Welcome back for another quick look at some of the green news headlines from the past week. This edition features: awesome vacation destinations powered by renewable energy; Toyota surpasses 5 million hybrids sold milestone; New York City bike sharing members will have access to 6,000 bicycles; and reducing food waste for World Environment Day.
(photo: bluelagoon.com | Iceland)
Green Vacation Spots Powered By Renewable Energy. From Huffington Post: ?A major task for anyone taking a trip is finding the right accommodations. Luckily, for those of us who want to be Earth-friendly while on the road, this doesn?t have to mean trading a comfortable hotel bed for a tent. Whether you want to go completely off the grid while still retaining some luxuries and comforts or you simply want to make your travels as green as possible without too much sacrifice, these resorts and destinations, all powered by renewable energy, should be at the top of your list.? See the full slideshow of destinations here.
Toyota hybrid sales pass 5 million mark. From Reuters: ?Toyota Motor Corp has sold more than 5 million gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles as of the end of March since they first went on sale in 1997, the automaker said on Wednesday. Its Prius series accounted for about 70 percent of that, making it the most popular hybrid model in the automotive industry. Globally, Toyota sold 1.2 million hybrid vehicles in 2012, the first time it sold more than 1 million hybrids in a single year. Helped by government subsidies and tax incentives, about 17 percent of the vehicles sold in Japan in 2012 were hybrids. Toyota and Lexus, its luxury brand, sold 678,000 hybrids, accounting for three-quarters of the total hybrids sold. In the United States, Toyota sold about 327,000 hybrids. Hybrid accounted for roughly 3 percent of the total sales, with two of every three hybrids sold being a Toyota or Lexus. Toyota sold just 17,300 hybrids in China, the world?s biggest auto market, in 2012, accounting for about 2 percent of its total sales there.?
New York City?s Citibike bike-share starts selling annual memberships for $95. From Treehugger: ?New York City?s bike-sharing program is finally getting close to launching. Annual memberships for Citibike are now available, and the first 5,000 members will be considered ?founding members? and get some perks (though what exactly is still not clear). There are also discounted yearly memberships available for those who qualify (criteria here), and daily and weekly memberships for those who suffer from commitment anxiety. 6,000 bikes are expected to be deployed at 300 stations.? ?View the bike station map.
World Environment Day is June 6, 2013. Even though it?s not until June, we wanted to highlight the theme for this year?s World Environment Day straight from the United Nations Environment Programme:
?The theme for this year?s World Environment Day celebrations is Think.Eat.Save. Think.Eat.Save is an anti-food waste and food loss campaign that encourages you to reduce your foodprint. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), every year 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted. This is equivalent to the same amount produced in the whole of sub-Saharan Africa. At the same time, 1 in every 7 people in the world go to bed hungry and more than 20,000 children under the age of 5 die daily from hunger.
While the planet is struggling to provide us with enough resources to sustain its 7 billion people (growing to 9 billion by 2050), FAO estimates that a third of global food production is either wasted or lost. Food waste is an enormous drain on natural resources and a contributor to negative environmental impacts.
This year?s campaign rallies you to take action from your home and then witness the power of collective decisions you and others have made to reduce food waste, save money, minimise the environmental impact of food production and force food production processes to become more efficient.
If food is wasted, it means that all the resources and inputs used in the production of all the food are also lost. For example, it takes about 1,000 litres of water to produce 1 litre of milk and about 16,000 litres goes into a cow?s food to make a hamburger. The resulting greenhouse gas emissions from the cows themselves, and throughout the food supply chain, all end up in vain when we waste food.
In fact, the global food production occupies 25% of all habitable land and is responsible for 70% of fresh water consumption, 80% of deforestation, and 30% of greenhouse gas emissions. It is the largest single driver of biodiversity loss and land-use change.
Making informed decision therefore means, for example, that you purposefully select foods that have less of an environmental impact, such as organic foods that do not use chemicals in the production process. Choosing to buy locally can also mean that foods are not flown halfway across the world and therefore limit emissions.?
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