‘It’s easy being green’.

‘Green is the new black’.

Are you tired of simplistic eco slogans and soundbites yet? This may come as a bit of a surprise — but I’m really starting to hate Earth Day. One might think that the editor of environmental-leaning publication like Inhabitat would live for Earth Day, but the opposite is true for me. I’m starting to come to the conclusion that Earth Day is just a shallow marketing opportunity for companies to jump on the green bandwagon and try to make some extra cash using eco-caché. Having one single day designated as Earth Day gives people and corporations an excuse to pay less attention to the environment the other 364 days of the year. The greenest and most innovative companies are not the ones running Earth Day marketing campaigns and giving out eco totes on April 22nd. In fact, you wouldn’t believe some of the ridiculous green-themed press releases I received over the past few weeks leading up to Earth Day. Read on for five of the most egregious examples of greenwashed Earth Day marketing gimmicks I’ve seen, and chime in with the most ridiculous gimmicks that you’ve run across in the comments – we’ll be collecting your submissions and adding them to our post!

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Post tags: carbon offsets, earth day, earth day 2010, eco tote bags, eco water bottle, environmental activism, environmental responsibility, gimmicks, green design, Greenwashing, sunchips bag, sustainable design

There are mainly pointless designed object in the world, but this has got to top the list of wretched excess.  GoVacuum.com has created a 24-carat gold vacuum cleaner that comes with the hefty price tag of $1 million. If you can afford to buy this contraption, the chances that you do your own house cleaning are very, very slim.

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Post tags: $1 million, 24 carat, gold carat vacuum cleaner, gold vacuum cleaner, govacuum, govacuum.com, millionaire, vacuum cleaner

Tired of peeling labels off of your fruit? The Brazilian advertising agency AGE Isobar has found a solution with its cubic mold, which presses a brand’s label into the surface of pieces of fruit. The mold is now the base for a juice company’s marketing campaign, and the results resemble a love child between Carmen Miranda and a box of LEGOs.

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Post tags: advertising, AGE Isobar, Brazil, brazilian fruit, Camp Nectar, carmen miranda, cubed fruit, embossed fruit, LEGOs, marketing, square fruit

The web is buzzing today over a new research study that looks at the effect that large Texas wind farms have on surface temperatures in their immediate surroundings. “New Research Shows Wind Farms Cause Global Warming,” says one FOX headline; “Wind Farms are causing global warming, researchers say,” says another. Unsurprisingly, it’s all just hot air. The study, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, does find that wind farms are causing a slight increase in local temperatures, which is very different from global warming. Come, we’ll explain.

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Post tags: "wind power", FOX Nation, Fox News, media criticism, renewable energy, science, West Texas, wind energy, Wind Farms, wind turbines, windmills

Read the rest of 6 Earth Day Activities That Will Actually Make a Difference

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Post tags: 6 Earth Day Activities That Will Make a Difference, earth day, earth day 2011, environmental sustainability, farmer's market, green design, green lifestyle, sustainable design, sustainable lifestyle, vegetarianism

A couple weeks ago we reported on the killing of an elephant for sport by GoDaddy CEO Bob Parsons. As shocking as the news may have been, it seems that in a strange turn of events it may have come as a winning situation for GoDaddy’s competitor Namecheap. After pledging to donate $1 to Save The Elephants for every domain transfered from GoDaddy, Namecheap ended up with $20,000 to donate to the foundation.

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Post tags: african elephants, bob parsons shoots elephant, endangered elephants, godaddy ceo bob parsons, godaddy ceo shoot elelphant, godaddy ceo shooting elephant video, godaddy elephant video, namecheap, video bob parsons

Bob Parsons, the CEO of domain registry company GoDaddy, apparently enjoys hunting endangered species for fun. Parsons recently posted the above video on his blog, which shows him hunting an elephant in Africa after it trampled crops. In the video, he states, “For the second year in a row, I spent 10 days hunting problem elephants in Zimbabwe. Of everything I do, this is the most rewarding.” Rewarding?! We think “horrifying” and “nauseating” would be more apt descriptions.

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Post tags: african elephants, bob parsons shoots elephant, endangered elephants, godaddy ceo bob parsons, godaddy ceo shoot elelphant, godaddy ceo shooting elephant video, godaddy elephant video, video bob parsons

How many legislative bodies does it take to block efficiency? Well, it appears only one — as Republicans in Congress try to repeal the 2007 Ban on incandescent bulbs. Spearheading the charge is Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who publically slammed the Energy Department saying the agency has “forced Americans to buy toilets that don’t flush properly and light bulbs they don’t want in the name of energy efficiency.”

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Post tags: 2007 Ban on Incandescent Lightbulbs, efficient lightbulbs, energy department, energy efficient lightbulbs, green energy, Lightbulb Freedom of Choice Act, national resources defence council, rand paul

Read the rest of Yellow Pages Finally Launches Phone Book Opt-Out Website

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Post tags: delivery, directory, Eco, green, Paper, phone book, Printing, rant, recycling, soy ink, Sustainable, Waste, website, yellow pages

Architects Newspaper recently shared some surprising news suggesting that new low-E windows could be responsible for melting the vinyl siding on neighboring homes. Reflections from the windows are reported to be heating up nearby vinyl siding to the point that it melts.

Reflective building materials can have detrimental effects on neighboring structures. The Disney Concert Hall in LA designed by Frank Gehry was perhaps the most notorious case of reflectivity from a building causing local overheating. (The polished metal cladding was lightly sandblasted shortly after the building was completed in order to correct the problem.)

The test report from Infrared New England about vinyl siding melting strongly implies that it is low-E windows that are causing the problem. However, a flat window shouldn’t be able to reflect more sunlight than the amount that falls on it, which should be similar to the amount that falls on a similar area of siding — the siding should be no more susceptible to melting than it is when it is normally exposed to the sun. A local television station reporting on the story notes that it is the inward flexing and curvature of the windows that is concentrating the sun and causing problems. The low-E coating is immaterial, aside from the fact that many replacement windows have low-E coatings, and the problems may crop up when replacement windows are installed.

In light of increased environmental, health and lifestyle awareness around the world, it’s not surprising that green cache can be a key factor in boosting a brand’s reputation and consumer reach. So how do you effectively market a green product in this day and age? Well, considering there are over 130 million blogs on the Internet (according to Technorati), and 350 million people reading blogs daily (according to Comscore), the blogosphere is definitely a great place to start. But getting a blogger – especially a ‘green blogger’- to evangelize your product isn’t as easy as copying them on a mass e-mail with a list of specs or even sending them unsolicited free stuff (in fact, these fall into the more irksome modes of approach). Rather, if you want to get some effective green online marketing going, check out these five great tips from Inhabitat’s Editor-in-Chief (and seasoned blogger) Jill Fehrenbacher on how you can best win over an eco-blogger and get them to love and want to evangelize your product.

READ MORE >

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Post tags: 5 Ways To Win Over Green Bloggers, eco bloggers, eco blogs, eco marketing, enviro bloggers, environmental bloggers, environmental marketing, green bloggers, green blogs, green marketing, how to win over bloggers, marketing to bloggers, winning over bloggers, working with bloggers

The market for eco-friendly products and services has exploded in the past five years, and it is pretty clear that companies with environmental brand cache have an edge over their competitors. If you think you have a solid eco story to tell about your brand and you are trying to engage in some ‘green marketing’, bloggers can be a real boon to your business — IF (and only if) you can get them to like your brand and want to evangelize your products. The flipside to this, of course, is that bloggers (like any other type of journalists) can just as quickly throw a major wrench in your public brand perception with negative articles and bad publicity if you get on their bad side. So what is the best way to win over eco bloggers? Here are 5 tips from a green blogger who has been working in the space for 5 1/2 years. (Yes, I’m talking to you PR people! )

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Post tags: 5 Ways To Win Over Green Bloggers, eco bloggers, eco blogs, eco marketing, enviro bloggers, environmental bloggers, environmental marketing, green bloggers, green blogs, green marketing, how to win over bloggers, marketing to bloggers, winning over bloggers, working with bloggers

For the past five years Inhabitat has written about many LEED buildings. The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification system has proven to be enormously successful at pushing commercial buildings to reduce their environmental footprint. However the New York Times featured an important story on the under-performance of some of these buildings and has just published an opinion piece by Alec Applebaum in which he suggests that governments add-long term energy management initiatives to a LEED building in order to keep the project from “going gray after its grand opening.” Is the LEED system dropping the ball on energy efficiency?

Read the rest of Is LEED Still Leading the Way for Green Building?

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Post tags: "leed", green architecture, green building certification, green design, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, LEED Buildings, leed certification, new york times, Opinion, sustainable design, United States Green Building Council, usgbc

If you’ve been shopping, watching TV or surfing the web at all, you’ve undoubtedly noticed all of the companies taking their products and services green. While this is generally a good thing, we can’t help but notice some brands going about it in all the wrong ways: producing useless ‘eco’ wares that defeat the purpose of being made of sustainable materials or even blatantly greenwashing. If you’re interested in making your company more eco-friendly, and want to do it the right way, check out our list of the top 5 things you
shouldn’t do while trying to go green.

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Post tags: eco business, environmental business, environmental policies, going green, green business, green your business, Greenwash, tips to green your mistake, top 5 business mistakes

If you’re reading Inhabitat, you’re no doubt aware of how popular the ‘green’ trend has become. Businesses have finally started to realize that the environmental movement is here to stay, and that there is money to be made in going green. This is something that Inhabitat readers and concerned citizens should be happy about… sort of. While it is great that so many businesses finally see the green in ‘going green’, too often businesses approach going green in all the wrong ways – producing useless ‘eco’ products, tone-deaf marketing, or even worse: greenwashing. Check out our list of the top 5 mistakes that businesses make when trying to go green.

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Post tags: eco business, environmental business, environmental policies, going green, green business, green your business, Greenwash, tips to green your mistake, top 5 business mistakes

Ok, now we’re really mad. The news about trashed merchandise keeps getting worse. In the wake of last week’s story that H&M and Walmart have been ditching unsold clothing in trash cans behind their stores, some employees from the Borders Group have outed their company for plans to trash tens of thousands of books when they close over 200 Waldenbooks locations by the end of January.

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Post tags: books, bookstore, borders, commercial waste, eco rant, green design, h&m, merchandise trashing, sustainable design, trash, waldenbooks, Waste

Inspiration for this rant landed on doorsteps in my area a few weeks ago, and has been sitting there, becoming increasingly soggy and unsightly ever since. Digging around the internet I found that many other people are also upset about the massive yellow and white phone books forced upon them. Some areas even have four or five phone directory companies distributing books to each residence! Maybe the contract companies hired to drop off the books do not have the resources to consider individual addresses in metropolitan areas like Philadelphia, where I reside, but the litter created globally by the mass amounts of unwanted phone books seems inexcusable. Wanting to know who I could point a finger at, I set out to find the root cause of the issue.

Read the rest of GREEN RANT: Stop Sending me Phone Books!

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Post tags: book, directory, litter, phone, phonebook, superpages, trash, Waste, whitepages, yellowpages

Ahhhh summer. The afternoon picnics. The poolside cookouts. The breezy rooftop parties. The gazillion plastic cups to clean up? The half-filled bottles of beer that have been abandoned by their drinkers? The gallons of perfectly good undrunk beer that will be washed down the drain? Really people? Is it necessary for a person to pour themselves a drink, walk over to talk to someone, and then leave said cup on a table still 75% full, only to go pour yourself the same drink in a different cup?!!! It baffles the mind! Has anyone else noticed the phenomenon known as “floater syndrome” and been completely disgusted by it? And is there any way that we can get people to stop?

Ideally, people would use reusable tableware or biodegradable cups, but more often than not, those big red beerpong cups are the beverage holder of choice. And I’ve seen hosts collect those, wash them and use them again which is better than just throwing them away. What is not okay is the insane amount of cups that seem to be used in proportion to the number of people at the party. Why does a party with 20 people use 60 cups? Is it a hygiene thing? Do people feel that they need a new cup every time they have a new drink? Is your cup “contaminated” after you drink from it for too long?

And it gets even worse. As a person who loves beer, the other phenomenon that causes me great heartache is when I go to clean up after a party and find full bottles of opened beer around the house just sitting there, lonely and unappreciated. Now what could have happened in the scenario that led up to this horrible waste? Could one of my friends have just opened her beer only to learn, right at that moment, that she was pregnant and could no longer drink alcohol? Could one of my other friends have suddenly realized that he was meant to be a monk and shun all worldly delights? I suppose there are many things that could explain the opened beers but none of them unburdens my heart. There has got to be a better way…

If you’re just as annoyed about floaters and the heinous amount of wasted cups and beer that are leftover after a party ends, you might be wondering what you can do about it. Check out the gallery for some ideas that I am hoping to put into play to end this terrible waste of crucial resources (beer) once and for all. And for more info on making beer itself more sustainable, check out Sustainabrew, our very own Jason Sahler’s green beer blog.

Images via Lighting Trends Blog, Idealist, HVChronic, KSTP and Geekologie

For some, Earth Day is a reconciliatory one day affair – a way to make all of your eco-wrongdoings from the past year disappear. While Earth Day has certainly provided critical impetus in years past for environmental awareness and action, it is not enough. In order to truly affect change, Earth Day must be every day – which is why Grist has started its Screw Earth Day campaign! “In many cases, Earth Day has been reduced to a sort of planetary sound bite,” said Chip Giller, founder and CEO of Grist. “Well, we think that bites. Our campaign is sending the message that it’s time to wake up and smell the planet: the environmental challenges of today require us to treat every day as an Earth day. One day is for amateurs.” We couldn’t agree more. Stay tuned with us here at Inhabitat for more posts on Earth Day this week and how you can turn your Earth Day into Earth Year.

+ Screw Earth Day

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Post tags: earth day 2009, eco rant, Green Rant, gristmill, screw earth day campaign

Why does NYC send easily recyclable PET plastic containers to landfill?

New York City recycles plastic – or so I thought! For the last several years I have been carefully scrubbing all plastic number 1 (PET) and number 2 (HDPE) containers (such as most deli containers that you get when you buy tomatoes or sliced fruit) and collecting them for NYC recycling. Just yesterday the superintendent of my building brought a giant bag of deli containers back up to me from the recycling bin and said ‘This all needs to go in the trash – NYC won’t recycle it‘. I stared at him disbelief until he pulled out a flyer from the NYC government stating that it WON’T TAKE ANY PLASTIC EXCEPT PLASTIC BOTTLES – even easily recyclable #1 (PET) and #2 (HDPE) plastic!

This news blew my mind – why would the New York City government waste a chance to recycle all the PET and HDPE in non-bottle containers such as fruit and deli containers? Especially when most other cities (such as San Francisco) DO recycle all plastics? According to the NYC recycling website, it seems that the reason NYC is not doing it is because ‘it is not worth the effort’:

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Post tags: HDPE recycling, NY Plastic REcycling, NYC Plastic Recycling, NYC Recycling, PET, PET containers, PET recycling, PETE, PETE containers, plastic number 1, Recycling PET in NYC