The June issue of Vogue is packed with Green Goodness! I saved it for my flight to London last week and I was so pleased to find so many verdant gems among the regular great-as-usual Vogue content and reporting.

Gorgeous shoot, all sun-drenchy and summery. Here Cameron wears a Hessnatur silk and cotton tank, an Ecote belt and Del Forte organic cotton jeans.

First, Eco Chick Cameron Diaz not only graced the cover, but was featured in an eco fashion spread inside the mag, wearing some of my fave designers, including John Patrick Organic, Stella McCartney, Del Forte, Hessnatur and Olsenhaus, all of which have been featured on this site.

A 3.1 Philip Lim dress in eco-dyed natural silk with an Eco Emporia belt made from recycled fire hose.

Gisele Bundchen looks naturally gorgeous in this 100% organic cotton suit colored with low-impact dye from Loyale.

Though Gisele DID date Mr. Supergreenie Leo DiCaprio for some time, and she has a great green blog, she also seems to have no problem wearing fur or representing some pretty ungreen companies like True Religion jeans and Victoria’s Secret.

However, she is incredibly influential (and is the top-earning model in the world, according to a recent Forbes report) which is great news for Loyale’s Jenny Hwa, who designed the lovely greenblue bikini pictured above on The Body. I’ve been a big fan of Loyale (see Spring ’09 here) for years (featured the line in Plenty when I style edited there) and it’s so great to see a New York-based eco designer like Jenny getting her due in Vogue.

I was especially excited to see that in the travel special of this issue, Vogue highlighted get-in-shape getaways with a green bent (my preferred mode of vacation), including Charym, a local-to-me yoga/hiking/mountain biking spa in my home state of Connecticut. Is that a woman about to go river kayaking in VOGUE? (Not in those boots, though they are superfab, but anyway). Other vacays encourage surfing, organic massages, horseback riding and trail running. Hey, I trail run!

And the last page of Vogue’s June issue features the Fendi Abici bike (only a Benjamin under $6K! What recession?) But it IS Fendi, and this officially means city biking is in, which in an indirect (but important, I’d argue) way bodes well for bike lanes, pedestrian-focused cities, and pushing the car OUT.

“The science is beyond dispute… Delay is no longer an option. Denial is no longer an acceptable response.”

I never thought I’d see the day when the President of the USA would be considered “more green” than the prime minister of Canada. I’m happy to say, that I truly believe Obama is just that. (Although…to be fair – being “more green” then the Canadian government isn’t super hard right now.)

The future looks mostly friendly with Obama on leading the way. Originally there was some skepticism over his support for “clean coal” support – but won the environmentalists back with his incredibly aggressive and undeniably ambitious plan for climate change and renewable energies. This plan focuses on an attempt to reduce 80 % emissions from 1990 levels by 2050 along side auctioning 100 % of the pollution permits. If he holds true to his plan it will also include a $150 billion investment for green jobs and clean energies.

He is calling for 30% of all the government’s electricity to come from renewable energy within the next 11 years, and 25% of ALL U.S.A electricity to come from sustainable/renewable sources by 2025. All “new buildings” would be carbon neutral by 2030 and U.S oil consumption would drop by at least 35%. He opposes oil drilling in the Arctic, supports Nuclear energy (although doesn’t want it stuck under Yucca - but did accept $159 800 in contributions from Exelon) and supports labeling foods for GMOs and country-of-origin.

So it looks as though that America is rolling into a new year with some bright light ahead of them. To the east Spain is putting forth intense efforts to start a competition for the biggest and baddest solar energy device this world can offer. They’re not even going to keep it to themselves, but have said that they will export the technology to places such as Algeria and Morocco.

The 20MW solar tower is also a forerunner for an even more ambitious idea, one that Abascal [Abengoa’s CTO] hopes will become a standard for CSP plants in future — a 50MW version that could generate electricity around the clock. “During the day, you’d use 50% of your electricity to produce electricity and 50% to heat molten salt. During the night you use the molten salt to produce electricity.”

Molten salt technology is in its early stages but Abengoa is testing the idea at a power plant in Granada. So far the company has demonstrated that it is possible to store up to eight hours of solar energy by heating tanks containing 28,000 tonnes of salt to more than 220C. “This will make it possible to have almost constant production or at least it will be able to produce energy for most of the day,” said Abascal.

India is doing it’s part by introducing such technology as the solar rickshaw!

The solar version reaches a pretty impressive speed of about 15 kilometres per hour and, fully-charged, the battery can keep going for 50-70 kilometres. The goal is to develop the current four Soleckshaws into more advanced models in time for the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

Hopefully these sorts of technologies will only keep going so that the everyday rickshaw driver can afford one. But for less costly environmental efforts we can turn to Japan where they’re using recycled bottles to save people’s lives.

All over the world there are people devoting their lives, or simply just doing their best to help save the environment. I look forward to this new year, when I suspect that we’ll see many changes in America, Canada and all over the world. Although some of the governments may not have the best plans, at least they’re starting to have plans at all. And it’s going to take the effort, passion and devotion of every single person to see some major changes starting to take place.

So Happy New Year! I hope this coming year brings you lots of green-filled surprises and cool new technologies for us all to try out. Throughout the year I’ll keep you updated on coral reefs, endangered species, deforestation, pollution and the hardships that people are facing because of global warming and other environmental disasters.

“We are not acting as good stewards of God’s Earth when our bottom line puts the size of our profits before the future of our planet.”
— Obama Oct. 14, 2007, in a speech at an interfaith forum on climate change

I want my child to connect with nature, but how can a suburban park be designed to both protect visitors from Lyme disease–carrying ticks and restore the natural ecosystem?
—Lena Crandall, Scarsdale, NY

The funny thing about wildlife (even the kind that finds its way into parks and playgrounds in developed areas) is that it’s wild and therefore not completely controllable. In order to eliminate Lyme disease–carrying ticks, you would have to ban all warm-blooded animals and pave over the greenery. Still, you wouldn’t be creating an optimal environment for children. “In a matter of a few decades kids’ interactions with nature have been reduced significantly compared with all of human history,” says Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods. “A new body of evidence suggests getting kids out-
side, which engages all the senses, leads to a longer attention span, increases in cognitive development, and [reduces] stress.”

So unless you want your child to grow up playing in a parking lot, the best way to avoid deer ticks is prevention. “You can’t really prevent ticks from being in outdoor areas, but you can be proactive about your own actions,” says Beth Herr, pro-
gram director at New York’s Westchester County Parks Department. (New York had more cases of Lyme disease in 2006 than any other state.) “Be sure that you tuck your pants into your socks, wear light-colored clothing, and check yourself and your child for ticks right after using outdoor facilities.”
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I’m considering buying a tankless water heater. With all their great energy-saving features, why haven’t these systems caught on?
—Louis Weiss, Berkeley, CA

Whoever invented the storage water heaters most of us have in our homes today must have been thinking of how best to waste energy instead of save it. Think about it: Conventional systems keep water warmed to skin-scrubbing temps 24/7 even though hot water is needed for only an hour or two a day. Tankless (or demand) types do just the opposite: Water is heated instantly when you turn on the shower. Since roughly 13 percent of a home’s energy is used for this purpose, making the switch to a tankless kind could save an average of about $180 a year, and also help reduce your family’s carbon footprint.

If you choose a natural gas–burning model, it will use about 30 percent less energy than an electric one, and you can up the efficiency even more by picking a unit with an intermittent ignition rather than a constantly burning pilot light. (Two companies that sell such models are Bosch and Takagi.)

You will also save water. “You don’t need to run the shower waiting for the hot water, which wastes an average of five gallons every time you do it,” says Claudia Chandler, assis-
tant executive director for the California Energy Commission.

So why haven’t these caught on? Tankless heaters supply two to five gallons of water a minute, which might not be enough when you want to take a shower and run the dishwasher at the same time. A simple solution is to just add another unit. You will never run out of water completely, as with other heaters. While a tankless unit might be more expensive up front, you will save so much on your electricity bill it could pay for itself in as little as two years. You might also enjoy a windfall come April 15. The federal government and many states (see Energy Star and DSIRE) now offer rebates and tax deductions for energy-efficient appliances, including a $300 credit for certain tankless water heaters installed between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2007.
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I might start heating my home with wood pellets. Is this a sustainable resource?
—Jon Bradford, Lancaster, PA

What could be cozier than the smell of wood smoke drifting over a snowy landscape? Until the early 1900s, 90 percent of Americans heated their homes with wooden logs, which are a renewable resource, since trees can be planted to replace those cut for fuel. When fossil fuels became cheaper and more widely available, many people switched from the messy fires that needed constant stoking to furnaces that burned oil or natural gas (which are both finite, nonrenewable fuels).

Concerns about global warming, rising fuel prices, and ground-level air pollution have led some homeowners to rethink how they heat their homes, and wood is slowly making a comeback. Unfortunately, traditional wood stoves and fireplaces contribute to local air pollution, since they produce particulates (few older stoves have an air smoke filter), and they can be high maintenance to keep going. Stoves that run on pellets instead of logs are cleaner and require less upkeep (picture a bag of half-inch-long pellets instead of logs).

The fuel for these stoves is also sustainable, as most pellets are made of compacted sawdust, waste paper, and bark, all by-products of the paper, agriculture, or lumber industries. Sawdust wood pellets produce the least amount of ash. Some stoves can also burn other biofuels, including soybeans, corn kernels, nutshells, barley, and cherry pits, that might otherwise end up in landfills. But make sure your stove can handle alternative fuels before trying them.

You might also have an energy auditor or certified provider come check out your house to see what size stove you need based on the area you want to heat and how well it is insu-
lated. Most pellet stoves do need to be plugged in to run their fans and controls; you can expect to use about $9 worth of electricity per month. Setup for a pellet stove is faster than for a wood stove, and about half the price. Although a pellet stove costs considerably more than a wood stove ($1,700 to $3,000 compared with $400 to $700), the pellet stove could pay for itself in as little as four years.

From my column “Green Guru” at Audubon Magazine.

I was embarrassed. There’s no other way to describe how a green, treehugging, environmental blogger such as myself felt clambering into a Chevy Tahoe outside a restaurant on the West Side of Manhattan recently. This ‘full-size’ (read that as gigantically huge) SUV was a hybrid, true, but its slightly lower emissions did nothing for the fact that driving one of these things through New York City streets makes you feel like a road hog, no matter how obsequiously you try to maneuver. Not to mention the flit of panic that cruised across my brain as I thought about parallel parking it (but no matter, it would hardly fit in a parking space on the street anyway). And be not fooled: I have city-driving skills. I’ve been driving in Manhattan since I was 17 (that’s 13 years of competing with taxis, avoiding pedestrians, and lots and lots of street parking).

I was ensconced in the driver’s seat of the not-yet-released hybrid Tahoe because GM invited me. I’ve been writing about how to live sustainably for years now, and I thought that despite my lack of love for SUVs, I should go and try one of the hybrid models out. I’ve driven my friend’s Prius quite a few times, so I know how hybrid engines handle, and I wanted to compare. The hybrid Tahoe is similar to the Prius in that also shuts the engine off at stops, utilizes braking energy to recharge the battery, and runs on battery-only at low speeds, all of which save gas. As soon as the foot hits the pedal, it’s go time, with nary a lag, in the Prius, anyway. Except that this time I was driving a super-sized vehicle, so it still took awhile to get 5,500+ pounds going.

This is the gps thing that also shows you how your car works, in case you’ve bought a hybrid without really understanding what it is (which I’m sure will happen)! But also nice to have a visual to show your friends and family while explaining how your crazy newfangled truck works.

While I was busy praying that nobody I knew saw me driving the Tahoe through the already-congested streets (I realized that I was taking up the space two cars could drive in!), my lovely guide, Mary Sipes from GM, was telling me about how this car was mainly sold to women, who either buy or influence about 85 percent of car-buying decisions. I realized with a depressing thought that us ladies were probably responsible for the whole SUV craze. Because we want to feel safe, and most importantly, we want our children to be safe (even though SUVs, with their high rollover rates, and poor rear-crash protection stats are anything but safer for kids). Still, many people still think that driving the biggest behemoth on the road is smart, ignoring completely what that means to the safety of other drivers when you crash into them.

I am especially sensitive to this last point. I drive a 1997 Saab 900, which is a smallish, zippy car (with not-that-great gas mileage, yes I know! I make up for it by not driving much, as I ride my bike and take the train 80 percent of the time). About six weeks ago, a woman in a glowing gold Cadillac Escalade backed into my parked Saab while I was waiting on line for gas (the irony does NOT escape me here). She was going about five miles an hour and totaled the driver’s side of my car with her bumper. When she hopped out (she was the solo occupant, natch) she apologized profusely, exclaiming that, “The sensor is supposed to tell me when I’m going to hit something behind me!” I guess looking over her shoulder was too much trouble, but it taught me an important lesson: you don’t want to be in an accident with a large SUV. There’s the weight differential, which automatically puts a smaller car at a disadvantage no matter what, and then there’s the fact that her bumper was just about level with my chest as she backed towards me.

It was a scary and sobering experience. The stats back me up. According to a 2005 report by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety that looked specifically at crashes between cars and SUVs, “The car occupant death rates went up as the weights of the SUVs and four-door cars went up, but the increase by weight was much steeper when the collision was with an SUV.” And this from a 2002 Washington Monthly article, “When a car is hit from the side by another car, the victim is 6.6 times as likely to die as the aggressor. But if the aggressor is an SUV, the car driver’s relative chance of dying rises 30 to 1.” To feel safe did I need to be driving a huge SUV too? Were our highways now turning into an SUV arms race? You aren’t safe unless you have the biggest truck?

Ms. Sipes told me that there is now what GM calls vehicle-to-vehicle compensation in the new 2007 and 2008 hybrid versions of the Tahoe and Yukon, which is, “Three brackets, mounted to the frame, which manages energy in collisions with smaller vehicles. It’s really simple.” Too bad they didn’t add those earlier; they could’ve saved some lives.

Back at my test drive, I noticed I had to stop much more often since I couldn’t wiggle through spots I would have been able to in my Saab, which made it slow-going. It reminded me of the news article I read that stipulated that the popularity of SUVs was increasing congestion especially in suburban areas, since fewer of the larger vehicles could make it through an intersection in a given amount of time (3-4 SUVs could go through a light in the time it took 5-6 cars).

But onto the main reason I was here. Ms. Sipes was telling me that the fuel economy in the city for the new Tahoe and Yukon (same car, different styling), was 40 percent higher in the city, 25 percent higher on the highway, with the hybrid engine. Which is good news since the non-hybrid version only gets about 13-15 mpg in real-world city driving conditions (up to 20 mpg highway driving).

The little gauge at the upper left tells the driver if she’s driving economically or not. Hard braking and crazy acceleration will take you out of the ‘green zone’.

While I suppose it’s a step in the right direction to put a hybrid engine in a gas-guzzler, I couldn’t help reflecting on the history of the American auto industry, which has vehemently fought fuel-economy standards since the oil crisis of the 1970′s passed us by, leading to the pathetic fact that overall, cars and trucks miles per gallon efficiency has flatlined in recent years. There was a fuel-economy bill that was filibustered by the Senate in 1991 that would have raised standards by 40 percent over a decade. If adopted, we would now be saving over a million barrels of oil a day (not to mention taking a chunk of CO2 out of the global warming equation). Why was it fought so hard in the Senate? Because Ford and GM thought it would affect their profits. It is exactly this lack of foresight that has caused the American car companies to lose market share. To their new Tahoe and Yukon hybrids, I say, too little, too late.

At this point in the climate-control game, hybrids, especially on such large fuel-suckers, are a feel-good choice for soccer moms, not a serious solution. What we need now is cars that run on batteries that we can charge up at night from our solar panel, wind turbine, microhydro system or even coal-burning power plant (still cleaner than burning fossil fuels in an internal combustion engine, according to this information.

Good thing GM’s working on the Chevy Volt. Now that’s a car I can get behind without embarrassment, and it looks like it’ll even fit in the streets of New York.

This puppy’s got hybrid decals all over it but it’s promotional only. The final model will have three slightly less obnoxious silver tags on various parts of the truck, because as Mary Sipes said, “Hybrid drivers want other people to know they’re driving a hybrid.”

Article reprinted with permission from The Huffington Post. Images by Starre Vartan for Eco Chick.

Blake Hamster is a collaborative effort by a loose network of designers, artists, marketeers, journalists, authors and musicians from all over the world. It is their aim to experiment with different products, production processes and distribution models while upholding a set of aesthetic and ethic ground rules.

A Blake Hamster release may take on many forms. This time it is a range of shirts, next time it could be anything from sweaters to a collection of household wares with a stylish twist, to a magazine or an art-show.

Check out their limited edition 80′s rocker-inspired shirts, which are sweatshop-free, made from 100% organic cotton and printed with non-toxic water-based dyes.

The above video, filmed by Brian Clark Howard, with Olivia Zaleski as host and Starre Vartan as producer, was recorded the night before the fashion show. Check it out to hear from some of the designers who showed their stuff, as well as learn about the sustainable aspects of the show’s set design.

NEW YORK, Thursday, April 19th – Who knew organic cotton, hemp, and recycled soybean fiber could be so hot? Well, we at Eco Chick had a pretty good idea, but thanks to EGBNY’s Project Earth Day Fashion Show, the rest of the world is catching on. The show featured two sections: a student-design competition, and a local NYC eco-designers showcase, proving once and for all that green is beautiful, sexy, and fashion-forward, not frumpy.

Set & runway designer Amber Nelson
Image by Starre Vartan

Organized by EGBNY (which stands for Emerging Green Builders New York, and is part of the national US Green Building Council), and co-sponsored by Teknion, Green Drinks, and 02NYC, the event pulled out all the green stops by reducing, reusing, and recycling on all levels, including a sustainable runway made from 100% recycled plastics, re-using shipping pallets (which will be returned to the warehouse after the show), and modular carpet samples made from recycled fibers. Even the hardware securing the runway was salvaged.

Project Earth Day fashion show coordinator Molly Garretson says, “EGBNY wanted to host a fun annual event to celebrate Earth Day and to encourage learning, networking, and sharing new ideas about green interior design and eco-fashion.” Mission certainly accomplished!

Part One: The Student Competition

The winning student design, by Xay Xiong
Image by Josh Wiese

Second-place winner from designer Kacie Rushton
Image by Josh Wiese

Rear detail of Rushton’s recycled polyester pants and hemp jacket
Image by Starre Vartan

Third-place winner Jennifer Kim’s futuristic creation
Image by Josh Wiese

Red Dress
Image by Starre Vartan

Back of Red Dress
Image by Starre Vartan

An Honorable Mention went to for this Chanel-print-inspired coat by Caroline Hur.
Image by Josh Wiese

Dress made with recycled fabrics and a bodice woven from a plastic bag

Student designers with their models
Image by Starre Vartan

The judges’ table (from L to R): Jennifer Busch of Contract Magazine, Randy Fahey of Gensler, Christian Larsen from MoMA, Jill Danyelle, of FiftyRX3 (and a designer herself) and Margaret Lydecker of GreenDrinksNYC.
Image by Starre Vartan

Part Two: Local NYC Eco-Fashion Designers

Bahar Sharpar dress

AuH2O reworked top (from men’s pants) and skirt
Image by Josh Wiese

AuH2O restructured/recycled dress
Image by Josh Wiese

Doie dress
Image by Josh Wiese

Dress from Ekhovarhuset
Image by Josh Wiese

Dress from Ekhovarhuset
Image by Josh Wiese

Yellow Loyale frock
Image by Josh Wiese

Image by Josh Wiese

Image by Josh Wiese

Image by Josh Wiese

Men’s organic cotton denim jumpsuit
Image by Josh Wiese

Charcoal Hemp Suit
Image by Josh Wiese

For more pictures, check out the Flickr photostream.
For more coverage, go to Inhabitat

Well, IPCC’s (intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) 2nd report of four came out Friday (thats a pdf link…) It is by far the most comprehensive and heavily reviewed word on climate change. They don’t conduct experiments or get funded by companies… It is a collaborative effort put together in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the U.N Environmental Program to combine and summarize the absolute best information that we have on climate change and what will happen in the coming years. There are three working groups that put together different aspects of the information; Group 1 – the relevant science Group 2 – the potential negative and positive effects climate change will have on nature and the economy and how to adapt Group 3 – options for change. In other words, this is the report to trump all other reports on climate change. And this year they’re releasing another assessment… If you missed it, the report on relevant science was released in February.

As for the newly released report – The future does not look so bright. The report given by hundreds of scientists says that there will be big problems in Asia, Sub-Africa and Small Islands, but that North America and Europe are not off the hook either. Increases in heat waves, loss of food production and water resources, more severe storms and erosion are all already happening. It is the poorest of the poor countries that will be getting hit the hardest, but also the poorest of the poor in affluent countries will also feel the extremely detrimental effects. Those who can’t afford health care, or water to be shipped to them. Those whose houses can’t stand up against extreme storms and can’t afford to pay a lot of money for groceries.

Some scientists have criticized the report saying that it was too watered down and not “striking” enough – so really, if what you’re about to read is the “watered down” version… imagine how catastrophic the …properly watered (?) version would be.

“We’re no longer arm waving with models,” said Dr. Parry, who identified areas most affected as the Arctic, Sub-Saharan Africa, small islands and Asia’s sprawling, crowded, flood-prone river deltas. “This is empirical information on the ground.”

The report said that climate patterns were shifting in ways that would bring benefits in some places — including more rainfall and longer growing seasons in high latitudes, opening Arctic seaways, and reduced deaths from cold — but significant human hardship and ecological losses in others. (NYT)

…

“These impacts have been known for many years, and are now seen with greater clarity in this report,” he said. “That clarity is perhaps the last warning we’re going to get before we actually have to report in the next IPCC review that we’re seeing the disaster unfolding.”

What sort of impacts? I’ll do a recap…

The map at the beginning of this post correlates with this information:

So, what can these changes do?

Africa: 75 to 250 million people may be at a shortage of water… deteriorating standard of living and agricultural production. Agriculture will also be effected by the decreased length of the growing season, some food production could be lost by up to 50%. Food production will also lower because of increased over-fishing, and the waters rising will affect the coastal areas costing 5 – 10% of the GDP to adapt. The coral reefs will continue to be destroyed.

Asia: Himalayian glacial melt will flood areas, create mad avalanches and effect the water sources, there will be a shortage of water but mostly because of increased demands for it as the population increases. The heavily populated delta regions are at great risk of being flooded as the waters rise. Obviously their attempts at keeping up with the states in industrialization and urbanization will put huge pressures on resources. There will be in increase in crops up to 20% in some areas while decreasing 30% in other areas.

Australia and New Zealand: By 2030 water security will increase due to reduced precipitation and increased evaporation. Within the next 10 years there will be a significant decrease in biodiversity in places like the Great Barrier Reef. By 2050 the coastal regions will be f’d. The agricultural and forestry productions of the country and expected to decrease in Australia but increase in New Zealand.

Europe: There will be some retreating glaciers, but an increase in food production, flash flooding, coastal erosion and up to 60% species loss in some areas. A shift in species ranges with difficulties of adaptation and increased health issues. Climate change is expected to “magnify regional differences” in regards to natural resources and assets. In Southern Europe there will be more drought and a reduction in the amount of water available as well as hydropower. There will be a decrease in tourism and an increase in wildfires, not a great substitute. Central and Eastern Europe will have a decreased in precipitation and a decline in forest productivity. Northern Europe will be a bit of a mixture of ups and downs… less heating needs, increased food production but then more floods and endangered ecosystems.

Latin America: This is scary sad – The temperature will go up so much and decrease the moisture in the soil to the extent that the tropical forests will be replaced by savanna… obviously that means less biodiversity, and less food production, except an increase in soybeans in some areas as well as water shortages in general. There will be increased desertifications and salinisation… (I remember getting a lecture once about how horrible goats are because they lead to desertification.) The sea levels will again effect low lying coastal areas.

North America: There will be an increase in food production in most areas. The western mountain ranges will warm and increase flooding and reduce summer water flows. The forests will be effected by bugs, diseases and fires, and cities that are already effected by heat waves will feel this more heavily. There will be an increase in storms, and low lying populations are at risk to the sea level changes.

Polar Regions: The ice sheets and glaciers will melt which will change natural ecosystems disrupting migratory paths. There will also be an increase in the depth of permfrost seasonal thawing. Indigenous ways of life will also be effected because of the disruption of the paths the animals use, that they relying on for hunting and impacts on their infrastructure.

Small Islands: Erosion will effect fisheries and reduce the “value” of tourism. Sea levels rising could wipe out entire Islands, increase storms and erosion and threatening vital infrastructure. The water supplies will not be able to meet demands and non-native species will start to move in.

The report on wtf we’re supposed to do will be coming out later this year.

First Sirius and XM, and now there’s a merger of Wild Oats and Whole Foods! Apparently, it’s because the natural foods supermarkets are experiencing so much pressure from other retailers who sell organic food, like Wal-Mart. For an in-depth businessey analysis, check this out.

On one hand, Whole Foods has been opening LEED-certified stores, so when it remodels the old Wild Oats stores, maybe they’ll make them more energy-efficient and all that good stuff. On the other, why remodel stores that are perfectly fine as-is? And what about good old-fashioned competition? To only have one natural-foods supermarket (I’m talking the big ones here, not the smaller places like Mrs. Green’s) in the whole country seems like a bad idea, for both consumers and natural products companies. If your companies’ stuff is not in Whole Foods now (all the markets will now be called Whole Foods), you’re screwed.

Of course, I’m all for supporting a smaller, local natural foods market, but in my area the larger stores were the only place to get certain things, like large bottles of agave, a selection of organic chocolate, my favorite tofu bologna and natural makeup. (I guess I can order off the internet, but then I think about the shipping, the packaging, etc. Isn’t it less wasteful to go to a store rather than order online?)

TEXT by guest-blogger Greg Grigoriou

When I set out to look for my next car, i had a feeling the list would be short. A born again friend of the Earth, I knew that I would be relegated to a cute little Prius, or a fairly powerless Toyota Camry Hybrid. Now don’t get me wrong, those cars are tremendous technological achievements, with nearly zippo emissions and high mpg. But why do I have to drive Miss Daisy just because i want to spare the planet?

Then i checked out Honda and found my next car.

The Honda Accord Hybrid is the first car I’ve found that offers scintilating performance in tandem with near zero emissions (its a PZEV, a Partial Zero Emissions Vehicle). Granted there are some pretty amazing hybrid offerings from Lexus, but unless you are in the 100k income bracket the closest you’ll get to sitting in one of those is at an auto show.

The numbers, for those of you who care for bragging rights, are downright gaudy for a working class car:

-0-60 in 6.7 seconds, about the same as an Audi A4
-253 hp, 23 more than a BMW 328i.
-35 highway mpg /28 city mpg. (15 percent more fuel efficient than a Volkswagon Jetta.)

Unlike other hybrids (cough cough Prius) which claim mpg’s of 50 and 60, but in reality only deliver in the low 40s, this car actually meets its expectations. And the warranty is just as impressive as the engine: 8 years on battery components, and a 15 year warranty on emissions control components.

The car has only a few annoying quirks. For example, the rear seat doesn’t fold down, which is frustrating considering the car is a midsize sedan (the battery blocks access to the trunk). So I guess I’ll get some weird stares when I have my hockey sticks stored on a roof rack. And then there’s the price. Don’t get me wrong– you definitely get what you pay for with this car– but it’s still over 30 grand, putting it in the same class as the more prestigious 3-series BMW, or Audi A4. If you’re trying to impress your clients, this car probably isnt the way to go. I also think the sales of this car would have benefitted from more stylish design cues to separate it from the regular gas engine counterpart.

The Accord hybrid won’t save you as much money at the pump as other hybrids, but you still get the same nearly zero emission effect while idling or driving at lower speeds. There is a subtlety of engineering at work too; unlike the Prius, which turns its engine off completely when the battery kicks in, the Accord drives just like a regular gas-powered car with the assistance of battery power. No whirring, or fancy dashboard graphics to advertising your tree hugging greatness to the world. In fact other than the hybrid logo, this car is one stealthy green machine.

Honda has done right by car afficiados and environmentalists alike, and once again proves itself to be a leader in automotive inginuity.

Jessica of Feministing is speaking at the panel, which will be on blogging and feminism.

Tuesday, November 14
7pm
Altschul Atrium, Altschul Hall
(Barnard is located between 116th and 120th streets on the west side of Broadway)
Free & open to the public

From the Barnard Center for Research on Women:

Cyberspace . . . will have important effects in encouraging women to participate in designing and implementing models of economic development, constructing stable democracies, ensuring that different cultures can exist side by side without violent conflict and providing the sense of trust, partnership and solidarity that are necessary to any society in which people cooperate for mutual well-being. – Lourdes Arizpe

Of the internet’s viability as a tool for political change, we ask, is there a better example than the blog? Young and youthfully minded feminists have learned that blogging allows them to carve out personal and political spaces where their lives, their issues, their analyses of the world can come into sharp focus. Outside the confines of mainstream media, where women are addressed (usually exclusively) as consumers, feminist bloggers have become the cultural producers blazing some of the most radical and rousing paths toward revolutionary social change.

This one is free and has no reservations required. I’ll be at this one for sure! Go! It will be really interesting. I think that the topic of women in the blogosphere is a HUGE considering the male dominance that we see. It should be fab.