Now that's what I call RECYCLING

Ok seriously. I spend every day of my work week collecting bottles and cans, and even though I know they are being trucked away to Delaware to be recycled and turned into who knows what, there is a big difference between watching them disappear and end up who knows where, and knowing exactly what they are being used for- and that it saves energy to boot.

Check this out:




The problem with conventional solar panels is that they are expensive to produce, and require the use of a lot of virgin materials, none of which are particularly green. And despite government efforts to provide tax breaks and things of that nature, they are still inaccessible. From what I can tell from these videos (watch some of the related videos as well), you could make this at home, if you were handy and had some knowledge of how to install the ductwork. You'd just need some kind of fan system and a decent hole drill.

Its DIY solar power! Combining all the best aspects of "green" into one! Recycling, reusing (or is that the same in this case?) and renewable energy...!

If anyone notices some of the ridiculous quantities of aluminum cans recycled every weekend on campus disappearing, you'll know why.

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So what exactly is composting all about?

I spend my afternoons knee-deep in rotting fruits and vegetables. I’m quite friendly with maggots, worms, and other creepy-crawlies that you’ve probably never even heard of. I chase off swarms of flies reminiscent of the Amityville Horror. It’s not that bad; I’d even go so far as to say that I have fun doing it.

…No, really.

I’m half of Washington College’s formidable composting duo. Every weekday afternoon, Donna and I head out to Buildings and Grounds to work on the compost pile. When we get there, there are two or three trash cans waiting for us in front of the compost pile. The bins are filled with food waste from the dining hall. We drag them over and dump them on top of the heap. Then, we use our shovels to break the food into smaller pieces so it will decompose faster. Doing this also helps mix the new waste into the compost. When we’re finished, we cover the pile with dead leaves and woodchips and rinse out the trash cans.

I’ve heard that a lot of students on campus aren’t even aware of the composting program. I’m going to give you updates on our progress about once a week so you can stay informed about the environmental efforts on campus. But first of all, what is compost, and why is it important?



Compost, once it is complete, is an excellent natural fertilizer. It’s brown, crumbly, and doesn’t seem all that different from fertile soil. Compost is easy to make at home. It’s largely food waste, with dry materials, such as leaves, added to improve the chemical ratio. It needs moisture and air to decompose properly. All kinds of creatures find compost piles to be lovely places to live. If you were to dig into our pile here, you would find maggots, worms, and all kinds of other bugs that help decompose the food and make the compost more fertile. The process eventually concludes with mature compost- the familiar soil-like substance you might use to fertilize your houseplants.

But why compost in the first place? Why deal with all the rotting food and bugs? Is it really worth it? The answer is yes. First of all, compost saves space in landfills. America is quickly running out of space for landfills, and with the amount of trash we produce, this is a pretty serious problem. While food is biodegradable, landfills are terrible places for decomposition. The conditions aren’t survivable for all the friendly critters that live in a backyard compost pile. Oxygen can’t get to the trash that sits in landfills. The minimal decomposition that does take place in landfills actually creates explosive methane gas- something that is far more undesirable than a few maggots.

A compost pile has access to oxygen and water, making it an ideal environment for the bugs that aid in decomposition. Mature compost is nutrient-rich and chemically balanced, making it an excellent fertilizer. Some scientists even believe that the heat produced by a compost pile could even one day be used to heat homes!

While it is clear that a compost pile is far superior to a landfill, don’t just throw all trash into a compost pile. There are very specific guidelines about what belongs in a compost pile and what doesn’t. Of course, anything that is non-biodegradable is out. No matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to turn a plastic bag into compost. Food waste and paper, however, make excellent additions to a compost pile. Avoid composting animal products, such as meat, eggs, and dairy, because they will attract rats and smell really bad. Also avoid things that have been treated with pesticides because they will harm the bugs in the compost pile, and eventually the plants that receive the compost as fertilizer.

Now that you know the basics of composting, you might be interested to learn more about the program here at Washington College. Check back for weekly progress updates!

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George Goes Green! Again.

Once again, it is time for our annual George Goes Green marathon! As George Goes Green is now practiced all year round, and not just in April, we've made this year's theme: An Action a Day Keeps Global Warming at Bay. On the George Goes Green website you can find a calendar with tips and suggestions to help make every day a green day. We'll also be posting tips, pictures and video here on the blog throughout the month of April.

This year we also are leaving behind the energy competitions of the past. As this is the fourth year of George Goes Green, we figure you've got the idea by now and should be saving energy ALL year round. Instead, we're focusing on individual actions and innovative solutions to sustainability, through a series of events (including our sustainability workshop, which I will blog about at some point) and the annual George Gets Ingenious competition. Here is your chance to win $250.

No, for real. YOU CAN WIN $250. I know I could use that much.

The rules and guidelines are posted here for your edification: click here

Photos, suggestions, and other submissions can be sent to tholste2@washcoll.edu. For Washington College students, faculty and staff ONLY please.

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Go Grinch Green This Holiday

I have to admit that I used to dread the holiday season with the same amount of trepidation I typically reserve for getting fillings, or visiting the MVA. I worked retail through high school and most of college, and the holiday season from behind the counter was one never-ending nightmare. The amount of things purchased- the quantity of paper used to wrap purchases, and the bags to cart them home, and the wrapping paper and the bows and ribbons and all the multitude of trappings that seemed to accompany the holiday turned my eco-sensitive stomach on an annual basis.

Now I flat out refuse to set foot in a store from November onward- and I’ve found this to be a much better approach to the holidays. What shopping I do I manage during the year- either from local vendors, where I find unique hand crafted items for the people on my list, or, for the more difficult giftees (my dad), I use the internet to find ecofriendly stores who ship with a minimum of packaging and donate proceeds to minimizing their carbon footprint.

But really, by and large, I don’t buy gifts at all.

I’ll let that sink in for a minute. No, I’m not a Grinch- I just know that most of my friends share my sentiment for gifts that have no particular purpose- bottles of lotion and the umpteenth scarf and who knows what else. I have more than enough STUFF, thanks. When I give gifts, I aim for things I know will be appreciated. This is why most of my friends receive cupcakes, often accompanied by a bottle of wine.

We prefer to take a more traditional approach to the Christmas season, making it more about visiting and spending time together, celebrating the season over a good bottle of wine and delicious baked goods, preferring to exchange cookies and clementines rather than objects we know none of us will use. If you think about it, this is how Christmas used to be- a celebration of the season, where people exchanged special treats of cakes and candied fruits and spirits, and all the children got a new toy to last them until the next year. Possibly immediate family members would make something special for one another, or include a small gift carefully selected for the recipient. But gift giving was not an obligation in the sense that you had to go out and buy something for every person you crossed paths with on a regular basis (and especially not for people you saw maybe once a year).

This method is not only less stressful (and in my opinion, far more enjoyable than endless hours spent stressing over what to buy the people in my life), but is much more ecofriendly. Most websites will offer holiday green tips such as reusing wrapping paper and packaging materials, but I find I don’t use them at all. There’s nothing to throw away (we recycle the wine bottles) and nothing leftover to clutter our lives except the warm memories of evenings spent laughing and eating.

It may take some doing to convince your family to go more traditional, but I find most of the people I talk to are more than willing to adopt a less materialistic attitude toward the holiday- only they are afraid their own families won’t go along with the plan. I suspect we are all wishing for a way out of the hectic, stressful, topped with a bow holiday lifestyle we seem to be stuck in- and if this holiday, we turned and reached out to one another with our hands instead of our wallets, we’d find others just as willing to accept our gifts of good cheer. There’s a lesson to be learned from How the Grinch Stole Christmas: “He hadn’t stopped Christmas from coming- it came! It came without ribbons! It came without tags! It came without packages, boxes or bags! Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before- maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store- maybe Christmas perhaps, means a little bit more.”

Remember the Grinch, after all, is green.

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Two Sides to Every Story

Working in the Miller Library on campus has me riddled with two inquiries . First, why does no one seem to be using double-sided printing? Second, why is the temperature of the library controlled by another building? However, let us focus on the double sided printing dilemma.
Initially, I suspected no one would use double sided printing because they were unaware of its existence. I then took it upon myself to design advertising to promote eco-friendly printing, but much to my dismay posters to this effect were already strategically placed throughout the library. Not only were there posters in the library, students were aware of their printing options.
Trying to recover some dignity, I assumed students on a campus that emphasizes saving the environment must have a valid reason for not using double sided printing. Perhaps, the process of switching from single to double-sided printing is too complicated or time consuming. Further research led me to conclude that this process is neither complicated, nor time consuming. I managed to make the switch with about three extra steps. It took about a minute, but I am technologically challenged, and do not follow directions well.
Being absolutely beside myself I decided the students at WAC do not realize just how many trees are being destroyed due to their lack of consideration. Subsequent to a great deal of homework I discovered that there are about three thousand sheets of standard A4 paper per tree. I then set up the following statistics: there are approximately 300 seniors who all print say an average of 50 pages for their thesis, along with 100 pages in drafts and research articles etc. For those keeping score at home that amounts to 45 thousand pages, which is 15 trees; double sided printing reduces this number by half. So if every memeber of the senior class used double sided printing they alone could save eight trees. Not to mention every other student printing play scripts, power points, term papers, or other lengthy documents.
In addition, I found out that it requires 13 ounces of water to produce one sheet of paper. This is more liquid than is in a standard can of soda. Combine this with the above 45 thousand sheets of paper, and that is 585 thousand ouces of water, roughly 4, 570 gallons of water. This is enough water to fill an above-ground swimming pool that is 15 feet in circumference.
We all enjoy having unlimited free printing at the library. I myself often take advantage of it, but do everyone a favor, take the extra minute, change the print settings, save a few trees, and a great deal of water. It is not complicated, it does not hurt, and there are posters with directions for those who are computer illiterate such as myself. Also, if anyone is ambitious enough to install a thermostat in the library I would be grateful. This idea may seem far-fetched , but I think the librarians are responsible enough to regulate the temperature of the library.

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Food Crisis? What They're Not Saying

There’s a lot of discussion right now about an upcoming food crisis. A lot of the blame has been placed particularly on biofuels- if corn is used to produce ethanol for gasoline, it isn’t used as a food source, many claim. The debate about biofuels is grounded in legitimate concerns, as biofuels alone can never replace our current reliance on fossil fuels. There isn’t enough land on the planet to produce that volume of organic material.

However, it doesn’t hurt to look at where the vast majority of corn is actually going. Corn, along with the other grain crops (soybeans, wheat, barley, rye), makes up the vast majority of what we call conventional agriculture in the US, particularly here on the Eastern Shore. But those grains are not raised for people food (nor for biofuels). They are primarily fed to chickens.

All across the country, low-grade grain crops are raised explicitly for chickens, cows, and other livestock, who are fattened on the high protein grains just before they find their way to the store. The amount of grain it takes to produce a pound of beef could alternatively produce about 12 loaves of bread. The media (and most of the UN committees) claim we need to up food production in order to meet the crisis, but in reality, we are producing more than enough food, but using it inefficiently. Aside from feeding our grain crops to livestock, our biggest problem is distribution. People are starving because they have to buy food imported from elsewhere, which makes very little sense when you consider the places with the highest rates of starvation (developing countries) could largely support themselves agriculturally- if only those regions weren’t devoted to producing exports of their own. For a very, very long time (thousands of years) people have supported themselves on what they could grow in their own region, and got along fairly well doing so. Why does this make sense? Well, because it means people aren’t paying for both the food AND the shipping that brought it to them, and a few middle men along the way. They’re just paying for the food, or raising it themselves.

This isn’t the end all be all solution. There are many, many complex issues involved with agriculture (and I will likely post on them again). But I wanted to take this opportunity, as the weather warms, to point out that we have one solution to a global food crisis right here in Chestertown. And that is the weekly Chestertown Farmer’s Market. That’s right, if you want to support agriculture, farmers, and help prevent a food crisis right here on the Eastern Shore, all you have to do is take a trip down to the Farmer’s Market. Pick up some beautiful local asparagus. Sample something you may not be familiar with- a new type of lettuce, or something a little more exotic like bok choi. Meet your local growers, and learn something new. Best of all, keep your money right here, in the Eastern Shore economy, rather than seeing it paid out to some distant company that’s importing their tomatoes from South America and spending all their profits on shipping and advertisement. In turn, the people of South America can start growing food for themselves, rather than you- and maybe come a little closer to alleviating a worldwide crisis. Sound farfetched? Maybe. But we have to start somewhere, and when it gets down to it, the Eastern Shore tomatoes taste better anyway.

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Reduce Reuse Recycle... Rave?

Oh, my. Jimmy's Deposit Box: Take note.

Apparently the first ever eco-conscious club has opened in Britain. Apparently, by getting their groove on, visitors to the club will help generate electricity by means of spring powered coils in the floor. The club will also serve organic spirits and feature a recycled water system.

Now this is what I call green drinks.

I also have to say its one of the more innovative methods I've heard for alternative energy. I've long said we should hook the stationary bikes in the LFC up to some kind of energy producing system- with all the athletic teams in there burning calories, we should really be putting that energy right back into powering the building. While a night club might be a stretch for WC, and possibly for Chestertown, there must be other ways we can think outside the box. Maybe something to look into for Birthday Ball? Can that be our theme next year??? According to the owner of the club, "There is no greater platform than clubbing to reach out to young people." What WC is lacking, then, is a good rave.

If nothing else, our local bars could get further onto the eco-bandwagon by serving a higher percentage of local beers and wines, and organic spirits. To my knowledge, Andy's is in the lead, serving seasonal vegetables, local seafood, and hormone-free beef, as well as having a wide selection of Maryland region beers. Andy's is also your spot for Chestertown Green Drinks, the third Thursday of every month from September to May. You can find our schedule here. Just follow the links until you find Chestertown (US: Maryland: Chestertown).

You can find out more about the technology side here. You can also read a lot of... creative... suggestions for sustainability in the comments, including self-powered glow sticks. I'm not so sure glow sticks are something we need to keep around, as the goo that keeps them lit up is pretty toxic... but dream big, econauts, dream big.

And look out for upcoming lines of "green" club wear. Talk about getting your green on.

One more thing: the website for the club itself: www.club4climate.com. This is actually a little absurd, and kind of misses the point. But more on that later.

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