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My friend couldn’t be more environmentally if she tried! For a start her children wear the most beautiful organic hats when it is cold weather, I am sure that most of their other clothes are organic as well. I know that my friend makes sure that she always recycles everything that she can and will not use plastic bags, she always has plenty of reusable organic cotton bags with her so that she can use those instead of having to take a plastic one.

When she had a party in the summer I was really impressed that she managed to find disposable plates which were made from recycled material and even some biodegradable cups. It was fantastic how she made everything look so beautiful and the organic food was all really delicious, but then she has always been a great cook. I sometimes wonder how she manages to look after her family, keep a job going and look after the environment! I guess it gets easier as you practice more and get to understand more about what you should be doing to care for the environment then it probably becomes habit just to buy environmentally friendly products and recycle and reuse things wherever you can.

Older killer whales (Orcinus orca) nearing menopause are more successful in rearing their young, according to a study.

The research has shown that estimated survival rates for calves born to these older mothers were 10 percent higher than those for other calves.

For the research, Eric Ward from the Northwest Fisheries Science Center, Seattle, USA, and colleagues studied killer whales inhabiting the inland and nearshore waters of Washington state (USA) and British Columbia (Canada).

They used a 30-year dataset collected by the Center for Whale Research and Canada’’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

“During annual photographic surveys, nearly every individual in the population has been recorded. Each animal has unique pigmentation, scars, and fin shapes, allowing us to track the survival and reproductive performance of each female over time,” he said.

The study was aimed to investigate what benefits killer whales derive from the menopause.

One theory, termed the “attentive mother hypothesis”, is that giving birth to calves and then losing the ability to reproduce helps the mother to focus on bringing up her offspring, without wasting time and energy on further pregnancies.

The findings support the theory to an extent in that during a calf’’s first year of life, having a mother who was nearing menopause increased chances of survival.

Ward said: “We found that the oldest mothers may also be the best mothers. Older females may be more successful in raising young because of maternal experience, or they may allocate more effort to their offspring relative to younger females”.

The study is published in BioMed Central’’s open access journal Frontiers in Zoology.

Marquees in New York City’s Broadway theater district will go “green” this year as part of a plan to save energy and the environment.

Broadway’s “Great White Way,” nicknamed for the many marquee and billboard lights that flood the theater district with light, will soon be the “Great Green Way,” New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said at a news conference at the Eugene O’Neill Theater to launch the initiative.

“By this time next year, the lights on Broadway will burn just as bright, but the energy bills and our city’s carbon output will be lower,” Bloomberg said.

Already, 10 Broadway theaters have changed 10,000 exterior and interior bulbs to more energy efficient compact fluorescent bulbs as part of the initiative organized by the mayor, the Broadway League and the National Resources Defense Council.

Broadway theaters plan to do everything from washing their costumes in cold water to producing and disposing of sets in a more environmentally friendly way to lower the theater industry’s carbon footprint, organizers said.

Several characters from Broadway shows made cameo appearances in support of the plan to lower carbon emissions.

“Higher… bad! Lower… good!” roared the character “Monster” from the Broadway musical “Young Frankenstein,” who appeared with “Avenue Q’s” Nicky and “Wicked’s” Elphaba.

Broadway shows are a major attraction for visitors to New York City and shows sold 12.27 million tickets in the 2007-2008 season, contributing $5.1 billion to the city’s economy and supporting 44,000 local jobs, according to the mayor’s office.

A future of all-electric cars coasting along streets and highways may be illusory, given that their range may be cut in half by aggressive drivers speeding along with the air conditioning blasting, US scientists said on Monday.

That may not be a bad thing, as it will persuade consumers to choose the best blend of electric- and gas-powered hybrid vehicle to suit the type of driving they do.

“Ideally, everybody wants an electric vehicle. Realistically, from a cost point of view, what is the solution that allows you to go mass market? How can the customers save money?” said Aymeric Rousseau, who analyses such problems at Argonne National Laboratory, a government-funded research center hosting a conference on lithium battery technology.

Rousseau is working with the US Environmental Protection Agency to offer realistic appraisals of the likely range of the next generation of plug-in electric vehicles like General Motors’ Volt.

Rousseau previously helped the agency lop 10 percent or more off of promised miles-per-gallon estimates on existing gas-powered vehicles, which were posted on 2008 models.

The goal is to promise drivers of a lithium-ion battery equipped electric hybrid vehicle a 40-mile range on one charge, but that may be a gross exaggeration, he said.

Aggressive driving — faster acceleration and driving at faster speeds — may cut that range to between 28 and 32 miles. Using the air conditioning may reduce the vehicle’s range to around 15 to 20 miles, he said.

In response, the vehicle’s gas-powered engine will kick in two or three times during an excursion, which actually is a cost-effective response and will help extend the life of the battery, Rousseau explained.

People who drive on city streets and need travel only a few miles can use battery-only power. Those who have a longer commute at high speeds — or who drive aggressively with the air conditioning on — may want a smaller battery to improve the vehicle’s overall efficiency, Rousseau said.

For different types of trips, renting a different type of hybrid vehicle may be most efficient, he said.

Another Argonne researcher told the conference a highly efficient diesel engine was much more cost-effective for highway driving than a hybrid vehicle with a lithium battery, based on the current cost of fuel and electricity. But the hybrid would beat the diesel vehicle in city driving.

Another variable to consider is the cost of making batteries.

With nickel hydride batteries now in vogue in such hybrids as Toyota’s Prius, nickel prices have risen sharply. That has made lithium-ion batteries, which are a more promising technology because they can hold more power in a more compact space and have other advantages, more enticing as an alternative. Of course, lithium is likely to rise in price if it is used for vehicle batteries as well as laptop batteries, Rousseau said.

“There is no single silver bullet,” he said on the sidelines of the conference. “There is not one technology that will be best for everybody. Our goal is to understand how people drive, and depending on how they drive, what is the impact of one technology or another, from a fuel efficiency point of view, and a cost point of view.”

Mayor Boris Johnson unveiled a plan on Friday to help London tackle the challenge of climate change with less carbon dioxide, more trees, better drainage and increased water efficiency.

Some 15 percent of London is deemed at high risk from flooding due to global warming — an area including 1.25 million people, 480,000 properties, 441 schools, 75 underground and rail stations, 10 hospitals and one airport.

At stake is an estimated 160 billion pounds ($293 billion) worth of assets, not just in London and its vital financial district, but all along the banks of the Thames estuary where vast new housing developments are being planned.

“We need to concentrate efforts to slash carbon emissions and become more energy efficient in order to prevent dangerous climate change,” Johnson told reporters at the iconic Thames Barrier flood defense system.

“The strategy I am launching today outlines in detail the range of weather conditions facing London, which could both seriously threaten our quality of life — particularly that of the most vulnerable people — and endanger our pre-eminence as one of the world’s leading cities.”

Global warming is expected to give London and its surrounding area longer, hotter summers as well as warmer wetter winters with the added problems of more frequent heat waves, droughts and flash floods from rising sea levels and downpours.

Some 600 Londoners died as a result of the 2003 heat wave that killed about 15,000 in France alone, while low rainfall in 2004/05 led to water shortages in the capital.

The plan, which builds on Johnson’s predecessor Ken Livingstone’s aim to cut London’s carbon emissions by 60 percent by 2025, is to help the city prevent climate change, prepare for its consequences and recover from its effects.

“London is not unique — all major cities such as New York and Tokyo are at risk from climate change. By producing this strategy, we put London in a position of strength,” Johnson said.

He wants more trees to be planted around the city both to absorb excess rainwater and offer more shade from heat waves.

Areas of the city at high risk of flooding must be identified and protected and the Victorian-era drainage system, which cannot cope with torrential downpours, must be extended and improved.

But water shortages are also a potential problem — the London area has less water availability per head than Morocco — and water usage is above the national average.

Johnson’s plan calls for compulsory water metering which has been shown to cut consumption by up to 10 percent, homes to be made more water efficient and greater use to be made of rainwater harvesting.

It also calls for urban designs that can cope with rising temperatures in a city whose centre is already on average significantly hotter than the surrounding area.

Tibetan antelope, popularly known as Chiru, blue sheep, wild Yak and many other rare and threatened species in the high-altitude Himalayan region have greater hope of survival with wildlife experts and armed forces joining hands for their conservation.

A research project has been initiated by Wildlife Institute of India (WII) in collaboration with forest department of Jammu and Kashmir, ITBP and Army in Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary’s Changchenmo valley in Ladakh to identify threats and management issues for the survival of these animals.

The idea is also to study the habitat characteristics and seasonal movement patterns of these ungulates which are on the verge of extinction due to massive destruction of their habitat and hunting by poachers.

For instance, wild Yak presently exists only in the Changchenmo valley in Ladakh in the entire Himalayas and are rarely sighted says K Sankar, senior scientist at the Dehradun-based WII who along with his colleague GS Rawat has undertaken the four-year-study.

In other areas in Himalayas, the bulky animals who weigh about 1,000 kgs and have long black hair with curved horns on their head are domesticated and their breed is not pure.

“The wild gene of yak is thus very important for future genetic studies for diseases resistance etc. The study aims to evolve a long-term population and habitat monitoring protocol for Yak as other fauna in the region,” says Sankar.

Since army and paramilitary forces personnel are always on patrol in inaccessible mountain terrain where temperature plummets to as low as minus 40C during winter, they can do the job better then any wildlife expert, explains Sankar.

Arctic Ocean sea ice has melted to the second lowest minimum since satellite observations began, according to scientists at the US National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Sea ice had melted recorded on Monday exceeded the low recorded in 2005, which had held second place. With several weeks left in the melt season, ice in summer 2008 has a chance to diminish below the record low set last year, according to scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Environmental groups said the ice melt was another alarm bell warning of global warming. “It’s an unfortunate sign that climate change is coming rapidly to the Arctic and that we really need to address the issue of global warming on a national level,” said Christopher Krenz, Arctic project manager for Oceana.

“This is not surprising but it is alarming,” said Deborah Williams, a former Interior Department special assistant for Alaska. “This was a relatively cool summer, and to have ice decrease to the second lowest minimum on record demonstrates that global warming’s ongoing impact is profound.”

The National Snow and Ice Data Center, based at the University of Colorado, reported the ice Monday melted below the 2005 minimum of 5.3 million square kilometers set on September 21 that year. Exact figures will be released on Wednesday.

Through the beginning of the melt season in May until early August, daily ice extent for 2008 closely tracked the values for 2005, the center said.

In early August 2005, the decline began to slow. In August 2008, however, the decline has remained steadily downward at a brisk pace.

“Samantha Who?” star Christina Applegate, 36, is free of cancer after having both breasts removed to combat the disease, the actress told a U.S. television news show on Tuesday.Applegate, who revealed her diagnosis for breast cancer earlier this month, had the double mastectomy performed a month after her diagnosis, she said on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

The actress, who stars on the ABC sitcom “Samantha Who?,” said she bore a genetic risk for developing breast cancer, and she said her surgery was meant to prevent the cancer she suffered in one breast from coming back. But she said it was difficult to have both breasts surgically removed.

“Sometimes, you know, I cry,” Applegate said. “And sometimes I scream. And I get really angry. And I get really upset, you know, into wallowing in self-pity sometimes. And I think it’s all part of the healing.”

Applegate also talked about her mother, Nancy Priddy, who survived breast cancer and helped support the film and TV star in battling cancer.

“She’s been sort of this quiet warrior in the back and has been a great support, and just telling me that I was going to be OK. And I knew I was going to be OK. I’ve watched her,” Applegate said.

In the interview with ABC, Applegate said she will have reconstructive surgery on her breasts in coming months, and she showed fans that her sense of humor has remained intact.

“I’m going to have cute boobs ’til I’m 90,” she said.

The California-born Applegate rose to fame playing a ditzy daughter on the Fox network’s bawdy family sitcom “Married … With Children,” and since then has starred in several movies and TV shows.

She won an Emmy, U.S. television’s top honor, for a guest role on “Friends,” and was Emmy-nominated for “Samantha Who?” playing an amnesiac trying to put her life back together.

Applegate told “Good Morning America” she is starting a charitable foundation to help women meet the costs of MRI exams, which is how her disease was discovered.

The actress also will appear on upcoming TV fundraiser “Stand Up to Cancer” singing alongside Mariah Carey, Beyonce and Sheryl Crow, who also has battled breast cancer.

This is an assignment my lecturer gave me. I would like to hear out your opinions. If you have a website about it, please share it with me.

I believe in personal action. It is much easier to lead people by example. I’ve made many changes in my life that benifit the planet and I share my experience with others. I let them know that my changes create a healthier life for my family and most save me money. Without telling others what they should do, they have made changes in their lives and love to let me know what they are doing.

I’ve had freinds adjust thermostats, buy more fuel efficient cars, install a variety of energy efficient items in their homes, change cleaning products to natural non toxic, and my favorite: my hair stylist has changed her entire retail line to eco friendly companies.

My inspiration has been “The Green Book”. I’ve read many others, but this seems to be a very common sense approach.

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There are a lot of people who say they want to save money not the earth.. Well if you go green you will save money and no longer be dependent on the oil companies for survival (filthy rich bast@!#$). The earth will bounce back from almost anything we do to it but we won’t. So they may not want to save the planet but what about themselves?
Good luck you may not change their mind but maybe you can get them to look at things in a different way.

…from being destroyed by others?

yes and no,to restore an area yes.if to rob/steal legally fished or hunted areas then NO.

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yeah i do because something needs to be done to save our planet.
for my birthday i actually got half and acre of rainforest from coolearth to stop it being cut down. i believe i have made a difference no matter how small