Unite

The collection of December 07 photographs by photographer Chris Jordan, titled An American Self-Portrait, incredibly eye-opening for anyone who has not seen them. Just link over to the global intelligencer to see for yourself. Images included are:

- Two milion plastic bottles (used every five minute in US)

- 1.14 million paper bags (used every hour in US).

- 426,000 cell phones (disposed every day in US)

- 15 million sheets of paper (used every five minutes in US)

- 106,000 aluminum cans (used every 30 seconds in US)

There is more too. Please note that these figures are the ones listed alongside the photographs themselves. I wonder if those figures have gone up or down since 2007, what do you think?

An astounding 78 percent of voters, surveyed in post-election polls, believe investing in green technologies is needed in order to revitalize our broken economy. Many of those polled in the survey also claimed that global warming needed to be an area of great focus for this new U.S. administration. There was much support among the youngest voters, and that helps ensure that education and awareness is running strong with the generation of people who have the most at stake. Now we need to follow through on this! You can read more about the post-election poll at Zogby International.

Green Groove is very excited to promote the National Recycling Coalition's "America Recycles Day" this November 15th. There couldn't be a better way for Green Groove participants to be a part of this great day than by going to their website to take the pledge. If you are making progress on your goals, and need to ratchet things up a notch, don't miss out on this opportunity to educate yourself on the importance of recycling. Get involved, do it, go now - http://www.nrc-recycle.org/americarecycles.aspx

This looks like it could be a real win for a greener Earth. What a historic moment. Now we have a job that starts right now... making sure the change we were promised comes swiftly. No more excuses, if there was ever a time to act, it is now, why we have a chance at getting some real policies changed in government. "Spartans! This is where we fight!"

There is no question that politics, and this year's U.S. presidential election, will play a very important role in shaping the policies that help save our planet from catastrophic climate change. Make sure your voice is heard. Go vote in favor of the candidate you think will help promote a greener future. Go vote! This is one of the very rare opportunities Green Groove will actually allow a regular plan goal to be substituted with this very simple, yet crucial, time-sensitive goal. Vote on or before Tuesday, November 4th, and feel free to swap that with your regularly scheduled goal. Also, please let us know who you voted for, and why, right on the Green Groove Unite blog post.

Now, we don't want to exclude young Green Groove participants, and those who may be citizens of other countries, so we have something for you too. If you are ineligible to vote in the United States, you may take this as an opportunity to share with your friends and family the importance of making one's voice heard.

By the way, congratulations to all of the Green Groove particpants who have made a stand and begun to conduct a phased withdrawal on catastrophic climate change! Hopefully it has been a enlightening, and fun, experience. Thanks!

Good 50x70 has a web page listing their 2008 poster entries for the global warming category (just click on the Good 50x70 link to go directly to the gallery). Not sure how long it has been up, and if this is old news, but thought it was worth writing a post on it anyway. It is very easy to slip into the green mindset that taking care of yourself, and the planet, is only the common sense thing to do, but we have to remember that there are actually high stakes involved in ignoring global warming. Viewing some of the poster entries are pretty good reminders that serious issues such as rising sea waters, extinction of various species of animals, and the fate of mankind are all at risk if we fail to act. A big THANK YOU goes out to all the Green Groove participants.

The challenge was developed to inspire the next president of the United States to take action on global warming. Currently there have been more than 100 submissions, and the judges are narrowing down the winners from the remaining sixteen finalists. Tuesday, the winners will be announced on Brighter Planet's Vimeo Channel.

The winning videos will be on national tv, and distributed to Congress and the presidential candidates. Let's hope they watch them! Click on the continue reading link below to see one of my favorite videos.

New ad released by www.techforobama.com points out reasons why it is important to cast your vote in favor Obama/Biden when it comes to media, telecommunications, and network neutrality. In the add the arguement is made that not only are telecommunication laws at stake, but by backing innovation and new technological ideas the democratic candidate (Obama) will help push the economy into the future. You can view the add by clicking continue below.

ABC, CBS, and CNN all ran ads from the oil and coal lobby last night after the second presidential debate, but nowhere did you see the latest "'we' can solve the climate crisis" ad put out by wecansolveit.org. In fact, "we" hasn't even been able to get a response from ABC as to why they won't air the ad. You can take action, and hopefully get ABC to run the ad this Friday during 20/20, by going to the petition page to let ABC know that you expect to see it during the airing.

If you'd like to view the add, please click continue below this article to see the ad for yourself.

Rocket scientist, Alberto Behar, recently released 90 rubber bathtub ducks into Greenland's Jakobshavn glacier in an attempt to track their movement toward Baffin Bay. Since the water that travels below the glacier acts as a lubricant to help move the ice toward the ocean, much can be learned from the rubber duck experiment that wouldn't be possible by simply studying the surface. For the time being, the researcher will sit back and wait for any email responses from anyone lucky enough to stumble upon one of the ducks. Learn more by reading the article in USA Today.