Blogs & Ecology

Image by M. Betti and WaterAid

Don't laugh, this is serious. Did you know that 40% of the world's population, 2.6 billion people, don't have access to a toilet. To raise awareness of this global sanitation crisis and to celebrate a humble yet essential bathroom fixture, World Toilet Day is being proclaimed today, November 19. WaterAid has launched this campaign because without clean water and separate toilet facilities, diseases such as diarrhoea spread and affect children--5,000 a day die from illness related to poor sanitation.

These three young men having been walking across Britain without any money, camping out and relying on the kindness of strangers to survive. Calling themselves "singing adventurers", they have taken three major trips in the past three years, sleeping wherever they can and foraging for food. They sing three-part folk songs, ancient and modern, wherever they are welcomed. They "busk in heaving towns, chant in crumbling chapels, and get feet tapping in many a-pub across the land."

Since no one can match the spectacular architecture of the China Olympics 2008, particularly in these tough economic times, Britain is looking elsewhere to make its mark for 2012. Their choice: great gardens and a Botanical Olympics. Britain has a horticultural tradition that set the pace for the western world, hence the announcement that there will be a half-mile long botanical garden as the focal point. Inspired by Britain’s five centuries of collecting plants from around the world, the park will be a lasting legacy for the community after the games are finished.

Similar to our Green City Guides, the Healthy Voyager is an online video blog of healthy places to eat in different cities around the US. San Diego, Denver, and Big Bear are just a few of the featured locales. ...

Photo credit: Global Green

Global Green, Hollywood's favorite environmental non-profit, is showing they have the substance to back the style: last week, they launched their pilot program to create five green schools serving low income children in the Los Angeles area. Along with Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), Global Green unveiled two of the finished projects with a ribbon cutting ceremony. Of course, the ribbon was green. Pics of the school after the jump....

image by trevor reichman

What was a large downtown parking lot in Houston just a year ago, is now Discovery Green, downtown Houston’s new urban park. Underneath the park, an underground parking garage now accommodates the same number of cars as before…no more, no less. An above ground portal, designed by Austin artist, Margo Sawyer, takes drivers from their cars below the Earth up to almost a dozen acres of new centrally located parkspace. ...

Photo courtesy of Terry McTm

:: Learn how to host the hottest, eco-haute dinner parties.

:: Meet the mastermind banking on earth-friendly alternatives to Styrofoam and other wasteful food containers.

:: Looking for a cheap and fun weekend activity for the kids? Take them on a local green adventure!...

Well thats up to a jury of your peers (or a peanut gallery, if you prefer) to decide. The new site SideTaker.com allows roommates, coworkers, neighbors, siblings, and those in relationships of any kind to air out their differences in front of a global audience. Beware of using this site at work, as reading about one train wreck after another can be addicting....

Photo via Lizzardo

One of the major issues behind the digital divide is the expense of obtaining a computer. They cost a pretty penny and when you’re on a tight budget, it can feel impossible to bring home the latest in computer gear.

Thankfully, there is a way to get affordable computers to people who need them and improve our impact on the environment at the same time. ...

Photo by Superfem

Today is Blog Action Day and this year's focus is on poverty. As the techy type, I'll be focusing on how the intersections of technology and poverty. But be sure to catch the many other angles of poverty covered today on TreeHugger. Check the end of the post for links to all our Blog Action Day posts.

Image credit: greenjobsnow

No doubt, it has been a tough couple of weeks on Wall Street and on Main Streets all across this country. People looking at their retirement funds wondering where the money has gone. People looking at their health care plan wondering where it has gone. And too many people looking at what was once their job, their paycheck, their source of income and livelihood, and wondering where on earth it has gone.

Image courtesy of Habana Works

Girls Gone Green. This is the kind of sexy environmental idea that makes you wonder why it hasn’t been done much before. And it’s a wonderfully cheeky concept—a calendar full of girls posing for the sake of green....

Image courtesy of Urban Go Green

The Urban Go Green Tour is kicking off in Harlem this month. It’s an innovative event that fuses together a sustainable product expo, hip-hop concert and green job fair with an emphasis on urban environmentalism. The event will focus mainly on developing awareness of environmentally related employment opportunities for city-dwellers via training programs and panel discussions—and it’ll do it all to a hip-hop beat....