Green book review for the holidays - part 1: The book you should bring to parents

Today we start a new holidays series - in the next two weeks, we will review here green books that not only are interesting and focusing on green issues, but can also be great gifts on for the holidays!

Each book will be dedicated to another group and we start today with a group I'm proud to be part of for the last 18 months - parents. And the green book we're recommending to give to parents is:

The Looking Book

Author: P.K. Hallinan
P. K. Hallinan has been writing and illustrating books for children since his wife first asked him to create one for their boys more than 35 years ago. Today, P. K. writes inspirational stories about holidays, relationships, and life values. His book, Let's Be Kind, was chosen by Focus on the Family as a top 10 family-friendly picture book. P. K. has over 100 titles to his credit, with more than eight million copies sold. In addition to his writing, P. K. is an ordained minister and a well-known school speaker.

Illustrator: Patrice Barton
Patrice Barton's artistic talents were first discovered at age three, when she was found creating a mural on the dining room wall with a pastry brush and a can of Crisco. Her interest and passion in art grew as she did, and she earned a BFA in Studio Art from the University of Texas. She has been working as an illustrator ever since.

Publisher: Ideals Children's Books

Published on: October 2009

What this book is about? The Looking Book tells the story of Kenny and Mikey, two young boys each given a pair of "lookers" by their mom. "Lookers" are special glasses, she says, to help you see the world like never before. The ordinary transforms into the fantastical, as the boys see with greater clarity the wonders they overlook everyday.

As the boys discover the fun of the outdoors, Hallinan imparts a well-timed message to a generation of "digital natives." Once outside, they are captivated by the trees, grass and even ants, seeing them like never before. Thy find a ladybug and butterfly with their "lookers" and think they are even cooler than the ones in cartoons. Eventually, the boys realize that they don't even need their "lookers" to enjoy the world outside.

Why it's a great holiday gift for parents?
I think there is almost no parent out there who doesn't deal with the problem that kids nowadays prefer to stay at home, usually in front of the computer or the TV, instead of playing outside. Now, research suggests that playtime may be as important to a child's academic experience as spelling tests or problem solving, but I also think there is an important "green" added value for this kind of experience. When nature is no stranger to a kid, then I believe she or he will grow up to be more sensitive and caring about nature and the environment.

When kids learn about it only through the virtual world, there's a good chance they won't be able to recognize all the richness and the beauty we have around us and hence won't be that concerned about protecting and supporting mother earth.

The lively rhyming with the beautiful illustrations making this book both educational and fun and can actually help parents in what some may see as mission (almost) impossible - getting children to open the door, go outside, play and enjoy in the wonders of the world around them.

Price: $12.74

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

And don't forget that if you're buying a green book, you can even make your gift greener by adding our holidays special offer to it - trees/stickers and a beautiful holidays gift card made of recycled paper. For further information, please go to www.ecolibris.net/holidays.asp

GIVEAWAY ALERT!!

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

How you can win? Please add a comment below and share with us your experience on what's the best way to get children to play outside. Submissions are accepted until Friday, December 18, 12PM EST. The winner will be announced the following day.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Help SHI win up to $1 million for with just a few clicks on FaceBook!

Sustainable Harvest International (SHI) are one of our three planting partners that does an important work in Central America, providing farming families there with the training and tools to overcome poverty while restoring our planet''s tropical forests.

And now you can help them to win up to $1 million in a Facebook-based contest of Chase Community Giving. It's really simple - just a couple of clicks and it can really help this great organization, so I hope you'll find the time and vote for them. And don't forget tomorrow is the last day you can vote!

How do you do it and how important is it to SHI? you can read about it in the message below sent from Florence Reed, the founder and president of SHI:

A minute or two of your time might just make the difference for Sustainable Harvest International in winning up to $1 million in the Facebook-based Chase Community Giving Contest. And we could really use this miracle right now as several of our biggest donors find that they cannot donate what we expected from them this month.

Facebook users can cast a vote - no later than December 11^th - for Sustainable Harvest International as we compete for the Chase prize.

If you’re not already on Facebook, this might be a good time to join or you can forward this email to your friends who might be on FaceBook. If you are already a member, please take a few seconds to cast your vote for Sustainable Harvest International in the Chase Community Giving Contest on Facebook!

Quick and easy steps to casting your vote for Sustainable Harvest International:
1. Visit the <<Chase Community Giving>> site ( http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/707760)

2. Search for “Sustainable Harvest International.”

3. Sign-in to your Facebook account.

4. Click “Allow.”

5. Click the “Vote for Charity” button.

6. Become a fan.

7. Post to your profile

Once you’ve cast your vote, be sure to tell your friends to do the same! The only way for us to win is if all of you vote for us and get a number of your friends to vote for us and tell their friends

In the Chase Contest, the nonprofit with the most votes by December 11th wins $1 million, the top five runners-up win $100,000, and the top 100 thereafter win $25,000! Together we have a real chance to add needed support to our environmental and humanitarian projects abroad in Central America. Thank you for your time and caring!

Thanks,
Flo

Florence Reed, Sustainable Harvest International , www.sustainableharvest.org
Planting Hope, Restoring Forests, Nourishing Communities

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: promoting sustainable reading!

ForestEthics is releasing its annual Naughty / Nice list of companies in the direct mailing industry

An irritating byproduct of the holidays season is the growth in junk mail. So much waste of paper that in the best scenario will go directly to the recycling bin and in many cases will just end up in the landfill.

Some companies are better of course than the others, but how can we know who is good and who is bad?

Well, fortunately ForestEthics comes to our help (like they do every year) with their annual Direct Mail Industry Scorecard that grades companies according to their paper choices and the steps they're taking to minimize their direct mail's footprint. The report includes 3 grades: Nice, Checking Twice and Naughty. As you can imagine, naughty is the worst among the three.

The grades were given according to four criteria: whether or not Endangered Forests are cut to produce the company’s catalogs; whether the company uses Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-certified paper; the amount of post-consumer recycled content in the company’s direct mailings; and the company’s efforts to reduce overall paper consumption.

This is the forth year this scoreboard is published, so you can also compare the results to the last couple of years. And the results are definitely encouraging - there are more ‘nice’ companies (12 this year comparing to 10 last year) who are taking concrete steps to ensure that their paper choices don’t endanger precious wildlife, and don’t destroy intact Boreal Forest. The naughty list also got shorter with 5 companies this year comparing to 7 last year.

So, who's Nice? at the top of the list you'll find companies that you definitely expect to find there such as Patagonia (using the highest percentage of post-consumer recycled content in all the land) and Timberland (stopped printing catalogs altogether!). You can also find there some less expected names like Victoria's Secrets (I saw they got the same grade last year, so apparently it's not such a surprise). Also on the top of the list Macy’s/Bloomingdale’s who followed up their phase-out of Bloomingdales’ catalog by increasing post-consumer recycled content from 10% to 30%.

And who's on the bottom? five companies got the Naughty grade: Sears, Neiman Marcus, Eddie Bauer, Citi and Chase.

I was surprised to see Citi on the list, as they just recently won the "Most Innovative Bank in Climate Change" Award From The Banker Magazine, and on their press release about it you could read a quote from Sandip Sen, Head of Citi's Alternative Energy Group, saying "Citi has been a leader in environmental sustainability for eight years". Well, it seems like their Naughty grade is a result of the bank's refusal to reply to ForestEthics' questions. If the bank is a leader as it claims to be, I see no reason why it won't cooperate with ForestEethics and share its policy paper with them. I'm sure Mr. Sen would agree with me here.

Thanks to ForestEthics and the great job they're doing. I'm sure this report is not only a way to make companies' paper policies more transparent, but also an effective tool to pressure them to improve their practices, as we can see from the improved results presented this year.

The Direct Mail Industry Scorecard is available at http://forestethics.org/downloads/naughtynicelist2009_Ultimate.pdf (2008 scoreboard can be found here)

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Check out our holidays special offer!

Special gift at Strand for the holidays season!

We always say that a good book is a great gift for the holidays season - unique, personal and affordable. And if you buy your books at Strand, you can also get a great gift for yourself with the free holiday tote bag they give for every purchase of $50 or more, online or in-store.

This is a great green offer from Strand and of course not the only one they make - Strand, New York's independent landmark book store, is taking part in our bookstore program and customers at the store can plant a tree for every book they buy there and receive our sticker at the counter!

This beautiful tote bag (see above) was designed by Strand Art Staffer Tyler Combs and features an illustration of books. The offer expires on January 3rd and limited to one tote bag per customer.

Don't forget to check out their website at http://www.strandbooks.com to learn more about the books offered at the store. You're also welcome to take a look at their events list at www.strandbooks.com/calendar

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainble reading!

Everything you always wanted to know about forestry carbon credits - A special interview with Paulo Lopes of Carbon Clear

Today the U.N. Climate Change Summit (COP15) gets underway and no matter how optimistic you are about these talks, I think it's an exciting day and I hope the last day will be even more exciting!

One of the issues that will be brought up during these talks is the REDD mechanism, which is supposed to provide monetary incentives to prevent deforestation. We covered this issue several times in the last couple of month (see our 3-part series on the potential and risks of forest-based carbon credits).

Today, just in time for the Copenhagen talks, we have an interview with Paulo Lopes, a Carbon Management Consultant at Carbon Clear, who holds Msc in Environmental Technology at Imperial College London and did his thesis on forestry carbon standards. Paulo is one of the most knowledgeable persons I know on forestry based carbon credits and we thank him for the opportunity to get a better understanding of one of the most interesting issues to be discussed in Copenhagen in the next 12 days.

Hello Paulo. You did your Master's Thesis about Forestry carbon standards (“Review of Forestry Carbon Standards – Development of a tool for organizations to identify the most appropriate carbon credit") - what brought you to write about this issue?
My masters degree had a large focus on climate change policy and the carbon market. To gain a deeper understanding I decided to work with Carbon Clear as a Forest Carbon Offset Analyst and learn from their knowledge and experience.

One would think that all carbon credits are the same, but they are like any other product whereby quality influences price. While researching forestry projects to invest in, I came across a range of carbon credits coming from a multitude of different forestry standards.

This can be confusing, even for people working in the sector. As there were only a limited number of independent reviews about the standards available, I decided to do a research and comparative study of all the forestry standards that are up and running in the world. This helps to understand what makes them different from each other and most importantly which standards are validating high quality carbon credits.

What is the biggest problem we have right now with forestry carbon credits and how it can be solved?
At the moment, the biggest problem is that only tree planting projects are accepted under the Kyoto Protocol. On top of that, the rules to validate these projects are so complex that only less than 0.5% of the carbon projects are forestry ones.

In addition, deforestation accounts for almost 20% of global GHG emissions, and there is no mechanism (such as REDD – Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) to reduce it under the Kyoto Protocol. It means that no carbon finance has been invested in projects to stop deforestation.

The voluntary carbon market, which regulates outside the Kyoto Protocol, began to fill the gap for forestry carbon credits and several standards flourished to provide the rules to validate forestry projects. But we are still at a very early stage, most of the standards were only started to validate forestry projects in 2009.

The post-Kyoto agreement is the key to boosting carbon finance in forestry projects. Governments, NGOs and businesses need to work hard to include it in their negotiations. While we are waiting for governments to put their policies into practice, we as consumers and businesses need to provide carbon finance to these projects.

What's your response to the criticism on carbon offsetting and especially on forest-based offsetting schemes, such as Justin Francis of Responsible Travel who stopped using it and says "Carbon offsetting is an ingenious way to avoid genuinely reducing your carbon emissions" (Ethical travel company drops carbon offsetting, Nov 7)?
It’s remarkable that a business promoting Western Australia as its destination of the month is now encouraging its clients not to offset their emissions in an effort to protect the environment. My view is that consumers and businesses must cut their emissions but the technology is just not in place to get this to zero. As nearly all human activity results in carbon emissions, offsets provide a valuable and effective tool in reducing our unavoidable emissions.

Therefore, the question is not whether we should reduce OR offset. What we must do is to reduce AND offset. We do not have the luxury to be fussy about how we reduce the emissions. We must use every solution that is in our hands. More than 350 million tonnes of CO2e have been reduced from offsetting projects in the developing world. These reductions would not have been possible without the money coming from carbon credits.

The offsetting market has evolved significantly in the last few years and is now much more sophisticated. Once an offset project is set up, independent certifiers will visit the project and check if the project meets the criteria and if it is reducing emissions. Every year a certifier will come back to the project and verify the emissions reductions. All the process is documented and available online to anyone.

Forestry projects add complexity to the process. While planting a tree absorbs carbon emissions thus reducing GHG, if the tree dies, the tree will release most of the carbon it has absorbed during its lifetime. One of the requirements to validate a carbon credit is that it should be permanent. All the standards developed solutions to solve this problem.
There are many mechanisms to prevent this, I will only exemplify two solutions:

Another tree must be planted in order to reabsorb the carbon released.
Use a buffer zone. It means that a forestry project can only sell part of the carbon it has reduced. Let’s say, a project uses a 50% buffer zone. It means that it can only sell 50% of the carbon credits. If something happens to some of the trees, it will be able to use the carbon credits from the buffer zone.

When it comes to carbon credits, should we make a difference between conservation (REDD) and reforestation/ afforestation projects or they're just the two sides of the same coin?
REDD and reforestation/afforestation projects are developed differently. A REDD project will prevent a forest to disappear. It means that a project developer will need to find solutions to prevent that illegal logging, diseases, fires or any other risks will occur. If it does occur, the certifier will not validate the carbon credits and the project developer won’t be able to sell the carbon credits.

A reforestation/afforestation project needs another type of expertise. Trees need to be planted and a full management system must make sure that the project will run for decades. In addition, it should absorb as much carbon emissions as possible in order to produce more carbon credits. If a tree dies, the carbon released must be discounted accordingly.

Carbon credits will always have one point in common: they have reduced one tonne of carbon emissions. Then, you can find out where it is coming from, whether it be REDD or reforestation/afforestation.

Do you believe providing monetary incentives to discourage deforestation is possible on global level? can we really overcome issues such as additionality or leakage?
We have no choice at this stage. We have to work to make this possible.

We have seen that most of the policies in place do not stop deforestation. The evidence is that in the last 30 years an area equivalent to the size of Texas has been felled down in the Brazilian Amazon. This does not account for all the deforestation in Central Africa and Indonesia. Only a few countries such as Costa Rica managed to protect their tropical forests thanks to government intervention and the financial returns from the tourism industry and the resources from the forest itself.

The only way to really avoid leakage is to monitor all the forests in a country. It is actually relatively inexpensive to monitor all the forests thanks to the use of imaging satellites and aerial photography in addition to ground monitoring. Brazil is working hard to develop such a system, however poorer countries may find this difficult to implement and manage without outside help.

Will the REDD mechanism be included in the next global protocol? and if so, do you believe it can be done without badly compromising it during the process?
It is very likely that REDD will be included in the next protocol. Negotiations between countries/ industries/ NGOs always end up in compromises. From a climate change perspective, compromise is not enough. We should follow what the scientific community is telling us which is that we need to reduce the levels of carbon in the atmosphere dramatically.

The key point for the success of any cap and trade scheme is that the cap should be set in accordance to the science and not to politics. The caps are too high at the moment which makes the price of carbon too low. An increase on the price of carbon will help the world to evolve to a low carbon economy much faster. If the price of carbon is high enough you will start to see thousands of organisations protecting forests and standing in opposition against illegal logging because it makes economic sense for them to do so.

You analyzed in your research several seven voluntary standards - why do we have so many standards? is there a chance they can be merged into one or two main standards?
It is unfortunate that we have so many standards, but this is a new market and until recently nobody knew how to calculate the carbon and address all the issues surrounding forestry projects. Several organizations started to take initiative independently and provide the tools to make it happen.

The positive aspect is that the standards are competing against each other which brings innovation and lowers costs. However, this is not sustainable and nobody in the market wants to deal with so many standards, therefore it is very likely that only a few of them will survive. It’s up to the market and governments to decide which will remain.

You used 12 criteria to compare these standards - What do you think is the most important criteria among them and what criteria was found to be the biggest differentiator between the best standards and the inferior ones?
The most important criteria for any standard are:

Additionality: provide evidence that a project would not have been possible without carbon finance.

Permanence: ensure that if a tree is destroyed (fire, disease, illegal logging…), there are mechanisms to replace the carbon released.

Leakage: provide evidence that by stopping deforestation in a project, the logging activity has not been displaced to another forest.

Registry: each carbon credit must have a serial number; this means that a carbon credit is traceable back to its origin and is unique.

Transparency: when buying a carbon credit, the buyer should be able to have access to all the documentation of that carbon project (project documentation, validation report, monitoring report, stakeholder consultations, pictures…)

All the standards take into account these criteria, but only a few of them address these points properly. If I want to buy a forestry carbon credit for my personal offsets, I would buy from Voluntary Carbon Standard & CCBS or CarbonFix.

Finally, what's your advice to a business or an individual who want to minimize their environmental impact and their carbon emissions and just get more confused with all of this data - what they should do? where to start?
The first step is to take advice from experts such as reputable carbon management companies. There is a lot of misunderstanding around carbon credits/ offsets/ carbon management and a simple phone call can help to clarify these issues.

To find a good carbon management company, you should look for the ICROA logo on their website. A carbon management company can only become a member of ICROA, if it follows the code of best practice. Among many aspects, it means that a member can only provide high quality carbon credits (VCS, Gold Standard and CDM/JI) and uses the best practice methodologies to reduce carbon emissions.

Regarding minimizing the environmental impact, there is a simple rule to follow:

Measure. Reduce. Offset.

Measure: the first step is to measure your impact, determine the carbon footprint. We need to understand the problem before we can reduce emissions. Most of your emissions may come from your travel, your energy consumption or your waste for example.

Reduce: after identifying where the carbon emissions come from, we need to reduce them as much as possible by setting up a plan and objectives, looking for solutions and put them into practice.

Offset: after putting in place an emission reduction plan, you need to offset the remaining ones. We will always have an impact, no matter how green we are and we need to take action to offset that impact. On top of that, you are providing finance to people in developing countries to grow sustainably.

Thank you Paulo!

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: check our special holidays offer!

*photos credit: Paulo Lopes and SHI accordingly

Looking for a good climate change book to read during the Copenhagen talks?

If you're looking for a good book to read during the the Copenhagen climate talks, Jeff Biggers has an interesting summary on Grist of his favorite climate and energy books of 2009.

As Biggers mentions, this year we saw many good books released on climate destabilization, dirty energy policies, bogus Big Coal campaigns, a vibrant anti-coal movement, and more.

Among his favorites you can find Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity, by James Hansen, Coal Country: Rising Up Against Mountaintop Removal, by Shirley Burns and Climate Cover-Up, by James Hoggan, which will be reviewed here soon.

So check it out and get yourself one of these good books to accompany you on the next 12 days, or even as an interesting holidays gift.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: check our special holidays offer!

Green book review - Whole Green Catalog: 1000 Best Things for You and the Earth

Today we review a green book that is catalog, which is following the path of the original Whole Earth Catalog. It is a unique book and not just because it's 400 pages long. It is the ultimate guide for green choices.

Our book today is:

Whole Green Catalog: 1000 Best Things for You and the Earth

Authors: Michael W. Robbins (Author), Renee Loux (Introduction), Bill McKibben (Foreword), Wendy Palitz (Designer)

Michael Robbins is the former editor-in-chief of Audubon magazine. He has written books and articles for numerous publications including New York, Discover, Mother Jones, Plenty and Popular Science.

Wendy Palitz is an art director who has worked for New York, Self, Travel Holiday, and Workman Publishing. She has designed books for Houghton Mifflin, Stewart Tabori & Chang, and National Geographic Books.

Renée Loux, author of Easy Green Living, is the host of the TV show Easy Being Green.

Publisher: Rodale Books

Published on: September 2009

What this book is about? (from the book's website) Think of the choices we can make—do make—every day as small steps, in either a positive or a negative direction. Each choice can work to benefit you, me, and our whole community—and ultimately, our global environment.

How can we make those right choices? One at a time, with the help of the Whole Green Catalog. We’ve convened thought leaders in every category—from home furnishings and appliances to clothing and children’s toys, from pets and beauty products to travel and investing— to share their authoritative tips, reviews, and advice. To share with you a wealth of green information and green ideas.

Just a few years ago, there were very few “green” products on store shelves and little or no “green” components in many of these categories; they simply didn’t exist or couldn’t compete in the marketplace. The sheer size of the Whole Green Catalog illustrates the diversity of possibility, discovery, and potential, answering such questions as: Can one go green and save money? Can people reduce their carbon footprint if they are business travelers? Is there an environmentally-friendly disposable diaper?

This catalog is a browser book. Like the original Whole Earth Catalog, which helped to define the credo of its age, this is a resource guide to a special kind of life: then, an alternative lifestyle and now, a sustainable one. It is designed for people to peruse, consult, find, and choose. And it is full of surprises and delights—on every page. Flip through, and you’ll find that it opens many doors.

Beautifully packaged with over 1,000 photographs and illustrations, and manufactured with 100 percent post-consumer waste materials, this volume is the perfect gift for anyone who cares about the future of the planet.

What we think about it?
This book has an ambitious goal - becoming the "green bible" of the 21th century by providing readers all the information and resources they need to live sustainable life. The book is definitely impressive - 400 pages makes it one of the most extensive resources for a greener lifestyle you can currently find, with 20 sections covering everything from food and gardening to electronics and the workplace.

The book rightly mentions that only a couple of years ago the number of "green" options you had in front of you was very limited. Today the situation is completely different and you have many choices to choose from. The problem is that many times we're not aware of these options and don't know or just too lazy to start looking for them. This book is supposed to be the solution for this problem, providing ideas, resources and tips in a very thorough and interesting way.

Just to give an example, in the food section, you can find tips on how to choose eggs, where to look for online resources on seafood, information on milk alternatives, recommendations on kitchen appliances and so on. This diverse information is also presented in a very inviting way, which makes you want to do the right thing.

The only question left is of course how relevant this book will be in a couple of years, or even in a year, in such a dynamic market that offer new options almost every day. It looks like the authors took it into consideration and tried to make sure a big chunk of the book will be valuable even for the long run, as well as adding a website (http://wholegreencatalog.com/) where updates can be added. Still, it's not a simple challenge, especially with such an extensive and ambitious catalog and only time will tell how well it handles it.

Last but not least, I would like to mention that the book was printed using Cascade Rolland Enviro100 School book text paper, which contains FSC certified 100% post-consumer fiber.

Bottom line: If you're looking for a great and valuable gift for the holidays for someone who wants to go green but don't know where to start, or already started this journey and needs more tools and resources to get further, this is your book!

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

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.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!