Earth Blog

The City of Claremont (nickname: “The City of Trees and PhDs”) has been awarded Silver level status by the California Green Communities (CGC) program for their work toward sustainability. Claremont is only one of four cities that have reached Silver status; the others are Monrovia, Riverside, and Santa Clarita.  Seven other cities including Los Angeles, Santa Monica and Ventura are using the program’s criteria to better their towns and earn recognition.

"Our City takes its commitment to sustainability seriously," said Mayor Sam Pedroza.  "It is a priority for the City Council and it is a consideration in every project and program we provide. Achieving the Silver level status validates the tremendous work this community has done."

Valentine’s Day was a shopping holiday we covered on the blog and we urged shoppers to buy local and ethical, if possible, when hunting for last minute gifts. Ethical consumerism and the effectiveness of “voting with your money” is being debated and discussed over at treehugger.com and at least one other green blog.

The debate started when Sami Grover posted: ““Why Corporate Fat Cats Love Ethical Consumerism.” He set out to explore the concept of: "Every time you spend a dollar, you are casting a vote."  The widely-accepted idea is this: If you don’t agree with the way a company does business simply stop shopping there and they will change or go out of business as they see their revenues drop. But is that wishful thinking? Grover argues that real change occurs at the political and cultural level. He cautions that ethical consumerism could erode the political activism he believes to be more effective at getting at the core problem. Is he right or wrong or somewhere in between?

San Diego residents will want to start saying, “Stay smart, San Diego.” Instead of the over-used “Stay classy, San Diego.” quote favored by the main character, Ron Burgundy, of the movie Anchorman.

Smart City San Diego is a cooperative effort between the city’s government, organizations, and businesses to support and increase sustainable programs. They hope the model will be an inspiration for other communities to start their own initiatives and projects. It’s still a young collaboration only a year old this month- but has accomplished much so far. 

The United States Postal Service (USPS) should have looked into sending a free, carbon-neutral penguin dressed in a little, blue postal uniform to the United Nations Climate Conference to help represent them at a media roundtable in Durban, South Africa this week. The roundtable was co-hosted by the South African Post Office and by the International Post Corporation, an association that includes the USPS and twenty-three postal agencies across the globe whose goal is to improve international postal services. 

Automakers in Japan will be held to a standard of 24 percent better fuel economy by fiscal year 2015, if lawmakers get their way.  The 24 percent improvement is in comparison to the standards for fiscal year 2009.  The Japanese government will determine if automakers have set these standards by taking the average fuel economy of all of their vehicles, rather than making the determination for each class of vehicles the manufacturer produces.  This is the way the United States and the European Union hold automakers accountable.