper, careful to roll it back up “to use again later.”

“The Butterfly Ball and the ■

Grasshopper’s Feast” (Candle-wick Press, $22.99, all ages) by William Plomer and illustrated by Alan Aldridge.

A richly colored reissue of a

1973 British classic. Inspired by an 1807 poem from William Roscoe, Plomer’s verse is per-fectly wed to Aldridge’s detailed fantasy world of small animals and insects as they prepare to party. “When the guests began to dance/Even those who had no wings/Flew around, as if in a dream,/On feet like enchanted things.” Nature notes by Richard Fitter.

“The Adventures of a Plas-tic Bottle” (Simon & Schuster, $3.99, ages 4 to 6) by Alison Inches and illustrated by Pete Whitehead.

A very, very happy glob of crude oil keeps a diary of his journey through the manufactur-

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ing chain. He becomes a bottle of water then gets shredded, heated and extruded at a recycling plant to be reborn as synthetic fleece fit for an astronaut. An age-appro-priate glossary is included.

Earth Day celebration: Planting a tree is an investment in the futureEditor’s Note: Today is Earth Day. Across the Cedar Valley, Iowa and the nation, schoolchildren will be “going green” by gathering on their school grounds or in parks and arboretums to plant trees. Homeowners can enhance their properties by doing the same.

Reprinted from The Courier

A tree is a nest egg for the future.

Plant one, and it is an investment in your property. As it grows and matures, a healthy tree enhances the beauty of your landscape, provides a food source and pro-tection for wild-life and releases oxygen into the air through pho-tosynthesis. It may stand for a century or lon-ger, making it a gift for future generations.

“ Planting a tree makes you part of the continuum, and it feels good to plant a tree and watch it grow. There’s no instant gratification — some trees take a long time to mature — but there’s satisfaction in the process of planting and car-ing for a young tree,” said Todd Derifield, Waterloo city forester.

Experts point out that if a tree is planted correctly, it will grow twice as fast and live twice as long as one that is incorrectly planted. One of the most common mis-takes is planting too deep. Always plant the tree at the same depth as it was grown in the container or if the tree is balled and burlapped, the level it was planted in the field.

Here is a step-by-step approach to tree planting:

To select a location, site a tree based on its size at maturity. A tree commonly spreads its branches about the same distance as it is tall at maturity. Make sure the tree isn’t crowded against structures and overhead utility lines. The

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city regulates trees that can be planted on the city-owned rights-of-way between the sidewalk and curb. Some trees are unsuitable for growth near streets, such as variet-ies that produce thorns or fruit or will obstruct visibility at inter-sections. Check with Derifield at Waterloo Leisure Services for per-mission to plant in this location.

Call Iowa One Call at (800) 292-8989 before digging (it’s free). Underground utilities will be marked, helping you avoid unwanted repair bills or personal injury.

Handle the tree by container or root ball, never the trunk. Don’t let the root ball dry out.

Planting:1. Dig a hole two to three times

wider than the root ball and as deep. “If your soil is really com-pacted or hard, dig a bigger hole. If the soil is too compacted, the tree will have a tough time sur-viving and penetrating the soil around them,” Derifield notes.

2. Do not add soil amendments.Partially backfill soil around the

root ball, making sure the tree is firmly positioned and centered to prevent it from settling after plant-ing. Water. Finish filling the hole with soil; tamp down firmly, but don’t compact the soil by stomp-ing it with your feet.

3. Make a water reservoir of soil 2 to 4 inches high around the margin.

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4. Water well. Let the water soak in, then mulch 2 inches deep around the tree, making sure not to mulch close to the trunk. Keep soil moist, not soaked, by week-ly watering, unless there is rain. Taper off when the ground freezes and hardens. Regular watering is important for the first couple of years to encourage strong roots.

5. Staking isn’t recommended, Derifield said, unless the tree has a loose root ball or needs help to stand up properly while it roots.

“Definitely do not stake for more than one season. It must be done carefully and correctly to prevent damaging the tree.”

6. Derifield discourages pruning for the first three years. “Leaves are food factories, and a typical tree that is transplanted can lose up to 90 percent of its root system. The theory used to be that you limb up to make up for lost roots, but I think it replenishes roots faster if you leave those branches in place for the first three years.”

GROWING THINGS

Melody Parkeris a master

gardener. Contact her at (319) 291-1429 or melody.parker@

wcfcourier.com.

Arbor FoundAtion Photo

The red maple tree is a Midwestern classic, and as it matures, offers shade and plenty of fall color.

Wednesday, april 22, 2009 THe COUrier PAGE �www.wcfcourier.com go green

Plastic goes from trash to useful, fashionable bags McClatchy newspapers

Plastic spills from bins and shelves throughout the basement of Paul Hempe’s home in Eden Prairie, Minn. — piles of it, sort-ed by texture and size. Purple mesh bags that once held onions. Opaque, sticky shrink-wrap. These are the ingredients for plastic fab-ric or Plabric, a material created by the ZerOwBag company, which turns trash into fashionable bags.

Hempe came up with the idea of recycling plastic bags when he was between jobs a year ago. He and friend Chad Campbell decided to go into business with the goal of creating products that would help raise environmental awareness and create a new home for plastic that is not currently recycled.

“We’re excited about the opportu-

nity to help people understand the problem of plastics in the environ-ment,” Campbell said. “We want to help people understand how big the problem is and what they can do to change their behavior.”

In the past seven months, Camp-bell and Hempe have produced and sold more than 400 of the vibrant, colorful and shiny bags, which range in price from $25 to $140 at zerowbags.com and a half-dozen stores throughout Minnesota.

“We did a little research and found that produce departments in grocery stores have a lot of plastic waste that really isn’t being recycled yet,” Hempe said. He has enough plastic waste collected from one grocery store to fill his basement storage room and half of his garage. Every material used is recycled, except for the thread

used to sew together the bags.One of their most notable prod-

ucts is the Green Baby diaper bag ($140), which comes with a cheeky changing mat covered in caution tape and marked with a circle indicating where to place the baby. ZerOw has a variety of style lines, including the Random Stripe, Metallic, Confetti and Des-ert Camo collections. The lines include handbags, large or small cosmetic bags and messenger bags. No two are alike.

At the studio, each piece of plas-

tic trash is cleaned, stacked and sorted by color for organization. Layers of different types of plastic are pinned and sewn together, then the prepared Plabric is run through a multineedle quilting machine. It is then ready to be made into vari-ous styles of bags.

Any leftover material is used to create one-of-a-kind art pieces. “I’ll let people decided if it’s fine (art) or not,” Hempe said with a laugh. “But if customers like our mission, it makes it more special for them.”

MCT PHOTO

The Random Stripe Signature Tote is a product of ZerOw Bags.

Recycle — don’t pitch — your old cellMcClatchy newspapers

The best bets for getting rid of a cell phone may be handing it over to a recycling group, donating it or reselling it.

Cell phones are made from pre-cious metals, copper and plas-tics. Recovering these materials through recycling or by passing it on to another person can help reduce processing of materials for new cell phones, and contribute to natural resource conservation.

RecycleCell phone manufacturers,

service providers and nonprofit groups often have programs to refurbish mobile devices or recy-cle their components. The EPA provides information about recy-cling at its Web site (www.epa.gov/epaoswer/hazwaste/recycle/ecycling/donate.htm). In addition, the U.S. Postal Service offers a free “Mail Back” pilot program, which allows customers to recycle small electronics, such as PDAs, cell phones, digital cameras and music players, without paying for postage. Details are available at www.usps.com/communications/newsroom/2008/pr08—028.htm.

DonateConsider giving the cell phone to

an organization that collects used mobile devices for charitable pur-poses. Charity Guide offers a list of

donation groups through its Web site at charityguide.org/volunteer/fifteen/cell-phone-recycling.htm.

ResellSome individuals and organiza-

tions will buy your old mobile devic-

es, though it’s tough to get much cash for your old phone. Recycling or donating are better options.

Source: Federal Trade Com-mission; Environmental Pro-tection Agency; American Bar Association

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Electric car owner considers vehicle a ‘toy’ built for funMcClatchy newspapers

SANTA ANA, Calif. — Chances are good that residents of Dana Point, Calif., have seen the gleam-ing yellow electric vehicle zoom-ing around town or parked at the harbor. And if their queries to an older gentleman near the little car resulted in teasing or jokes, they’ve met the owner, too.

George Johnson, 72, has lived in Dana Point in Orange County for more than eight years and says he loves being so close to the beach. As arthritis has set in, he has had to put aside the putting green he built in his back yard and spend a bit more time with his “toys.”

Johnson’s yellow electric vehicle is a Myers Motors NmG. It’s actually not a car — California classifies it as a motorcycle, but because it has a cover, no helmet is required to operate it. A full

charge to the nearly 600 pounds’ worth of batteries takes about six hours to complete and is good for

25 to 40 miles on flat ground.Johnson says the vehicle goes

up to 75 mph, but he hasn’t taken

it above 60. He usually drives it to the harbor and watches the boats come in.

“Everybody asks, ‘How far will it go?’ ’How much did it cost?’ ’Where did you get it?”’ Johnson said. “So I just kind of joke about it at first. Sometimes I tell them I got it from a Martian. Other times I got it from Dr. Seuss. Sometimes I tell people I got it at Toys R Us.”

Johnson raced motorcycles for almost eight years, but after a crash broke his collarbone when he was in his 40s, he opted out. He said his electric vehicle allows him to feel some of the freedom he once felt riding motorcycles, with an added amount of stability.

“It’s fun to drive,” he said. “I know everyone in the harbor, all of the old people and most of the dog walkers.”

Though Johnson affectionately

calls the vehicle his toy, it can peel out on asphalt. Despite what some onlookers think, Johnson did not make the vehicle. He paid just over $27,000 for a used 2007 model.

It runs on electricity, but John-son doesn’t consider himself “green.”

He doesn’t care about fuel prices — he says he will keep spending and driving. His home is paid off, he has no debt and he loves to travel. He also drives a sport utility vehicle, a motor home, a PT Cruiser, an electric tricycle, a Segway scooter and from time to time even inline skates — though he doesn’t go far because there aren’t brakes on those.

“I don’t care about much of anything, as long as I live good and have fun with my toys. ... I’m going to have fun. And I do, too.”

MCT PHOTO

George Johnson considers his electric vehicle more of a toy than an alterna-tive to gasoline-powered transportation. He drives his electric car all around Dana Point, Calif., and the surrounding area.

McClatchy newspapers

A clock powered by water and salt. A cork lounge chair. A solar-powered bag that can recharge your electronics.

The newly launched “Green by Design” Web site (http://green-bydesign.com/) resembles a lot of similar green product sites, but might be worth a second look. The site’s design is clean and easy to navigate, and while it includes a large catalog of products for sale, the entries come with a useful green scorecard showing why the product is “green.”

Among the products found there: biodegradable guitar picks, golf tees and ball markers from Wheatware USA.

The Web site also provides short takes exploring topics like the virtues and drawbacks of elec-tric cars, or the link between the “Ridesharing Community” and Charles Darwin (hint: feedback-driven “evolution” of products and services).

The site’s creators pledge to take a cold, hard look at green claims about products.

“Green By Design also aims to tone down green noise and empower people toward wise choices,” the site says. “Many products claim to be green — yet

how truly green are they?”Founder Martha Danly, who has

worked in the field of “e-com-merce,” says she wanted the site to be easy to use, and to avoid the hard sell.

“We’re addressing the person for whom the green factor is not the driving factor,” she said. “As I like to say, we’re not too hemp,

and we’re not too hip. We want to appeal to the mainstream consumer.”

She hopes her site will feel like a refuge from rising green clamor.

“It’s safe to be green here,” Danly said. “You don’t have to worry about being green-washed, too much green noise, green fog.”

The site avoids criticizing bad

products and ripoffs — Danly said she wanted to stay positive — but simply leaves items with a ques-tionable green pedigree off the Web site.

“If something is bamboo, by definition is it fantastic, really?” she said. “It depends. It could have VOCs (volatile organic com-pounds, a class of pollutant) or

some pretty nasty glues in it. It could be unsustainable bamboo.”

And for products she does list, the accompanying scorecard is meant to specify just what is green about it.

“We tell readers where the mate-rials come from, what it’s made out of, the manufacturing process, the country of origin,” she said.

‘Green by Design’ Web site aims to tone down ‘green noise’

Wednesday, april 22, 2009 THe COUrier PAGE �www.wcfcourier.com

Green office practices can save money in long runMcClatchy newspapers

PHILADELPHIA — When Josh Kaplowitz arrived at Drinker, Bid-dle & Reath L.L.P. in September 2007, the new lawyer was 28, “passionate” about environmental stewardship and appalled by his decidedly nongreen workplace.

“No one knew what to do with recyclables,” he recalled. “People were printing up obscene amounts of paper. I noticed an inexcusable amount of waste going on.”

Within three months, he had the blessing of Drinker administrators to form a green task force.

Today at the firm of 500 employ-ees, cornstarch-based biode-gradable forks and knives have replaced plasticware, printing with reckless abandon is a no-no and bottled water is gone.

And if the recent launch of the Greater Philadelphia Green Busi-ness Program catches on, Drinker might not be the only company with forks made out of corn.

The program aims to get com-panies throughout the region to make a public promise to

reduce negative impacts on the environment.

What’s the upside for business-es to make such a commitment, especially in a severe recession? Going greener will save them money in the long run, said Pat-rick Starr, senior vice president at the Pennsylvania Environmental

Council, primary organizer of the program.

He said it also could help firms recruit employees — when hir-ing resumes, that is — because job applicants indeed have been asking about potential employers’ environmental policies.

The Green Business Commit-

ment is far more exacting — and public.

Companies must follow a num-ber of steps within six months of signing the commitment. First on the list: Designate a green office advocate or committee to see that environmental promises are ful-filled. Another to-do item: Assess the company’s baseline carbon footprint.

Additional mandatory measures differ depending on whether a business is the owner or a tenant of a building. That’s a nod to the recognition that tenants have less flexibility in making structural changes to their work sites than owners do.

Enrollment in the program for early recruits, or charter mem-bers, will remain open for 60 days, Starr said. The perks for such membership aren’t vast — just free publicity on the program’s Web site, PhillyGreenBiz.com, which outlines mandatory steps for participants.

Depending on the number of green practices they adopt, busi-nesses could qualify for basic,

silver, gold or platinum status. With companies required to renew their commitment every 12 months through submission of a self-certification report, enforce-ment is essentially on the honor system.

Because participating compa-nies must post, in the workplace, a list of the green actions they have agreed to implement, Starr is counting on workers’ applying compliance pressure.

Just the switch from bottled water to pitchers of filtered water, Kaplowitz said, is saving Drinker Biddle more than $10,000 a year.

Rohm & Haas, another charter member, had already implement-ed a number of green practices when Starr brought up the idea of the Green Business Program.

Becoming a charter member seemed a natural, said Catherine Hunt, director of corporate sus-tainability — even with the com-pany’s preparing for its merger with Dow Chemical Co.

After all, she said, chemical companies are “where you get cornstarch forks.”

MCT PHOTO

At the Philadelphia law firm Drinker, Biddle & Reath, cornstarch-based biode-gradable forks and knives have replaced plasticware, printing with reckless abandon is a no-no and bottled water is gone.

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National parks seek to reduce pollution McClatchy newspapers

TACOMA, Wash. — Thousands of cars, pickup trucks and mini-vans carry visitors to national parks in western Washington. They leave behind tons of plastic water bottles, granola bar wrap-pers and banana peels.

The National Park Service and the U.S. Environmental Pro-tection Agency are striving to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through the Climate Friendly Parks program.

A carbon footprint estimates the amount of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and other greenhouse gases emitted. The footprints for Mount Raini-er, North Cascades and Olympic national parks are produced by the more than 5 million peo-ple who visit and the functions needed to operate the more than 1.85 million acres at the parks.

Officials recognize that even if they succeed in making park operations carbon neutral, the parks still will feel the effects of climate change caused by green-house gases emitted beyond park boundaries.

The hope, they said, is that park efforts will inspire visitors to do their parts at home and at work to reduce emissions across the region.

Chip Jenkins is the superin-tendent of the North Cascades National Park Complex that includes the Ross Lake and Lake Chalen National Recreation areas.

“National parks are the canary in the coal mine,” he said. “We are places where there are lead-ing indicators of what is going on in the United States. So if you are seeing changes in these parks, and we are, they are indi-cators of what you will see else-where in the country.”

These are some of the areas where staff at Washington’s three national parks want to focus early efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions:

Mount Rainier National Park1. TransportationGetting around the park is a

challenge for park employees and visitors. Transportation accounts for 72.6 percent of the park’s total carbon footprint, and

23.8 percent of its operational footprint.

Park employees often drive long distances to get to work and to reach work sites within the park.

The park has taken steps to reduce its transportation emis-sions. It owns 10 hybrid vehicles, two van pools shuttle employees from their homes in Eatonville and a no-idling regulation is in place.

Park staffers also want to per-suade more visitors to use the shuttle bus system to Paradise, the most visited locale in the park. This year the route was extended to the community of Ashford. There were 10,143 visi-tors who rode shuttles in 2008, down from the more than 18,250 riders in 2007.

One reason for the decline is that the park stopped a shuttle run along Paradise Valley Road in 2008, because more people were using it for sightseeing and not to get from cars parked along the road to Paradise.

Park leaders want to run an ongoing shuttle system, but have to resolve where to park visitor vehicles and how to pay for the system.

2. Building energy needsEnergy to heat and light build-

ings accounts for 55 percent of the park operations’ carbon

footprint.The Sunrise Lodge is the park’s

new poster child for energy inef-ficiency. The aging building has single-pane windows, no insula-tion in the walls and lots of “nat-ural ventilation,” better known as holes and gaps.

Insulating the walls and the ceiling would cut heat loss by 72 percent, said Teodora Rutar Shuman, a Seattle University professor, which could save 2,900 gallons of diesel fuel a season.

North Cascade National Park

1. TransportationGetting from park headquar-

ters in Sedro-Woolley requires a 50-mile drive for park superin-tendent Chip Jenkins. The leg-islation that created the park dictated Sedro-Woolley as park headquarters to provide jobs.

The park’s operations center facility is in Marblemount, also outside the park. These two locales explain why transporta-tion accounts for 50 percent of the carbon footprint from park operations.

Park staff is working with the Defense Logistics Agency to analyze the park’s fleet and make recommendations to increase efficiency.

2. EducationJenkins said the park can be an

example to visitors on how to reduce their carbon footprint at home. He cited the use of biodie-sel fuel for vehicles at Stehekin in the Lake Chelan National Rec-reation Area.

Additionally, if the park can run a successful recycling program at the remote Colonial Creek campground, Jenkins hopes that would encourage people to recy-cle at home, where they have curbside service.

The park, working with the North Cascades Institute, will host high school students from across the country to teach them about the ecology of the North Cascades and climate change. The idea, Jenkins said, is that the students will put what they learned from park scientists and other experts to work in their schools.

3. Ecosystem changesThe park has seen the volume

of its 300 glaciers decline by 7 percent from 1958 to 1998, according to a 2006 study by Andrew Fountain and Frank Granshaw.

Park staff also will inventory and monitor mountain lakes, bird populations and changes in veg-etation. The changes in alpine lake is of particular interest.

Olympic National Park

1. TransportationEmissions from visitor trans-

portation account for 61.4 per-cent of the park’s total carbon footprint. As a result, park staff members are discussing alterna-tive transportation, said superin-tendent Karen Gustin.

Nancy Hendricks, park envi-ronmental protection specialist, said that determining the feasi-bility of alternative transporta-tion is part of the park’s new general management plan.

2. RecyclingPark staff estimates handling

waste accounts for 5.7 percent of the park’s carbon footprint. But hauling waste is a significant challenge at a park as far-flung as Olympic, where park staffers have a three-hour drive from headquarters in Port Angeles to the Quinault River area.

3. Ecosystem changesIf climate change continues,

frequent flooding and habitat changes could alter the landscape and threaten park infrastructure.

Significant road repairs were necessary following major floods in 2006 and 2008. A comparison of aerial photos taken during the last 50 years shows trees encroaching into the subalpine meadow.

Wednesday, april 22, 2009 THe COUrier PAGE �www.wcfcourier.com go green

Salvage is a natural resource in home renovation projects

By JOSH DORFMANMother nature network (mnn.com)

For McClatchy newspapers

Reusing is a core Lazy Environ-mentalist tenet — as long as it’s easy and convenient. And when it comes to home renovation, the easiest places to turn for high-qual-ity, affordable, recycled building elements are the retailers that spe-cialize in these salvaged materials.

The Building Material Reuse Association maintains an extensive online directory of salvage retailers throughout the United States and Canada (www.bmra.org/listings). A quick search reveals providers in every state who offer every-thing from walnut flooring to gran-ite countertops. Just because a material is reused doesn’t mean it will necessarily look reused. And installing reused materials in your home means you are respecting your wallet while extending the useful life of quality products (and keeping them out of landfills).

The Green Project (www.thegreenproject.org), a non-profit organization based in New Orleans, shifted its salvaging oper-ations into high gear after Hur-ricane Katrina. In many neighbor-hoods where abandoned houses have been condemned, the Green Project sends trained deconstruc-tion teams to recover as much reusable building material as possi-ble before the houses are wrecked. As much as 70 percent of buildings are recovered.

Other major salvage warehouse

retailers like Second Use in Seattle, Wash., divert as much as 60 to 100 tons of quality reusable building materials from the landfill each month. You’ll find items such as appliances, cabinets, sinks, coun-tertops, doors, flooring, lighting fixtures, lumber, tiles, plumbing fixtures, windows and more — all at reasonable prices. Driftwood Salvage, based in East Palo Alto, Calif., not only sells salvaged mate-rials, but also uses reused materials to create its own line of affordable reclaimed products. Reclaimed wood butcher block countertops

sell for about $20 per square foot. Habitat for Humanity also main-

tains a chain of salvaged material retail warehouses throughout the United States and Canada called ReStores. Retailers such as Home Depot often donate surplus materi-als to ReStores in exchange for tax deductions, as do local contrac-tors with excess materials from job sites. Proceeds from sales sup-port Habitat’s mission to build low-income affordable housing.

Excerpted from Josh Dorfman’s recently published book, “The Lazy Environmentalist on a Budget.”

MCT PHOTO

Habitat for Humanity maintains a chain of salvaged material retail warehouses called ReStores.

Cooks stretch dollar buying in bulkBy SUPRIYA DOSHI

redeye For McClatchy newspapers

My new favorite shopping “technique”: Buying out of the bulk bins.

If you like to cook like I do, you’ve probably experienced the frustration of buying a whole box of some sort of new grain or bean when you just want a little. Or maybe you just want to try some-thing new without buying into it completely.

So I started making use of those mysterious bins filled with vari-ous types of grains, beans, flours, fruits, nuts, candy and that other stuff I still can’t identify.

But I’ve found that they’re good for more than sampling. The

products in them are often cheap-er than the stuff you’ll find on the shelf. Example: Steel-cut oats at $3.69 for 1.5 pounds packaged versus $2.50 for 2.5 pounds bulk.

Plus, if you’re smart, you can save on some packaging by using either the paper bags provided (I dump the stuff I buy into contain-ers I already have at home) or you can bring back the plastic containers they also have there.

If you’re in the vicinity of a bulk bin, I highly recommend trying the quinoa ... and maybe some of the chocolate-covered pretzels, just to make sure they still taste OK.

Read more about Supriya Doshi’s adventures in eco-friendly living at http://weblogs.redeyechi-cago.com/practicallygreen.

MCT PHOTO

Bulk bins are an economical way to try new items or save money on products used often.

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Desert damage: The dark side of solar power?McClatchy newspapers

Thousands of acres of solar panels could spring up across California’s Mojave Des-ert like a crop of crystal mushrooms — a new kind of gold rush meant to bring powerful environmental benefits.

Cutting such a wide swath, however, might also disrupt desert ecosystems and the fragile plants that thrive there.

It’s a concern expressed by some policy-makers and scientists, including Darren Sandquist, a Cal State Fullerton biologist with a perspective all his own.

For years, Sandquist has studied the subtle changes wrought across the desert surface by railroads.

Such structures divert runoff into cul-verts and channels, altering the flow of water across the land. That, in turn, changes both the types of plants in the Mojave as well as where they grow. Simi-lar effects can be expected from large solar array or wind power projects.

“It’s certainly going to damage some of the ecology,” Sandquist said. “I think that’s a tradeoff we have to accept. It’s part of becoming less reliant on oil, and more reliant on solar and wind power.”

Sandquist hopes designers of large solar and wind projects will try to avoid the

most harmful effects.The railroad he’s been studying, near

Kelso Depot in the Mojave National Pre-serve, has existed for about a century; he’s been able to track vegetation changes since that time.

Species of plants, plant cover and even the size of plants have been affected. Similar effects can be seen along desert highways.

“Anybody who drives through the des-ert notices the size of plants,” he said. “Right next to the road, the plants are much larger.”

Such changes are likely to bring shifts in animal populations as well, although Sandquist said measurements of effects on animals in the area are not yet complete.

Not only the effects of roads, but of dust kicked up when desert plants that hold soil in place are cut down to make way for solar arrays could be harmful to the delicate desert ecology.

“Studies have shown the dust on sur-faces of leaves significantly reduces the photosynthetic ability of plants,” he said. “Productivity decreases.”

One of his big concerns is something few of us even know exists.

“One of the most important living struc-tures on the surface are biotic crusts,” he

said — commonly networks of cyanobac-teria and lichens. They can be disrupted or destroyed simply by walking on them.

“They don’t extend more than a few mil-limeters below the surface,” he said. “Just by being there, they hold the dirt and silt in place.”

Losing them can lead to massive dust storms.

Even minor changes to desert solar proj-ects could protect the variety of organ-isms that dwell there, he said. Instead of building roads, for example, operators of arrays that require few visits for main-tenance might consider buying larger trucks and just driving over the existing plants.

Giant solar arrays are a very real pos-sibility in the Mojave. The California Pub-lic Utilities Commission estimates that 100,000 to 160,000 desert acres would be needed to meet the state’s goal of increas-ing renewable energy by 33 percent by 2020. Fourteen solar and five wind proj-ects are being proposed on about 42,000 acres within a 600,000-acre area known as the former Catellus lands, between the Mojave Preserve and Joshua Tree National Park.

Originally posted at Green OC (http://greenoc.freedomblogging.com/).

Eco Starter Kit helps reduce carbon footprint

McClatchy-Tribune news service

It seems now, more than ever, people are beginning to go green. But what does that mean exactly? While we all know it is impor-tant to help the environment, we are not always sure how to do so.

With this in mind, Eco Hatchery has designed the Eco Starter Kit — an easy and effective way to conserve water and energy, while saving money.

A variety of products are available in the kit that allow a typical U.S. household to save $260 on utility bills and reduce carbon usage by 2.5 tons in the first year alone, according to the kit’s creators. (Interested in your carbon footprint per year? Visit the car-bon calculator on www.ecohatchery.com).

Included in the kit are water quality and conservation tools, home insulation prod-ucts, a reusable shopping bag and water bottle, eco-friendly product samples, an online eco roadmap, a natural soy candle and more. The kit also comes with an illus-trated instruction book that describes the economic and environmental benefits of each product.

The Eco Starter Kit is $97.50 at www.ecohatchery.com.