IKEA Going Green???

IKEA to Sell Solar Panels?
By Elsa Wenzel, CNET News
IKEA plans to pour $77 million into clean-technology start-ups within the next five years andcould add "green" goods such as solar panels to its inventory, according to Cleantech Group. The four-person, 50 million euro IKEA GreenTech fund has been operating for eight months, the report said. And it could invest in up to 10 fledgling companies in the next few years, perhaps first in Europe, where IKEA rings up about 82 percent of its sales.
Efforts to commercialize new and affordable green technologies within several years could lead to IKEA selling the resulting products at its growing collection of stores, currently 283 in more than 30 nations. The goods reportedly would relate to energy in the form of solar panels, efficiency meters, and lighting; as well as more sustainable materials, and water treatment and conservation.

In 2007, IKEA expanded sales of pre-fab, low-income, eco-friendly housing from Sweden into the United Kingdom. Could its catalog of 9,500 products someday add flat-packed, "smart" green homes available globally?
Given IKEA's sheer reach, an aggressive focus on green technologies might reshape the furnishings industry. For instance, green-business gurus credit Wal-Mart's controversial efforts to green its shelves and practices with shifting big-box stores and shoppers' tastes toward less toxic and wasteful products.
Among IKEA's latest moves in support of sustainability, by the fall, it will eliminate its checkout use of plastic bags, for which it began charging British customers about two years ago. More than 380 billion plastic bags are estimated to be trashed each year in the United States alone, polluting land and waterways with toxic chemicals.
In the early years of this decade, the modern-furnishings goliath pledged to phase out unhealthy formaldehyde and PVC in its core products, and to stock wood certified by the Forest Stewardship Council.
Its Swedish stores use mostly renewable energy. Some of the 18,000 staff members use hybrid cars or bicycles. IKEA pledged to carry organic consumables, including coffee, jam, and schnapps within the year. But a nagging question remains: Would solar panels from IKEA require an Allen wrench?

101 Holes In The Ground Heat Up Latest IKEA
by April Streeter, Gothenburg, Sweden on 02. 5.08
Design & Architecture

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/02/100_holes_in_th.php

IKEA, that retailing paradox, has become more enamored of the big box store concept than ever - recently the company announced that it would eschew further development of web-based online sales in favor of more brick and mortar(!!!). While that's a somewhat untreehugger, last-century attitude, IKEA in Sweden is also going beyond the slightly shopworn 'we buy green energy' declarations of some retailers by generating a large portion of its own heating and cooling needs on site with geothermal heat pump systems.
At a new IKEA store in Karlstad, 101 separate holes drilled 120 meters (390 feet) into the ground tap 50 - 60 degree water that then provides 85 percent to the location's heating needs and 75 percent of air conditioning requirements (the actual pumping still uses electricity). The IKEA site is now one of Sweden's largest geothermal installations, and new stores at Uppsala, Helsingborg and Malmö are in line to get similar systems. Swedish IKEA stores get 91 percent of their energy/electricity needs from renewable sources (mainly hydro and wind), while globally the average is around 40 percent. Now if they could only figure out a way to get those cheap and (mostly) durable tables, chairs and kitchen doohickeys home to customers via sustainable transport! ::NyTeknik (Swedish only)

Seeds and how to keep them

Harvesting your own Garden Seeds

Some are easy, some are difficult, and some are better purchased….


Harvesting seeds for next year’s garden in not only possible, but for some flowers, vegetables and herbs, it is so easy that there is little reason to use purchased seeds.

The most satisfying and easiest of all seeds to save are those of the common French marigold. Simply pick the flower heads as they begin to fade, dry the flowers and pull them apart when they are thoroughly dry. The seeds are in the stem pod just at the base of the blossom and one flower will produce enough seed for an entire bed of marigolds.

Not all seeds are so easy to harvest. In the vegetable garden mustard, radish, salad rocket, and Chinese cabbage, all annuals in the cabbage family, as well as spinach, lettuce and the endives, produce seeds readily. In fact, both mustard and rocket will self sow if the seed heads are not harvested immediately when dry.

Let the seed stalk form and cut the entire stalk when it and the attached seed pods are dry and brown. The stalks can be placed in a large paper or plastic bag and beaten lightly with a stick to break the pods. Then pour out the seeds and winnow out the remaining slivers of the pod by blowing lightly over them.

Peas and beans may be left on the vine until the vines turn brown and the seeds are almost completely dry. Shell and dry on screens or in shallow layers in paper bags hung in a dry airy place. Watch carefully for signs of mildew and don’t store them until they are thoroughly dry.

Since peas and beans are both self pollinated, they need little isolation in the garden to prevent crossing. Different varieties of each may be planted for seed in adjacent patches and, by choosing plants just a few rows in for seeds, you can avoid even the slightest danger of crossing.

Since hybrids won’t produce seeds true to variety, only open pollinated corn is suitable for home seed harvesting. Let the corn ripen and the seeds dry on the stalk, then cut and dry thoroughly.

Tomatoes, cucumbers, melons and squash should be left on the vine until overripe. Seeds should then be separated from pulp and washed thoroughly to remove all pulp. Tomato, cucumber and cantaloupe seeds are sometimes easier to clean if they are left to ferment slightly in the pulp at 75º-80º (Fahrenheit) for two days. Wash thoroughly and dry in the sun. Don’t let squash seeds ferment. Although tomatoes are self pollinated, bees will occasionally cross pollinate, so if you are growing different varieties, separate them by 50 feet to keep varieties pure.

Italian tomatoes are even easier to save for seed – simply put overripe tomatoes under hay mulch where you want them to grow next year. In the spring, protect the seedlings until after the last frost.

Cucumbers, watermelon and cantaloupes won’t cross breed, but some squash and pumpkin will, so if you plan to save seeds, plant squash varieties and pumpkins at some distance from each other or stick to one variety of squash and don’t plant pumpkins.

Peppers should not be grown for seed if you plant both sweet and hot varieties unless you can separate them by ¼ mile. Be sure seed peppers ripen thoroughly on the plant.

The biennial crop – beets, turnips, carrots and cabbage – are difficult since they take two years to produce seed. In New England these have to be dug, stored in sand all winter, and replanted in the spring.

To add to the problem, carrots will cross readily with wield carrot (Queen Ann’s lace) which is common all over the area. Beets will cross with Swiss chard, even if it’s two miles away in your neighbor’s garden. Cabbage will cross with cauliflower, Kale kohlrabi, Brussel sprouts, and annual broccoli, producing some very disappointing crops if any at all. These seeds are all best purchased unless they can be grown under highly controlled conditions not available in the average home garden.

It is important to choose the right plant from a vegetable crop for seed production. Getting the seed in not the only aim; getting the best seeds is important if your next year’s crop is to depend on it. From leafy plants such as lettuce, choose seeds from plants that take the longest to go to seed. Conversely, on root plants, choose those with bolt first.

The rule is to save seed from the best plant, not the best fruit. For example, if you have a beautiful specimen of a tomato on an otherwise mediocre plant, serve if for dinner and save seeds from a few less magnificent tomatoes from a healthy plant whose fruit is uniformly good.

Many herbs set viable seeds which are easy to harvest. Since obtaining commercial herbs seed is sometimes more difficult than vegetables seed, and since buying a whole packet for a few plants usually needed is wasteful, herbs are particularly practical subjects for see harvest.

With salad burnet, all chive varieties, dill, fennel, parsley, teasel, and others with large and obvious seed heads, it is just a matter of checking seed heads and cutting them just as the seeds begin to scatter. Place in paper bags and allow to dry thoroughly before storing.

Basil, lemon balm, perilla, and others with less obvious flowers should be watched a little more carefully and flowers stalks removed when seeds are formed. Those with individual flowers like borage and nasturtium should be harvested as flowers fade and seeds form on a one by one basis. These need only be dried a few days before storing.

Seeds of all types of plants should be labeled, sealed in packets, and stored in sealed jars or cans when thoroughly dry. They should be kept both dry and cool. Separate squash, pumpkin and melon seeds from others and check these often for mildew. Discard any bad seed and re-dry remaining seeds if any damaged ones are found.

Storage methods used for seeds you have harvested yourself may also be used to preserve purchased seeds when you have some left over. Very often a packet of seeds will provide many more than the home gardener needs, especially on such crops as salad greens, which produce from the same plants over a season.

If the seeds are kept dry from the time you open the package, unused seeds can be resealed and stored in closed containers just as you would seeds you have harvested. Do not attempt to save carrot, parsnip or beet seeds, however, since they do not remain viable. But properly stored tomato, radish, greens, and herb seeds, along with many others are good for several years.

Taking out the trash in the "old'n days"

I was on a trip and came across this and throught it would be a perfect blog. How true it is.

Talking out the trash was hardly a chore.

By Clancy Strock (Contributing editor)

You can bet there was no curbside trash pickup during the 1930s on our northern- Illinois Farm. The only way to get rid of refuse was to haul it to the dump.

Kitchen garbage wasn’t much of a problem, because it was quickly and efficiently disposed of by our pigs and chickens. They were the In-Sink-Erators of that era.

We made the trip to the dump every few weeks, hauling the trash from a family of four in just a couple of gunny-sacks. We dumped the trash, then brought the burlap bags home. Waste not, want not.

Now let’s fast-forward to the present. Every Thursday night when I take out the garbage, I marvel at how just my wife and I can generate enough to pretty well fill a large plastic trash bin.

I’m positive we throw out more stuff than we bring into the house. But if that’s true, why aren’t we down to only a stove, a bed and two chairs? Where does all that trash come from?

Welcome to the Disposable Society. I remember the days when grocery stores had a double-decked row of glass-topped cardboard boxes filled with various kinks of cookies. You lifted the lids and helped you to your favorites, then the grocer weighed a paper bagful and wrote down the damages on your bill.

Nowadays, my favorite cookies are somewhere down a 50-foot-long supermarket aisle crammed with hundreds of tempting goodies. Most come packed in plastic trays wrapped in cellophane so sturdy that it takes a cutting torch and two sticks of dynamite to penetrate.

When I was a kid, our butcher kept a big barrel of fragrant sauerkraut behind the counter. He scooped out order into a little cardboard boat and wrapped it in waxed paper. Now my kraut comes in a metal can destined for the trash.

Years ago, tin cans didn’t have as much importance in the kitchen as they do now. That role was filled by mason jars. Thick, heavy and nearly indestructible, they were used year after year and then passed along to the next generation.

Thanks to those jars, we enjoyed lots of string beans, beets, kernel corn and lima beans during the winter. The vegetables came from our own garden and were preserved in glass.

The same was true of jams and jellies. Jelly jars usually started out life as peanut butter jars. They, too, served for years and years. It was unthinkable for anyone to throw them away.

Now we feel virtuous if we clean out our store-bought jelly jars and but it into the recycling container.

Especially prized were the little decorated jars that held cream cheese spread. They became fruit juice glasses that brightened our breakfast table. Throw them out? Never!

BOTTLES FOR FOOD

We didn’t drink much soda pop years ago because it was a luxury. When we did have some, it came in glass bottles that carried a refundable deposit.

Later, during the ‘40s and ‘50s, my five young-uns guzzled considerably more of the stuff than I’d ever had. At times, this came in handy.

When the checking account was running on empty, we’d fill the car trunk with pop bottles, take them back to the store and use the deposit money to buy food. Lots of neighbors did the same toward the end of the month.

But not now. Soda pop comes in cans and big plastic bottles…more stuff of the trash container. Good thing recycling’s catching on. Excess packaging is especially irksome when I bring home breakfast cereal. The box is big enough to ship a large dog, but holds only enough flakes to feed a dieting canary.

Ask the manufacturer about it, and he’ll explain the need for “slack fill” (an-oxymoron if I ever heard one).

The milk to go with that cereal arrives at the table in different ways than it once did, too.

Out on the farm, our milk came straight from the cow. Friends in town received theirs in glass bottles. The milkman picked up the empties when he left off the day’s order and took the bottles back to the dairy, where they were sterilized and used over and over again. Today milk comes in plastic jugs that are once and go into the trash. A lot of people even get their drinking water in such containers. Years back, the faucet used to do.

Food and drink aren’t the only commodities that help us generate modern mountains of trash. When I go out to buy some nails or screws, I find them in aggravating plastic boxes containing 12 screws or 20 nails or six itty-bitty washers. Never mind that I need eight screws or 32 nails.

What I wouldn’t give to go to an old-time neighborhood hardware store with open bins from witch I could scoop as many nails as needed into a paper bag.

Then there’s the matter of clothing. Mom used to darn our socks…and darn them and darn them again. She patched trouser knees and sewed elbow patches onto sweaters and flannel shirts. Mending clothes was her Tuesday night job, while we listened to the radio.

Shirts were made of cotton, sweaters and coats of wool and shoes of leather. They lasted a long time, often passed down from kid to kid.

With today’s cloths, you don’t patch, you pitch. Stuff that’s been worn only a year is generally threadbare, hardly fit to pass along.

We also live in the Non-Repairable Products Era. Don’t even consider trying to have a radio or toaster or VCR repaired. “Sorry,” they say, “it’s cheaper to toss it and buy a new one.” Every town used to have a guy who could repair just about anything that ran on electricity. But no more.

Tube-Testing Time


For that, even the average inept husband had a pretty good chance of rejuvenating those old TV sets and radios, which relied on vacuum tubes instead of transistors and printed circuits. It took a while to pull dozen tubes and put them through a tube-tester at Woolworth’s or Walgreens. But you could usually locate the bum one and, for $3.98, be back in business in time for Ed Sullivan and Fred Waring.

Wherever you live, I’m sure your local paper has carried reports on how the local dump is just about full. Where will we put all our future garbage? (Answer: Anywhere but my backyard.)

A few places continue to pile up, creating “Mount Trashmores” like the one outside Chicago that makes a dandy ski run in winter.

Other areas are recycling what they can. But it’s a losing game. We generate a lot of junk.

Household trash plus the contents of those brimming dumpsters behind fast-food restaurant, schools, hospitals, shopping malls and factories create another small mountain every 24 hours.

Life sure was simpler back when two burlap bags held our family’s trash for the month. I know…I was there.


‘I Know… I was There’
Another in a series looking back on the unforgettable times and memorable events in our lives.

From the July/August 1998 issue of Reminisce the magazine That Brings Back the Good Times

Vol. 8, NO. 4 PG 6-7

Why Choose Cloth Diapers?

Why Choose Cloth Diapers?

Health:
Disposable diapers contain traces of the carcinogenic toxin, Dioxin
The EPA lists Dioxin as the most toxic of all cancer-linked chemicals.
Dioxin is banned in most countries, but not the U.S.
Disposables contain sodium polyacrylate, a type of super absorbent polymer (SAP).
SAP was banned from tampons due to toxic shock syndrome.
In 1955, before modern disposable diapers were sold and consumed, it was estimated that 7% of babies and toddlers had diaper rash. In 1991, long after plastic disposable diapers dominated the market, the number jumped to 78%.


Environment:
· An estimated 27.4 billion disposable diapers are consumed every in the U.S.
· A single disposable diaper may take 250-500 years to decompose.
· Over 92% of all single-use disposable diapers end up in a landfill.

Cost:
· Americans spend about 7 billion dollars on disposable diapers every year.
· The cost of cloth diapering is about one-tenth the cost of buying disposables.
· If every one of those families switched to simple home-laundered cloth diapers, they would save more than 6 billion dollars, enough to feed about 2.5 million American children for an entire year.

Plastic Bags and what to do about them

Single-Use Bag Facts:

Learn the Facts:

· The average American uses 300 and 700 plastic bags per year. If everyone in the U.S. tied their annual consumption of plastic bags together in a giant chain, the chain would reach around the Earth about 760 times.
· According to the American Forest and Paper Association, in 1999 the U.S. alone used 10 billion paper grocery bags, requiring 14 million trees to be cut down.
· Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, they photodegrade—breaking down into small toxic bits. Contaminating soil and waterways and entering the food-chain when mistaken for zooplankton or jellyfish.

Do you have a single-Use Bag Addiction?

1. Have you ever been locked into the belief there are only two choices: “paper or plastic”?

2. Are you afraid that if you stop single-use bags your life will become more difficult or unmanageable?
3. Have you ever chosen to continue single-use despite one or more single-use bag failures? ( I know you have we all have)
4. Have you ever taken a bag when you were able to easily carry your purchase in your hand, pocket or purse? (Again I know we all have done that.)
5. Do you ever you request your purchase be double-bagged or god-forbid, triple bagged? (YA we double-bagged because we had failures in a single bag.)
6. Do you own a reusable bags but “forgot” them at your home or in you car?
7. Have you made a resolution to quit or reduce your single-use bag usage but continue the habit?
8. Have you ever blamed the bagger or store for your habit?
9. Have you ever succumbed to pressure by the bagger to take a bag?
10. Do you feel depressed, guilty, or remorseful after you use or throw away a single-use bag?
11. Have you ever purged your house of single-use bags only to find them piling up again in just a few weeks?
12. Do you have a large stash of single-use bags hidden in a cabinet, closet or drawer?
13. Have you felt awkward refusing a bag when offered?
14. Do you have a hard time saying no when a single-use bags are pushed on you?
15. Have you lied to or misled those around you about how much or how often you use single-use bags?
16. Do you have a “good” reasons for you single-use bag usage?
17. Have you ever had purple or blue fingers from carrying too many plastic bags a once?
18. Have you tried to control your single-use bag by switching from paper to plastic or plastic to paper?
19. Have you ever decided to stop using for a week or so, but only lasted for a couple days?

If you have answered YES to any of the questions, you may have a single-use bag problem.





Take Action:

1. Own and use reusable shopping bags.
2. Raise awareness.
3. Give Friend reusable bags instead of using a gift bag
4. Refuse a bag when you can easily carry your Purchase.
5. If you like when retailers allow you to choose if you want a bag or not, let them know.
6. Bring used plastic bags back to the grocery store for reuse (some place give you a money off you bill if you do.) or for recycling.

Lets Think Green

Sometimes it seems like modern America is one colossal plastic palace. The versatile material is in our cars, toys, packaging, clothing, home goods, food utensils, medical devices and so much more. It is also littering our streets, clogging our waterways and choking marine life. Many plastics can be readily recycled, but how do consumers make sense of all the different types and rules?

Number 1 PlasticsPET or PETE (polyethylene terephthalate)

Found in: Soft drink, water and beer bottles; mouthwash bottles; peanut butter containers; salad dressing and vegetable oil containers; ovenable food trays.

Recycling: Picked up through most curbside recycling programs -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Polar fleece, fiber, tote bags, furniture, carpet, paneling, straps, (occasionally) new containers PET plastic is the most common for single-use bottled beverages, because it is inexpensive, lightweight and easy to recycle. It poses low risk of leaching breakdown products. Recycling rates remain relatively low (around 20%), though the material is in high demand by remanufacturers.

Number 2 PlasticsHDPE (high density polyethylene)

Found in: Milk jugs, juice bottles; bleach, detergent and household cleaner bottles; shampoo bottles; some trash and shopping bags; motor oil bottles; butter and yogurt tubs; cereal box liners

Recycling: Picked up through most curbside recycling programs, although some allow only those containers with necks -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Laundry detergent bottles, oil bottles, pens, recycling containers, floor tile, drainage pipe, lumber, benches, doghouses, picnic tables, fencing
HDPE is a versatile plastic with many uses, especially for packaging. It carries low risk of leaching and is readily recyclable into many goods.

Number 3 PlasticsV (Vinyl) or PVC

Found in: Window cleaner and detergent bottles, shampoo bottles, cooking oil bottles, clear food packaging, wire jacketing, medical equipment, siding, windows, piping

Recycling: Rarely recycled; accepted by some plastic lumber makers -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Decks, paneling, mudflaps, roadway gutters, flooring, cables, speed bumps, mats
PVC is tough and weathers well, so it is commonly used for piping, siding and similar applications. PVC contains chlorine, so its manufacture can release highly dangerous dioxins. If you must cook with PVC, don't let the plastic touch food. Also never burn PVC, because it releases toxins.

Number 4 PlasticsLDPE (low density polyethylene)

Found in: Squeezable bottles; bread, frozen food, dry cleaning and shopping bags; tote bags; clothing; furniture; carpet

Recycling: LDPE is not often recycled through curbside programs, but some communities will accept it. Plastic shopping bags can be returned to many stores for recycling -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Trash can liners and cans, compost bins, shipping envelopes, paneling, lumber, landscaping ties, floor tile
LDPE is a flexible plastic with many applications. Historically it has not been accepted through most American curbside recycling programs, but more and more communities are starting to accept it.

Number 5 PlasticsPP (polypropylene)

Found in: Some yogurt containers, syrup bottles, ketchup bottles, caps, straws, medicine bottles

Recycling: Number 5 plastics can be recycled through some curbside programs -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Signal lights, battery cables, brooms, brushes, auto battery cases, ice scrapers, landscape borders, bicycle racks, rakes, bins, pallets, trays
Polypropylene has a high melting point, and so is often chosen for containers that must accept hot liquid. It is gradually becoming more accepted by recyclers.

Number 6 PlasticsPS (polystyrene)

Found in: Disposable plates and cups, meat trays, egg cartons, carry-out containers, aspirin bottles, compact disc cases

Recycling: Number 6 plastics can be recycled through some curbside programs -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Insulation, light switch plates, egg cartons, vents, rulers, foam packing, carry-out containers
Polystyrene can be made into rigid or foam products -- in the latter case it is popularly known as the trademark Styrofoam. Evidence suggests polystyrene can leach potential toxins into foods. The material was long on environmentalists' hit lists for dispersing widely across the landscape, and for being notoriously difficult to recycle. Most places still don't accept it, though it is gradually gaining traction.

Number 7 PlasticsMiscellaneous

Found in: Three- and five-gallon water bottles, 'bullet-proof' materials, sunglasses, DVDs, iPod and computer cases, signs and displays, certain food containers, nylon

Recycling: Number 7 plastics have traditionally not been recycled, though some curbside programs now take them -- (search for recycling locations in your area).

Recycled into: Plastic lumber, custom-made products
A wide variety of plastic resins that don't fit into the previous categories are lumped into number 7. A few are even made from plants (polyactide) and are compostable. Polycarbonate is number 7, and is the hard plastic that has parents worried these days, after studies have shown it can leach potential hormone disruptors.