Green Book of the week: Catch the Wind by Anne Johnson (and a giveaway!)

Today we review a green book that is presenting kids with the fascinating world of wind energy!

Our book is:

Catch the Wind (Discover Renewables)

Author: the folks at Mortenson Construction

Mortenson is a 54-year old family construction business that started building wind energy projects in 1995 and is now a leading builder and design-builder of wind power facilities in North America. This book is an effort to share our collective knowledge of this rapidly growing industry.

Illustrator: Shawn McCann

Publisher: Beaver Pond Press

Published on: October 2008

Ages: 4-8

What this book is about? (from publisher's website)

The notion of “green” has become a hot topic — and rightly so. Future generations deserve to live in a world that is in the same condition, if not better, than it is today. Wind farms are impacting our environment in an extraordinarily positive way. They produce clean, renewable energy that helps maintain air quality, preserves natural gas and reduces our dependency on traditional energy sources.

The creation of this book began with teacher requested wind energy materials for students. Educators are beginning to see science standards including content on renewable energy. There is a growing desire to learn about clean energy. So why not use our knowledge as a leading builder of wind farms to educate children about this growing industry?

Catch the Wind takes readers on a journey that will teach them about wind energy and the importance of making environmentally responsible choices. It was developed with input from educators and experts from within the wind industry. Children can follow Nels, an inquisitive boy, as he visits a wind farm with his father to discover the power of the wind. Diagrams of wind turbines and their components as well as key terms, defined in a glossary, make up the educational content of Catch the Wind. While exploring topics such as renewable energy, the history of wind power, and the steps to building a wind farm, Catch the Wind also raises awareness of wind power as a viable source of clean, renewable energy.

This book is a nonprofit effort courtesy of Mortenson Construction. Proceeds will be donated to nonprofit entities promoting the development and use of renewable energies.

What we think about it?

This book is a great resource for any kid who want to better understand wind energy. Actually, I believe many adults who will enjoy the story and learn from it as well.

We hear everyday news about renewable energy (here's an example from yesterday - U.S. Wind Capacity Grew by 10,000 MW), but how much do we really know about these new clean alternatives? and how much the new generation knows about them? With the growing use of clean energy, there's a greater need in effective educational tools that will provide basic information about clean energy. This book is definitely one them.

With its clear explanations, beautiful illustrations, photos, and of course a fun story, the book makes it very easy to understand wind energy, even for kids (and adults) who are not interested in "technical" stuff. Although this book is an imitative of a wind power company, it's far from being a commercial book and I think Mortenson deserve kudos for their initiative (it's also a nonprofit effort, where all the proceeds are donated to nonprofit entities). We can only hope to have similar books for kids on solar, geothermal, energy efficiency and other clean energy resources.

Bottom Line: If you're interested to teach your kids on wind energy, this is your book!

Disclosure: We received a copy of this book from the author.

GIVEAWAY ALERT!!

We're giving away two copies of the book, courtesy of the author, and of course a tree will be planted for the copy!

How you can win? Please add a comment below with an answer the following question: How do you introduce kids to renewable energy? We'll be happy to hear your personal experiences. Submissions are accepted until next Thursday, April 16, 12PM EST. The two winners will be announced the following day.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Love to help the world become a better place by choosing a green hosting?

Today we have two interesting guest posts. The first one is about choosing a green hosting.

Just trying to look for a good and reliable free web hosting provider could already be a tough challenge since not all fits the criteria of being reliable enough for your website. It’s true that there are still reliable web hosting providers around to choose from. But wouldn’t it be better if you get to find a good web host and be able to help our world become a better place at the same time. It would feel great to do your part on fighting the global climate change just by simply supporting web hosting that uses wind or solar-powered servers, wouldn’t it?

How do wind-powered servers help?

Well, hosting companies have data centers to manage and house their hosting equipments and servers. Web servers that are used in web hosting produce carbon emissions. With that being said, it contributes to the damage that our environment has been getting. And since Doteasy have many customers that also mean more servers are needed and thus more carbon emissions, they came to a decision to make a good change. This is by using wind-powered servers which helps to reduce the negative impact to our environment.

So if you’re looking for a web hosting provider, you might want to consider basing your decision on what also helps our environment by choosing a green web servers. Don’t just listen, be a part of the solution for our environment.

Doteasy is one of the best domain name registrar and web hosting firms around. But aside from just being one of the best reliable providers, they decided to be a part of the solution for the climate change problem. All their web servers from free web hosting to unlimited web hosting are now wind-powered. Not only that they provide satisfaction for all their customers with their great offers, but now they also help keeping our world a better place by becoming a part of the green web hosting industry.

We have a winner on our giveaway of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Renewable Energy for Your Home"

We had a giveaway of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Renewable Energy for Your Home" following the book's review last week.

We asked you to share with us what renewable energy system you would like to have at home and learned that most of you are interested (not surprisingly) in having solar panels. And we have a winner!

The winner of the giveaway is reader nfmgirl who wants it all, as she explains in her comment:

I always wanted a variety. I wanted to have a place out in the "boonies", and have some solar, some wind (a small windmill, not one of those monsters that explode bats lungs), and a water wheel. I want it all!

Congrats to nfmgirl and thanks to all the other participants. If you didn't win this time, don't worry - you'll have another chance to win a great green book in our next giveaway which will be online later on today.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: promoting green reading!

Green book review (and giveaway!): The Complete Idiot's Guide to Renewable Energy for Your Home

Our weekly green book review has moved this week to Tuesday because of technical problems yesterday. Still, it was worth waiting because we have a great book dealing with one of the hottest issues on the green agenda - renewable energy for homes.

Our book today is:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Renewable Energy for Your Home

Author: Harvey Bryan and Brita Belli

Harvey Bryan has been involved in sustainability and renewable design concerns for some 30 years. He has previously taught at MIT and Harvard and is currently a full professor at Arizona State University. He was on the Board of Directors of the Arizona Chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council and is certified in both BREEAM (a rating system used in Europe and Canada), as well as LEED. He is currently serving on the Board of Directors on the Green Building Initiative.

Brita Belli is the editor of E / The Environmental Magazine, the largest independent magazine dedicated to green issues.

Publisher: Alpha (a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.)

Published on: July 2009

What this book is about? (from the publisher's website)
An essential how-to on powering your home with sun, wind, water, and more.
For readers wanting to save money—and the planet—by using alternative energy, this book provides everything they need to know. The five basic sources are fully covered: sun, wind, water, earth, and bio.

The benefits, what is needed, and whether it will work for a particular home are all carefully laid out in this comprehensive overview:
• Solar energy for home heating, water heating, and electricity
• Wind power, hydrogen, and micro hydro power
• Heat pumps—air, geothermal, and water source
• Heating with wood and going bio

What we think about it?
Everyone knows renewable energy is good in general and for your home specifically and that it's good for the environment and for your wallet. But what's next? what do you do if you actually decided to move forward and green up your existing or new home with renewable energy devices? That's where this book becomes handy.

There's so much information available about solar, wind, hydropower and other alternative energy sources that you can very easily find yourself more confused and less confident in what you actually need to do. "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Renewable Energy for Your Home" is trying to make some order in this flood of information and to provide you a guidance that covers all the relevant aspects of choosing and using renewable energy systems at home.

And it does a pretty good job. It gives clear explanations on the options, the benefits, compare between options and even helps you to understand ratings of systems such as solar water heating systems.

The book includes updated information on one of the important issues involved in purchasing a renewable energy system - the benefits you can - tax credits, rebates, etc. There's also information divided to areas as the benefits in Florida are not similar to the ones in the Midwest.

Another important chapter I was glad to see in this book is "Size Matters" that reminds us that one of the sources of the energy problem we have is not only the current sources of energy but the size of the houses, which increased in 140% in the last 4 decades (2,349 square feet in average in the US - 2004 figures).

Bottom line: If you're thinking about getting a renewable energy system for your home, get this book! It may be a little too heavy for the beach but if you find a cool spot take it with you.

GIVEAWAY ALERT!!

We're giving away our review copy of the book, courtesy of the book's publicist, and of course a tree will be planted for the copy!

How you can win? Please add a comment below with an answer the following question: What renewable energy system you would like to have at home? Submissions are accepted until Tuesday, August 25, 12PM EST. The winner will be announced the following day.

If you're looking for other interesting green-themed books, you are invited to check out our green books page on Eco-Libris website's green resources section.

More relevant links:

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Green Building and Remodeling

Green Building & Remodeling for Dummies

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: plant a tree for every book you read!

Half Price Books is going green with full wind power!

More green news from booksellers: Environmental Leader reported that Half Price Books, a new and used bookstore chain, signed an agreement with Green Mountain Energy to power 30 stores and other facilities in Texas with 100% wind power for the next 3 years.

Half Price Books, the nation’s largest family-owned new and used bookstore chain, will be purchasing about 11.3 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of wind power annually from the renewable energy provider.

This move according to the Houston Business Journal, earned commendation from the EPA after Half Price Books’ purchase ranked fourth on the list of largest renewable energy retail power purchases in Texas, behind Whole Foods, FedEx Office and H-E-B Grocery Co. In addition to wind power, Green Mountain Energy Company also offers a choice of carbon offset products through its BeGreen division.

This is by all means a very bold move - by purchasing 11.3 million kWh of wind power, Half Price Books will offset estimated 15 million pounds of carbon dioxide, the equivalent of planting 901,000 trees or recycling 6 million pounds of newspaper.

“Half Price Books has long been a supporter of the environment, even going so far as to include ‘be kind to the environment’ in its official mission statement,” said Kathy Doyle Thomas, executive vice president of Half Price Books on the joint press release of Half Priced Books and Green Mountain Energy. “Making the switch to Green Mountain just made sense to us in order to continue to do what we can to help the environment.”

If you look at their Environment web page you can understand what Doyle Thomas is talking about. Just look at the first paragraph:

"Helping the environment by preserving and recycling resources is part of our daily business. At Half Price Books we feel that everyone can help preserve the environment. Trees recycle water, oxygen and carbon dioxide. This helps to reduce soil erosion, air pollution and flooding. Recycling paper also helps the environment by saving energy and water, as less energy and water is used by reprocessing already processed paper, rather than virgin pulp."

Kudos to Half Price Books. Now not only they will support the environment by selling reused books, maximizing the usage of printed books and saving resources, but they will also give a great example to the commitment to clean energy we wish many other retailers would do.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris
www.ecolibris.net