Free Republic

Recycling posters featuring the picture of US President Barack Obama have reportedly been spotted on garbage cans at the Estonian capital's airport. Obama's photograph is encircled with the three arrows that symbolize recycling and encourages consumers with his campaign slogan "Yes, We Can," Russia Today (RT) reported citing a report at delfi.ee. Eesti Pakendiringlus, an Estonian recycled packaging company, is stressing on the “can” with a pun on the word's other meaning tin.

Thrift-driven Americans are fixing up, making do and reusing so much to cope with the recession that the drop in throwaways means less fill for landfills. To deal with the drop-off in dropoffs, landfills are laying off workers, reducing hours of operation and hiking disposal fees, with the increases passed along to cities, businesses and consumers. "You can look at waste and see what the economy is doing," said Tom Houck, manager at the Defiance County Landfill in northwest Ohio. He's watched the amount of trash arriving at the landfill plunge 30 percent in the past year. With consumers cutting...

The film Recycle delves into the conscience of a jihadist – and brilliantly troubles our ideas about Islamic radicalism, writes Thomas Hegghammer In the mid-2000s, one of the most pervasive buzzwords in counter-terrorism circles was “radicalisation”, referring to the process by which more or less ordinary individuals become terrorists. Scholars and analysts around the world pored over biographies of militants, deployed statistical tools and conducted in-depth interviews, all in the hope of finding the drivers of radicalisation so that policymakers could address them. Some important discoveries were made, among them the fact that people are usually drawn socially into radical...

53-year-old Eddie House of San Carlos, California recycles, composts, and finds homes for his discarded items. He reduced his household waste to the point that he cancelled his garbage pickup service last year. His reward is a lawsuit from the city! The lawsuit, filed by San Carlos Deputy City Attorney Linda Noeske in San Mateo Superior Court on Jan. 22, seeks a permanent injunction forcing House to maintain garbage service. City officials are also seeking to recoup from House the costs of the lawsuit. The lawsuit claims House broke the city’s municipal code requiring all residential, commercial and industrial properties...

"Every city has a contract with their (waste) hauler and it depends on the revenue-sharing agreement," said Braicovich, adding that he would support the bill. Scavenging through other people's garbage and recycling bins is illegal in many Inland cities and existing state law already requires identification from anyone selling recyclables valued at $100 or more, said Don Drysdale, a spokesman for the CALIFORNIA Department of Conservation. There is also a limit of 500 pounds of aluminum cans that a person can sell per day. "That's a heck of a lot of cans," said Danny Frankel, president of Riverside Recycling.

SUFFOLK Police have filed more than 150 charges against three people accused of stealing dozens of catalytic converters from vehicles in Suffolk and Chesapeake.Late Friday, police announced that the three were arrested Wednesday, after a Suffolk officer saw them near a car at King’s Fork Middle School, city spokeswoman Debbie George said.David Christopher Bone, 27, and Nicholas Edward Villi, 26, both of Windsor, and Tiffany Nicole Holt, 22, of Chesapeake are being held without bond at Western Tidewater Regional Jail, a jail spokesman said.Bone and Villi each face 27 criminal charges in Suffolk; Holt faces 12 charges. All were charged...

Many people don't realize that shooting sports offer their own unique recycling opportunity. Check out this "Geeks On Caffeine" cartoon to see how shooters can be earth friendly and make a political statement at the same time! However, keep this in mind: This is probably not something your average "greenie" would appreciate! NOTE: THE AUTHOR OF THIS COMIC HAS REQUESTED THAT THE CARTOON NOT BE PASTED WITHIN THE BODY OF THIS POST. PLEASE VISIT THE SITE TO SEE THE CARTOON.

LOCAL council bin police wearing head lamps are prowling neighbourhoods in the middle of the night to check whether residents are recycling. At least one contractor hired by the City of Monash in Melbourne has been threatened with the sack after peering into rubbish bins by torchlight and spooking elderly homeowners at 1am. It is understood several other councils pay bin cops to hunt down rogue recyclers. City of Monash spokeswoman Jodie Harrison confirmed a "rubbish auditor" had been warned to switch to more reasonable hours after "freaking out" residents. Disturbed householders have discovered bin police kitted out with miners'...

WASHINGTON - Older White House computer hard drives have been destroyed, the White House disclosed to a federal court Friday in a controversy over millions of possibly missing e-mails from 2003 to 2005. The White House revealed new information about how it handles its computers in an effort to persuade a federal magistrate it would be fruitless to undertake an e-mail recovery plan that the court proposed. "When workstations are at the end of their lifecycle and retired ... the hard drives are generally sent offsite to another government entity for physical destruction," the White House said in a sworn...

The whole issue of recycling has been clouded by green ideology. The EU set it targets for increasing recycling back in 1999 without properly questioning whether that is always the best way of disposing of rubbish... Recycling your plastic bottles may make you glow with virtue, but if they have to be carted halfway around the world to be recycled, and then large quantities of energy are consumed in the recyling process, it is far from obvious that you are doing the planet a good turn. Alternatively, your plastic bottle could be burnt in a power station, its stored energy...

SAN FRANCISCO - Most Americans think they're helping the earth when they recycle their old computers, televisions and cell phones. But chances are they're contributing to a global trade in electronic trash that endangers workers and pollutes the environment overseas. While there are no precise figures, activists estimate that 50 to 80 percent of the 300,000 to 400,000 tons of electronics collected for recycling in the U.S. each year ends up overseas. Workers in countries such as China, India and Nigeria then use hammers, gas burners and their bare hands to extract metals, glass and other recyclables, exposing themselves and...

Giant microwave turns plastic back to oil 17:44 26 June 2007 NewScientist.com news service Catherine Brahic A US company is taking plastics recycling to another level – turning them back into the oil they were made from, and gas. All that is needed, claims Global Resource Corporation (GRC), is a finely tuned microwave and – hey presto! – a mix of materials that were made from oil can be reduced back to oil and combustible gas (and a few leftovers). Key to GRC’s process is a machine that uses 1200 different frequencies within the microwave range, which act on specific...

Australian state leader says he must recycle drinking water because of drought The Associated PressPublished: January 28, 2007 CANBERRA, Australia: An Australian state will become the nation's first to introduce recycled sewage to its drinking water, and the rest of Australia would follow suit as a record drought threatens water supplies around the country, a state leader said Monday. Queensland state Premier Peter Beattie announced his government had scrapped a referendum planned for March on whether Australia's third most populous state should introduce recycled drinking water. Beattie said falling dam levels left his government with no choice but to introduce...

THOUSANDS of householders are facing the prospect of paying Britain’s first domestic rubbish tax under an Environment Agency proposal to trial the system in councils across England and Wales, writes Jonathan Leake. The scheme would see householders charged according to the weight of all non-recyclable waste they put out for collection each week. Green waste — recyclable paper, metal and glass, for example — would still be taken away for free. The agency’s “pay as you throw” proposal is aimed at breaking a deadlock between government departments that has held up attempts to “green” Britain’s waste disposal system. Tomorrow, the...

Everyone's talking about the environment these days, whether it's Al Gore's army of global warming slide show presenters or billionaire Richard Branson's quest for alternative fuels. I'm nostalgic for the old days when all the environmentalists wanted was for us to recycle. In class a few years ago I was lecturing on the economics of environmental protection. As I described the market's surprisingly robust ability to conserve natural resources, one student asked me "Do you recycle?" "No," I answered. "Thanks for the effort," he replied sarcastically. He then angrily marched from the room. I detected that most of the remaining...

State officials announced Thursday that California has finally achieved its goal of reducing landfill waste by 50%, thanks to diligent recycling by residents and businesses. The milestone culminates a 16-year campaign by the state to persuade people to separate recyclables out of the trash. The state passed a landmark law in 1989 mandating that communities establish waste-management plans for residents and businesses that would ultimately divert at least 50% of all recyclable trash from landfills. California was supposed to reach the goal in 2000, but preliminary data released Thursday show that the goal wasn't reached until last year. A total...

<p>Dear Etta: I need your help to let the Jacksboro area squirrel hunters know Mepps still buys squirrel tails. Every year it gets tougher to get the tails we need to dress our spinners, but we know from experience a little ink or air time is always a big help. Details are below. Any assistance you can offer, Etta would be sincerely appreciated. Should you need additional information please contact me.</p>

BAGHDAD, Nov. 10, 2005 – "Fire in the Hole, Fire in the Hole, Fire in the Hole." Within seconds of that radio announcement, a fiery blast shoots skyward. Second, third and fourth blasts follow in rapid succession. Only then does the concussion hit spectators a mile and a half away -- not as sound but as a shock wave. In less time than it takes to regain equilibrium, smoke plumes coalesce into a thick cloud rising hundreds of feet over the desert. Twelve separate detonations have destroyed roughly 100 tons of munitions that will no longer pose a threat to...

What do you do with that old couch you no longer have use for? How about the TV you just replaced? Instead of filling a trash dump, turn your trash into another person's treasure. The worldwide Freecycle Network is a nonprofit Internet group where members can give and receive "gifts." If a usable item that the owner does not want or need any more, that person can post it on the Freecycle network in their area, said North Port's Freecycle moderator Mike Romer. Members send and receive e-mails, through Yahoo accounts, about items offered for free. Essentially the two types...

SAN FRANCISCO - When Earth Day dawned in 1970, optimistic environmentalists predicted emerging technologies would help reduce the nation's reliance on coal, oil, insecticides and other pollutants. But 35 years later, a big part of the problem appears to be technology itself. Tons of computers, monitors, televisions and other electronic gizmos that contain hazardous chemicals, or "e-waste," may be poisoning people and ground water. Activists say the nation's biggest environmental problem may be the smallest devices, and this week they're launching campaigns to increase awareness about recycling cell phones, music players, handheld gaming consoles and other electronics. Frequently, smaller portable...

Wednesday, December 29, 2004 Atheist: Christmas tree recycling unfairProgram changed because incentive said to favor ChristiansPosted: December 29, 20041:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com An atheist activist forced Chicago to change its Christmas tree recycling program, complaining it was unfair to non-Christians. The city wanted to bolster its Blue Bag recycling program by offering a years worth of blue bags and some mulch to anyone who turned in a used Christmas tree. But Rob Sherman, known for his campaign to keep crosses off city seals, protested to Chicago, insisting the trees-for-bags exchange unfairly benefits Christians, the Chicago Tribune reported. "The concern was...

| About Us | Goals | Research | Links / Downloads | Home Widescale Biodiesel Production from AlgaeMichael Briggs, University of New Hampshire, Physics DepartmentAs more evidence comes out daily of the ties between the leaders of petroleum producing countries and terrorists (not to mention the human rights abuses in their own countries), the incentive for finding an alternative to petroleum rises higher and higher. The environmental problems of petroleum have finally been surpassed by the strategic weakness of being dependent on a fuel that can only be purchased from tyrants.In the United States, oil is primarily used for transportation - roughly two-thirds of all oil...

URBANA, Ill. - A University of Illinois research team is working on turning pig manure into a form of crude oil that could be refined to heat homes or generate electricity. Years of research and fine-tuning are ahead before the idea could be commercially viable, but results so far indicate there might be big benefits for farmers and consumers, lead researcher Yanhui Zhang said. "This is making more sense in terms of alternative energy or renewable energy and strategically for reducing our dependency on foreign oil," said Zhang, an associate professor of agricultural and biological engineering. "Definitely, there is potential...

My neighbors are unhappy to learn that the trash they’ve carefully sorted for years into brown bottles, green bottles, cans, and paper is being dumped back into one pile at the local landfill. Except for aluminum cans, no one wants the sorted trash items. Is this bad for the environment? Probably not. I checked with Dr. Daniel Benjamin of Clemson University (and the PERC Center for Free Market Environmentalism) and he says: First, don’t worry that the trash going into our landfills will take over too much of the land area. People today are actually throwing away less trash (in...

Ever get annoyed that you can rename any icon on your Windows PC's desktop except for the recycle bin? A little playing around in the Registry and I found out how to eliminate this politically-correct subtlety from my machine. Here's how, in layman's terms: * From the Start menu, select "Run". * Type "regedit" then [enter]. * When regedit comes up, click "My Computer" in the left pane. * Press or select "Find..." from the "Edit" menu. * Type in the following in the "Find what:" box:645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E * (optionally, you can copy and paste the above from this page.) *...

Canadian Firm Prints Harry Potter on Green Pages VANCOUVER, British Columbia, June 19, 2003 (ENS) - Fans of the Harry Potter (news - web sites) books probably do not associate the little wizard with rainforests or recycling, but that will change for at least 935,000 readers of "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." The Canadian edition of the eagerly anticipated book--all 935,000 copies--has been printed by Canadian publisher Raincoast Books on 100 percent recycled, endangered forest free paper, a move that many believe represents a landmark event for environmentally friendly publishing. • Sierra Club of Canada - British...

<p>SACRAMENTO - Health-conscious Californians guzzle more than 1 billion water bottles a year, tossing nearly three million plastic bottles into the trash each day.</p> <p>The deluge is becoming a "crisis" for landfills, the California Department of Conservation said in a report Friday.</p>

Anything into Oil Technological savvy could turn 600 million tons of turkey guts and other waste into 4 billion barrels of light Texas crude each year... Pardon me, says a reporter, shivering in the frigid dawn, but that sounds too good to be true.

A group of Swedish environmentalists -- convinced that recycling is a colossal waste of time and money -- is urging people to toss their blue boxes in the garbage. To the chagrin of fellow environmentalists in Canada and across the globe, the group said burning cardboard, plastics and other household trash is actually much better for the planet than any recycling program has turned out to be. In fact, the group contends the so-called benefits of recycling are all but nullified by the environmental damage associated with hauling the waste to and from the recycling facilities. Coupled with the overwhelming...

That secular/New Age environmentalists are untroubled by the natural destruction of the environment and animal rights activists are moved only by human cruelty suggests that environmentalists are less interested in conserving the environment than in destroying the works of man and that animal rights activists are motivated more by hatred of people than love of animals.

<p>SACRAMENTO - Legislation that would have put California at the forefront of recycling scrapped electronics was rejected by Gov. Gray Davis late Monday, underscoring the political clout of Silicon Valley's high-tech companies.</p> <p>California would have become the first state to assess a recycling fee -- $10 per electronic product -- on new computers and televisions sold to residents.</p>

<p>JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) --  While delegates attending the World Summit wrangled over how best to save the planet's rapidly dwindling resources, they gave scant indication of leading by example.</p> <p>The 10-day summit, billed as the largest U.N. conference ever held, is expected to generate between 300 and 400 tons of trash, and so far, just 20 percent of it is being recycled.</p>

What are your views on what "green" design/lifestyle means and requires. As an architecture student, this is a major topic these days, but I wonder what everyone else thinks of this topic and it's importance. I am a conservative in a field of liberals, especially on this topic, and am interested in green design without the eco-freakishness. Comment away, and I will reply later with a little more on where i am going with this.