The Native Forest Law is being approved in Chile after 15 years of negotiations

It took them 15 years, but it was worth waiting - the Chilean parliament has approved a law to preserve the country's forests, promote their sustainable use and foster related scientific research.
SciDev.net reported (and thank you to Metafore for bringing it to my attention) about this happy ending for 15 years of negotiations, the longest any law has taken to pass in Chile.

Antonio Lara, dean of the forestry science faculty at the Austral University in Valdivia, Chile, who was involved in the negotiations since 1992, explained the essence of the new law, called 'The Native Forest Law': "This law introduces an ecosystemic vision that does not consider the forest just as a wood source, but as a benefit for the community, since it sets funds for forest recovery and for its non-lumber management."

Two important parts in the new law are the creation of a fund of US $8 million a year for forest conservation, recovery and sustainable management projects, and the protection of water sources by banning the felling of native forests located near springs, rivers, glaciers, wetlands, and lands with steep slopes.

This is great news from Chile and I hope that many other developing countries (and also developed countries) will follow Chile and adopt its vision. I just hope it just won't take them 15 years :-)

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

Do the green thing and take the stairs in January

We turned the lights off early and had some fun in the dark in November. We bought an old thing in December. And now we're taking the steps.

Yes, our friends at Do The Green Thing keep making our green life more interesting by giving us challenging green missions. This month they ask us to be heroes and take the stairs.

Here's their explanation to what's the logic behind it:

Labour-saving machines save us labour, that’s the point. They transport us from the ground floor to the fifth floor. They take us from A to B. They wash and dry and cook and clean for us.
But these machines use energy which produces CO2. It would help if we could use them less or use them more efficiently.

Take lifts. Or rather don’t. If you work on the 25th floor of a skyscraper, fair enough. But lifts are like vertical taxis - you wouldn’t hail a cab to go 100 feet down the road so why summon one to take you a few floors up?

So use less machine power and more of your own steam power. And if you take the stairs or find a way to resist other labour-saving machines, please come back and click DONE IT so we can count how much CO2 we’ve all saved.

Check out their website for more information. They have great videos, audios and it all comes with a great sense of humor, a you can see from the following video:




Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

Green Building & Remodeling for Dummies

I learned yesterday from the New York Times on a new book in the Dummies series, and this time a green one: Green Building & Remodeling for Dummies by Eric Corey Freed.

The book, according to its website, is "your friendly, step-by-step guide to every facet of this Earth-friendly method of construction."

Eric Corey Freed, is an architect from San Francisco, CA, the founder of and principal architect at organicARCHITECT, a firm at the heart of the environmental movement that designs environmentally-friendly homes throughout the U.S.

The Founding Chair of Architecture for The San Francisco Design Museum, he teaches at the Academy of Art University and UC-Berkeley, sits on the Environmental Committee of The Commonwealth Club of California, and writes a syndicated monthly column for GreenerBuildings.com.

The book provides an introduction to every facet of green building, from start to finish, including the materials, architecture, and construction methods of green building and remodeling for both homeowners and professionals such as architects, interior designers, and contractors.

The chapters are organized in five parts: The Need for Green, Paying Attention to Material Matters, Green Building Methods, Green building Systems and Site Planning, and The Part of Tens (top ten checklists).

I like the Dummies series and therefore I was happy to hear about this one. I agree what I read on Sustainable Design Update - this book is certainly another sign that green building goes mainstream.

Green Building & Remodeling For Dummies may not be the only book you need to read if you want to build a green house or remodel your apartment and make it more efficient and eco-friendly, but it's definitely a good place to start at. Mr. Freed according to the NYT cut out the technical complexities, so it should also be a good book to anyone who just want to get to know better what green building is all about.

You're welcome to search inside the book at Amazon.com and learn about it a little more.

More reviews of green books can be found on our green resources page.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

Prince Charles wants to team up with Norway to save forests

Reuters reported last week on a very interesting collaboration between Prince Charles and Norway. The goal: preventing deforestation in developing countries.

The article reports that Prince Charles, who is known as the Green Prince due to its extensive support of many green issues, offered to Norwegian Prime Minister, Jens Stoltenberg to work together on saving forests in developing countries. The offer came after Norway's announcement earlier in December that it aimed to provide about 3 billion crowns ($541.2 million) per year to prevent deforestation in developing countries.

Both Prince Charles and the Norwegian government see prevention of deforestation as an effective . Prince Charles said in the past that "the world's rainforests is key to combating global warming" and Norway has said that "fighting deforestation is a quick and low-cost way to achieve cuts in greenhouse gas emissions blamed by scientists for global warming, in addition to maintaining biodiversity and securing people's livelihoods".

Prince Charles is very involved with efforts to save forests lately. Last October he launched a new organization called Reforestation Project that calls for a new green economics that recognises the world's rainforests are worth more alive than dead.

The Gurdian reported that "The Prince's Rainforests Project will bring together environmentalists, scientists and leaders from the developing world in an effort to halt mass deforestation - a bigger contributor to global warming than the world's entire transport sector, including aviation."

Norway want to see the fight in deforestation in developing countries becoming a global concern and not only a local initiative - it has said that commitments to reduce emissions from deforestation in developing nations should be included in a global climate change regime from 2012 and that it will work to develop funding and certification systems to promote the effort.

This is great news for everyone, and I hope the Norwegians and Prince Charles will succeed in their mission to prevent as much deforestation as possible. And let's not forget that some of these trees are cut down for paper, so less virgin paper used for printing books can definitely help to make Prince Charles and the Norwegians' job easier.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

New subscription option on Eco-Libris website

We open the new year with a new option that we add to our website - subscription.

If you have a big library at home and you want to green it up one bookshelf or bookcase at a time, this is a great option for you.

The process is very easy and similar to one-time purchase: On the subscription page you choose how many books you want to balance out each month. Then just click on the 'Buy' bottom and complete the payment process on the PayPal page (you DON'T need a PayPal account and can also pay with your credit or debit cards). That's it. Now, every month we'll balance out for you the amount of books you chose by planting trees. You will also receive a confirmation email from PayPal on the monthly payment, and of course you will also receive our stickers on monthly basis.

If and when you'll decide that you want to suspend your subscription, you will be able do it easily and quickly on PayPal site.

We are very happy to offer this option to all the eco-conscious readers out there who want to balance out many books, but want to do it step after step and not all in once. If you have any questions about the subscription option, please feel free to email me at: raz [at] ecolibris [dot] net.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

How green is your New Year's resolution?

There's nothing like a fresh start. Fresh start is a hope for a better future leaving the hurdles of the past behind. And what date is better than January 1st for a fresh start?

Many people have their own New Year's resolutions promising themselves and the world to be better this year. And this year, for many better means greener - half Of U.S. adults, we learn from a new survery, will make a green New Year’s resolution.

Thanks to Environmental Leader I learned about a survey conducted by GfK Roper that checked how much Americans are thinking of going green this year. The results were published on a news release of Tiller, LLC, and here are some of the interesting findings there: 49% of all American adults say they will make a green New Year's resolution this year. It's more popular within young Americans (58% of Americans 18-24) in comparison with older ones (40% of Americans 65+).

Here are some of the green resolutions cited by responders and their popularity within the responders:
reducing household energy usage (75%)
recycling more (74%)
reducing the use of harmful household chemicals (66%).
reducing one's "carbon footprint" (43%)
Carrying fabric bags to the supermarket (42%)

Another interesting factor that was checked was guilt - according to the news release, 31% of the responders admitted to feeling guilty in recent years about not living a more eco-friendly lifestyle. Women (36%) are more likely than men (26%) to feel "green guilt."

Well, it's great to see that so many people are feeling committed to change their lifestyle. Let's just hope the willingness will really transform into action. Now more than ever it's time for action. Green action. If each and every one of us will take few steps this year to go green, 2008 might become the year of change.

We hope of course that going green this year will also include a step or even two towards sustainable reading. We look forward to seeing eco-conscious readers as well as publishers, writers, bookstores and others go green with Eco-Libris and in many other ways.

Let's make it together a year with less deforestation, less greenhouse gasses, less waste, less pollution and more trees and hope for a brighter and greener future.

Happy New Year,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

Picture Courtesy of RIPPLE Africa

Goodbye 2007, Hello 2008

I know you probably read already gazillion summaries of 2007 and got another trillion best wishes for 2008, so I'll try to be short here :-)

2007 was a very good year for me - About 6 months ago I co-founded Eco-Libris with a great group of devoted people and started to do the first steps to make reading more sustainable. We've balanced out so far more than 7,500 books! These books are balanced out by more than 10,000 trees that are being planted by our planting partners in developing countries.

Eco-Libris worked very hard in the last couple of months - we have established collaborations with writers, publishers, bookstores, organizations and others involved in the book publishing industry, and it's only the beginning.

We're very excited about the upcoming year and hope to increase our activities and grow to become an agent of change that move the book publishing industry towards greener choices and practices. We have a goal of balancing out half a million books by the end of 2008 and we intend to meet it, with your help of course.. I hope that in general 2008 will be a greener year and will bring us more hope for a better and greener future.

I would like to wish all of you a happy, prosperous and GREEN year.

Enjoy 2008!
Raz @ Eco-Libris

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

Picture Courtesy of Sustainable Harvest international