Got a gift card that's all used up? Don't throw it away! Check out some of these ways to repurpose old gift cards instead.

It's so fun to receive a gift card, but once they're empty they're just another throw-away piece of plastic. Boo on that! Instead of adding waste to our landfills or contributing to the growing plastic pollution problem in our oceans, you can keep those cards out of the waste stream instead. Here are a few projects to give those gift cards a new life when the shopping spree is over.

Grab yourself a Pick Punch, and make your own guitar picks from old gift cards. Don't want to spring for a Pick Punch? You can also make gift card guitar picks without a punch.

Over at Instructables, learn how you can turn those used gift cards into totally cute upcycled paper clips.

Got a few gift cards in your stash? Turn them into a beautiful faux shell necklace!

With just a few simple supplies, you can transform an old gift card into a very cute pair of earrings.

Finish off this gift card jewelry set we are apparently working on with a recycled gift card bracelet!

Have you guys made anything fun with old gift cards? Tell us about it in the comments!

Facebook is a financial juggernaut that claims to be committed to a clean energy future, but the discovery of a Zuckerberg-funded SuperPac promoting the world's filthiest fossil fuels has the Internet crying foul.

We don't feel it or see it as we're surfing the web or clicking "Like" on cat memes, but the internet generates a lot of pollution. See, the internet lives on giant electricity-sucking servers housed in climate-controlled data centers all over the world. The bigger the website, the more servers it takes to keep it up and running.

Facebook is one of the world's most heavily trafficked sites, so naturally, it's got more servers than just about anyone else. In 2011, in response to Greenpeace's popular "Unfriend Coal" campaign, the social media giant agreed to promote renewable energy, encourage major utilities to develop renewable energy generation, and develop programs that will enable users to save energy and engage their communities in clean energy decisions.

Soon, news of Facebook's new LEED-certified, uber efficient data centers were splashed across the headlines. "Hooray," we thought. "Facebook is doing the right thing, leading the way for the green internet of the future."

That's why millions of Facebook users were stunned to learn that CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s FWD.us SuperPAC is funding ads that promote the Keystone Pipeline, drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and attacks on Obamacare.

Now, there's nothing shocking about a billionaire supporting pro-oil, pro-Conservative rhetoric. What makes this development shocking is 1) how hard Facebook has tried to position itself as environmentally-concerned and 2) the fact that the SuperPAC  (supposedly) exists to support comprehensive immigration reform.

Apparently, the SuperPAC thought that by supporting some Republican senators' positions on fossil fuels, they would convince those politicians to vote in favor of immigration reform—a move that could anger their right-leaning constituents. In short, FWD.us is employing the same underhanded bribery that has allowed special interests to completely corrupt our political system. Thankfully, this dark side didn't sit well with Facebook users, the Progressive community or FWD.us' own donor list.

FWD.us “doesn’t understand the tech industry,” said a longtime tech lobbyist who remained anonymous to Politico. “Jumping into unrelated energy issues like Keystone pipeline has tarnished the tech community’s reputation. Not only does it involve them in an issue in which they have no position, it also unnecessarily aligns them with Republicans over President Obama and the core of the Democratic Party."

When news of FWD.us's pro-Keystone ads first hit the internet, progressive groups lost no time in using Facebook's own viral sharing functions to spread the word. That's when Zuckerberg made his second big mistake.

Miffed by the backlash when Facebook decided to pull an ad by activist mobile phone company Credo that criticized FWD.us. “Facebook took the extraordinary step of rejecting our ad featuring Mark Zuckerberg's photo along with a headline asking him to stop pushing pro-Keystone XL propaganda," Becky Bond, Political Director of Credo told Mashable. “But the ads that truly need to be pulled are the cynical and ineffective anti-environmental political commercials that Zuckerberg and FWD.us are airing in South Carolina and Alaska."

The move, which some viewed as self-serving censorship, prompted Credo and other groups to pull their Facebook ad campaigns, and caused some of the super PAC's top donors to withdraw their support.

Want to help? Check out Credo's petition asking FWD.us to stop running ads supporting dirty energy.

Image: Tar Sands Solution Network

The new V.Cological for Sea Turtles Collection gives back to the Sea Turtle Restoration Project. 

Surf and skatewear label Volcom launched it’s V.Cological Collection back in 2007, offering a range of clothing to “protect our planet’s rapidly shrinking natural resources.” With summer season and beach time around the corner, the ladieswear designers decided to put together a cute collection of ocean and sea turtle-themed tees, dresses, shorts, bikinis and flip flops. Not only are these cute digs perfect for warm weather, but a percentage of proceeds from the collection will go toward helping save the seriously endangered sea turtles.

All of the items in the V.Cological collections are made out of organic cotton, hemp, recycled polyester and recycled nylon. Sustainable and more environmentally friendly components like vegetable dyes, organic stains and other low impact production methods are used for the collection, which combines laid-back Volcom styling with an environmentally clear conscience.

The V.Cological series was initially set up to partner with 1% For the Planet, meaning that 1 percent of all sales of the collections are donated to 3,000 global environmental organizations. In addition to partnering with 1% For the Planet, the most recent Girls collection is donating 5 percent of proceeds to the Sea Turtle Restoration Project.

Sea turtles are majestic creatures that have lived on this planet for much longer than us – nearly 150 million years. There are currently seven species of the sea turtles dwelling in the Earth’s large bodies or water, all of which are endangered or threatened. The population of the most endangered species, the Leatherbacks, has declined by more than 95 percent in just the last 25 years. The Sea Turtle Restoration Project aims to protect and re-establish sea turtles populations through several campaigns around the world. 

Images: Volcom, fredsharples

We've reached that point where even my editor will throw Nest stories at me, assuming that I will want to cover them. He's right, of course, but I'm not sure what I think about the stereotyping.

So when Nest announced that they were now stocking their Nest Learning Thermostat in Home Depot stores, I was all over it like gravy on mashed potato (I'm told people like it). 

Nest already had a partnership with Home Depot Canada, dating back to 2012, but now the internet's favourite thermostat is available instore at US Home Depots as well as online at homedepot.com.

Nest is already available at Amazon.com, the Apple Store, Best Buy, Lowe's, and certain local certified dealers, but adding Home Depot to that list is only going to benefit the burgeoning company. That brings the number of retail locations to over 3,000 where you can buy the Nest Learning Thermostat.

"Home Depot is the biggest home improvement retailer in the United States, attracting millions of customers every day to stores in every state and throughout Canada," said VP of Nest Business, Erik Charlton. "Those customers are there to create beautiful, comfortable, efficient homes, and we can’t wait until they stop at our display and see how Nest can help."

Nest Comes To US Home Depot Stores was originally published on: CleanTechnica. To read more from CleanTechnica, join over 30,000 others and , follow us on Facebook (also free!), follow us on Twitter, or just visit our homepage (yep, free).

Beauty can come at a cost, but toxic lead in lipstick may be taking it too far.

According to a study conducted by UC Berkeley researchers and published in a recent issue of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, high levels of toxic heavy metals, including lead, were found in some of the leading brands of lipstick ingredients.

The study comes after a 2012 FDA review of 400 major lipstick products in which the agency declared the levels of lead posed no serious threats because there is "limited absorption." But, in a statement, lead study author Sa Liu, a UC Berkeley researcher in environmental health sciences, says “I believe that the Food and Drug Administration should pay attention to this,” adding, “Our study was small, using lip products that had been identified by young Asian women in Oakland, CA. But, the lipsticks and lip glosses in our study are common brands available in stores everywhere. Based upon our findings, a larger, more thorough survey of lip products—and cosmetics in general—is warranted.”

The Berkeley study found that women who are frequent lipstick users risk overexposure of lead as well as exposure to chromium, aluminum, cadmium, and manganese—all of which have toxic implications for women, particularly if they're pregnant or nursing.

Among the top 20 offenders, according to the study, are some of the leading brands: Cover Girl, L'Oreal, Maybelline, Revlon, Avon, and Sonia Kashuk. Burt's Bees, a long-time natural brand favorite, which is now owned by Clorox, also appeared on the list with its lip shimmer.

Want to avoid toxic heavy metals in your lipstick? Check out the Environmental Working Group's Skin Deep database for safe alternatives. Or, make your own.

Keep in touch with Jill on Twitter @jillettinger

Image: zitona

Read the rest of Off-Grid Nomad Shelters Provide Relief from the Sun for Tourists in Italy

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Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has just introduced the Federal Student Loan Refinancing Act, legislation which would allow students to refinance their college debt at a much lower fixed rate of interest. These reforms are especially needed now, because in July student loan rates in the US are set to double to nearly 7%. Strangely, this is also happening at a time when our government continues to allow billionaire Wall Street bankers to borrow money for a small fraction of that cost.

This important legislation could potentially save students billions in education debt, and would also function as a massive economic stimulus. Research from the Center for American Progress found that such proposed student loan refinancing would increase disposable income nationwide by an estimated $14.5 billion in just the first year.

The Huffington Post recently reported details of the senator's bill, which would mandate that the U.S. Secretary of Education immediately refinance nearly 90% of all existing federally backed student loans:

The plan sponsored by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) would force the U.S. Secretary of Education to automatically refinance most government loans carrying interest rates above 4 percent into fixed, 4-percent loans. Roughly nine of 10 federally-backed loans would be affected, saving nearly 37 million borrowers billions of dollars in annual interest payments.

“At a time when corporations, homeowners and even local governments are refinancing at historically low-interest rates and saving millions of dollars, students and families who take out loans to pay for college are getting left behind," Gillibrand said. "Ensuring that our graduates are not saddled with unmanageable debt by keeping interest rates low is just common sense."

China's powerful National Development and Reform Commission has proposed an absolute cap on emissions starting in 2016. The proposal still needs to be accepted by the Chinese cabinet, but experts say the commission’s influence makes it likely to pass. China today also announced the details of trial carbon-trading programs that will roll out in seven regions by 2014. In February, the country had said it would implement a carbon tax, but backed off a few weeks later, saying it will wait until early next year to get started on that.

The commission’s carbon-cap proposal calls for Chinese emissions to peak in 2025, five years earlier than previously planned. RenewEconomy explains:

China has already pledged to cut its emissions intensity – the amount of Co2 it emits per economic unit – by up to 45 per cent by 2020. The significance of an absolute cap is that it promises to rein in emissions even if the economy grows faster than expected.

A Chinese carbon cap could shake up future international climate negotiations, The Independent reports:

It marks a dramatic change in China's approach to climate change that experts say will make countries around the world more likely to agree to stringent cuts to their carbon emissions in a co-ordinated effort to tackle global warming. …

“Such an important move should encourage all countries, and particularly the other large emitters such as the United States, to take stronger action on climate change. And it improves the prospects for a strong international treaty being agreed at the United Nations climate change summit in 2015,” added Lord [Nicholas] Stern, [chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics.]

The 2015 summit will take place in Paris. Previous U.N. climate talks have played out according to a familiar pattern: high hopes giving way to deadlock and failure. When the world’s largest emitters refuse to agree to limits on emissions, it makes the commitments of smaller countries somewhat pointless. U.K. Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Davey told The Independent:

I'm really much more confident than many people about our ability to get an ambitious climate change deal done in 2015. Obama in his second term clearly wants to act on this and there has been a fantastic and dramatic change in America's position. Taken together with China's change, the tectonic plates of global climate change negotiations are really shifting.

Barack Obama’s advocacy group, Organizing for Action, has been calling out Republican climate skeptics in Congress, but climate activists are not impressed. They're planning to crash OFA events and push the group to fight the Keystone XL pipeline.

350.org and CREDO Action, the political arm of the company CREDO Mobile, are leading the charge. OFA is bracing for it. From BuzzFeed:

OFA circulated a set of talking points to its members for use in dealing with unruly activists. The document, obtained by BuzzFeed, includes information on the science behind climate change and the president’s environmental positions, and ends with a section titled “Keystone Talking Points.” …

The talking points come with a warning: “Volunteers from Credo Action or other organizations may attend your planning session and want to demand that we work on the Keystone XL pipeline.” …

“We understand that there are groups and individuals who would like to work to influence the President and the State Department on a variety of environmental decisions, but OFA’s plan is to do great organizing on building clean energy locally, turning up the heat on Congress and helping individuals and communities switch to clean energy,” the document reads. “They are more than welcome to work with those groups, but we encourage all volunteers to be part of our work and the mission of changing the conversation on climate!”

OFA asks its members to point to the State Department review process when asked about the pipeline.

Organizing for America defended itself to The Washington Post:

In an e-mail, OFA spokeswoman Katie Hogan noted the group already mobilized its members to both engage lawmakers on global warming and press for confirmation of Environmental Protection Agency administrator-designate Gina McCarthy.

“It has been made clear since our first day as an organization that we support the President’s plans from comprehensive immigration reform, to reducing gun violence to climate change, including the completion of the State Department [Keystone XL] review,” Hogan wrote. “Just last week OFA held almost 100 action planning sessions on climate change in communities across the country to talk about the action that can be taken right now to call out members of Congress for denying that climate change is a man-made problem.”

Um, Hogan, pointing out that you’re pointing out that Republicans aren’t taking climate change seriously is kinda missing the point.

A new generation of gardeners are interested in growing their own food, and The Patch, a new self-watering planter, helps guide newbies through the process. The planter, which is designed for urban gardeners, solves the most common challenge for novice gardeners: over-watering. The Patch Planter is an easy, self-watering and flat-packable planter that addresses this issue by providing the plant with the perfect amount of water at all times - yielding more nutritious and delicious food. The planter is currently in the beta stage, but Let's Patch is raising funds through Kickstarter to take its manufacturing process to the next level.

+ Let's Patch

+ Let's Patch on Kickstarter

The article above was submitted to us by an Inhabitat reader. Want to see your story on Inhabitat? Send us a tip by following this link. Remember to follow our instructions carefully to boost your chances of being chosen for publishing!

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"Oops."

Gulf Coast oil refiners and chemical processors say that a lot, but regulators are doing precious little to rein in what the industry euphemistically calls "upset" emissions.

Upset emissions are inadvertent releases of chemicals by industrial operations when something goes awry. And things seem to go awry awfully frequently. An ExxonMobil refinery in Baton Rouge, La., was averaging two accidental releases every week during one grim stretch.

That's according to an analysis by The Center for Public Integrity, which found that upset emissions are more prevalent than industry admits or government knows. Some highlights from the center's investigative report:

[A 411-barrel chemical leak last year] has played out again and again at the sprawling, 2,400-acre ExxonMobil Baton Rouge complex, which encompasses an oil refinery and a chemical plant, and dwarfs the Standard Heights community. The leak marks the 1,068th upset emissions event at the compound in the last eight years, according to a database of incident reports compiled by the Bucket Brigade. Of these events, 172 involved benzene, a carcinogen that can trigger headaches, dizziness and rapid heart rate.

Exxon’s chemical plant had 265 of all incidents. At the refinery, the data show 803 accidental releases over these years; at its height, the facility averaged two a week. …

The steady hazards extend far beyond Baton Rouge. In the Gulf states of Texas and Louisiana, the vast number of plastics, power and gas plants provide an on-the-ground case study of a national problem.

“Non-routine” upset emissions have become regular occurrences at oil refineries, chemical plants and manufacturing facilities.

The upset emissions can pose serious health risks, but the oil and chemical companies say there's nothing to worry about.

Dr. Mark D’Andrea, at the University of Texas Cancer Center, began tracking 4,000 residents exposed to the poster child of all upsets — the “40-day Release” at the BP refinery, in Texas City, which belched 514,795 pounds of benzene and 20 other pollutants throughout the spring of 2010. Earlier this year, D’Andrea unveiled preliminary data showing the residents have “significantly higher” white-blood cell and platelet counts than their Houston counterparts. The data suggests BP’s release may have increased their risk of developing such cancers as leukemia, the doctor says.

In a statement, BP says it does “not believe any negative health impacts resulted from” its 40-day release. “To our knowledge, the University Cancer Centers’ pilot study does not support a claim for any plaintiff alleging injury from that flaring and has no relevance to those claims,” the company wrote, referring to pending litigation filed by 47,830 residents and workers against BP alleging health ailments caused by the release. D’Andrea has not been hired as an expert witness for either side in the case, but has testified in pre-trial discovery.

For more, read the full report in all its grotesque glory.

Read the rest of NBBJ Unveils Striking Biosphere Greenhouses for Amazon's Seattle HQ

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Read the rest of He's Back! World's Largest Rubber Duck Floats Again After Springing a Leak in Hong Kong

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It often seems like teenagers are powered mainly by social media, so it only makes sense that a group of high school students would build a car that really was. This 1967 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia, converted to an electric car by at-risk students from five Kansas City high schools, will turn Twitter mentions and Facebook likes into wattage to complete a 1,000-mile trip to Washington, D.C.

The students are attending a run by nonprofit Minddrive, which admits 30 students per year who are "slipping through the cracks of the ‘traditional’ educational system." The students work with engineers and mentors to convert old vehicles to run on electricity.

The tweets-to-watts thing is a gimmick, not a feasible technology - we are at no point going to be driving around in vehicles that run on Klout. Here's how it works, according to the Chicago Tribune:

This educational trip is all about connecting: students connect what they learned in the lab to what they see in the real world, and they must connect with other students and people along the way or they don’t move on to the capital. The “social fuel” needed to complete the trip has been assessed at 71,040 watts. An Arduino computer connects the drive train to the cloud and registers in live time the wattage of a Twitter follow, for instance, with a value of 5 watts. A Facebook like is worth only 1 watt.

It makes a kind of sense, though - social media requires electricity, electric cars require electricity, and changing the way we use transportation requires cooperation and communication. We're willing to buy it. Or at least, we're willing to tweet at these kids so they don't get stranded somewhere in Kentucky.

Rooftop solar caught on camera exploiting a low-income household.Image Credit: Ronald Brakels

The paper focuses on network charges which have increased dramatically in Australia over the past five years due to power companies expecting electricity demand to rise and investing heavily in distribution infrastructure, which turned out to be a bad idea when demand dropped instead due to improved efficiency and rooftop solar. But, strangely enough, rather than simply providing a space for ESAA members to apologise for their mistake and the unnecessary hardship they caused Australians, the paper instead decides to blame their customers for not buying enough electricity.

While I can understand that the ESAA's members would prefer it if Australians bought more electricity, blaming the customer seems to show a profound lack of understanding of how markets work. If a business loses market share due to competition, they can either win back customers by improving their product or lowering prices, or they can accept that the market has changed and adapt to the new conditions. Blaming the customers for not buying enough may be cathartic if the business happens to be run by five year olds, but never results in a beneficial outcome.

The ESAA blames a very specific subset of customers for the increase in network charges, and these are people with rooftop solar. They say they're acting unfairly because they buy less electricity from the grid and so contribute less to its upkeep. The paper states, and I quote, “Most solar households end up only paying a fraction of their fair share of the cost of maintaining the network.” That is a very interesting position to take, especially when one considers that fact that rooftop solar reduces the need for transmission infrastructure and thus reduces network charges. Australia's peak electricity demand occurs on hot, cloudless, summer afternoons which is well matched with the output of solar power. Its ability to help meet peak demand was amply demonstrated during the horrid, record-breaking heatwave Australia experienced earlier this year. But for some reason, the ESAA mentions none of this. Nor do they mention the benefit rooftop solar provides consumers by pushing down wholesale electricity prices. Instead, they mention that “millions of dollars” have been spent on upgrades to deal with the inflow of electricity from rooftop solar, but neglect to mention that millions of dollars in upgrades are required whenever over two gigawatts of generating capacity of any sort is added to the grid. And it's a pity they didn't give an actual figure, as “millions of dollars” could be as little as 8.7 cents per Australian.

Justin Bieber via Featureflash / Shutterstock.com.

Cow with milk-providing teats poking out via Shutterstock.

So let's say you start drinking less milk or you stop drinking it entirely. Perhaps you develop lactose intolerance, or maybe you suddenly freak out when you realise you've been drinking fluid from a cow's breasts, or you just go off milk for some reason. (I've had milk go off on me, so I can understand if people go off it.) In this case, are you being unfair to other people who still drink milk? After all, if there is a fall in the total amount of milk drunk, then expensive milk-related capital will be used less and that will cause the unit price of milk to increase. There's no way around that, unless of course the milk industry correctly predicted that there would be a decline in the amount of milk drunk. In that case, they could have run down some of their capital and kept selling milk at the same price as before.

Now, you might ask, how reasonable is it to expect companies to predict changes in the demand for their products? Well, I don't know if it is reasonable, but I do know that we expect just about every business in Australia to do it, and if they get it wrong, they're the ones who have to deal with the consequences. If the milk industry over-invested in cows, they wouldn't get a lot of sympathy if they then blamed Australians for not drinking enough milk.

We shouldn't make the mistake of pretending there is a free market for electricity, but in Australia, for better or worse, we've decided to base our economy on market prices. Now, maybe we could have come up with something better than this - after all, some countries don't have market economies and they manage. Just look at North Korea. They haven't had a market-based economy for almost 70 years, and according to their propaganda, they're doing great! But the fact is, in Australia, market forces guide our economy, and it is a bit late now to suddenly cry that it's not fair if things aren't going to one's advantage. This is especially true if it is coming from people who thought market forces were just dandy when they were acting in their favour.

The ESAA paper says, “Current arrangements are unfair and need to be changed. At the moment, low income households who cannot afford solar, renters and people in apartments pay more to underwrite those customers who can install their own solar system.” The solution they offer to their problem of customers not buying enough electricity is to increase fixed costs while decreasing variable costs. In other words, they want people to pay more simply to remain connected to the grid and pay less for each kilowatt-hour they buy. This proposal is simply environmentally irresponsible, as it decreases people's incentive to conserve energy when most of Australia's electricity is still generated by coal. It is also simply bizarre given their professed concern for low-income households, as it would hurt low-income households more than high-income ones because poor people use much less electricity than rich people! How could they possibly have missed this? It is almost as if they don't really care about low-income households at all but are simply interested in reducing the incentive to install solar power. But I know this can't be the case because they wrote in their paper that they're concerned about fairness for low-income Australians. The only way this couldn't be correct would be if they had developed some sort of way to make words say things that are not true.

Installing Rooftop Solar Is Unfair, Says Energy Group was originally published on: CleanTechnica. To read more from CleanTechnica, join over 30,000 others and , follow us on Facebook (also free!), follow us on Twitter, or just visit our homepage (yep, free).

By Tory Field and Beverly Bell

Part 15 of the Harvesting Justice series

The Food Chain Workers Alliance has a goal of nothing less than full rights and fair wages for the 20 million workers who grow, harvest, process, pack, ship, cook, serve, and sell food in the US. Founded in 2009, the Alliance brings together 11 organizations representing workers throughout the food supply chain. It is organizing across sectors, building solidarity between workers in different industries. It is pushing for policy changes and educating and activating consumers so that we can all better align our food purchases with our principles. The Alliance also draws attention to the ways in which institutional racism in the US and around the world has produced a food system reliant on the exploitation of immigrants and people of color.

The Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC) is one of the founding members of the Alliance. Started in New York City, the organization’s original aim was to help find new jobs for workers who had been employed at Windows on the World, the restaurant on the 107th floor of the World Trade Center that collapsed on September 11, 2001. This mission quickly expanded to changing working conditions throughout the entire restaurant industry. In 2008, a national office, ROC United, was launched, which has since helped replicate the model in eight other places: Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, Michigan, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Houston.

“The restaurant industry is the largest private sector employer in the US,” said Jose Oliva, ROC’s national policy coordinator. “It is in the position of creating the conditions, setting the tone, setting the standard, for the entire sector, not just the service sector which has now become the core of our new economy, but for the entire private sector.” If food workers could exercise their power, added Jose, they could improve not only their own working conditions but also other aspects of the food system, from environmental impacts and animal rights to food quality for consumers.

ROC has won numerous campaigns against unjust restaurants, forcing them to change their practices. Their current campaign focuses on the world’s largest full-service restaurant group, Darden, which owns Capital Grille, Red Lobster, Olive Garden, Longhorn Steakhouse, and others. In 2012, ROC filed a lawsuit against the company for racial discrimination and wage theft. The organization is also leading a charge to raise the federal minimum wage for tipped workers, which has been frozen at $2.13 for more than 20 years. Over the years, ROC has led and won 13 campaigns against exploitation in high-profile restaurant companies, securing improvements in grievance procedures, raises, sexual harassment policies, sick days, job security, and anti-discrimination policies.

ROC is also making the public aware of what happens behind the scenes at restaurants. They have published in-depth reports and a new book, Behind the Kitchen Door, about working conditions, racism, and sexism in the industry.

Other compelling initiatives for food workers’ rights include:

Here are some ways you can support food, farm, and restaurant workers organizing for better working conditions:

Download the Harvesting Justice pdf here, and find action items, resources, and a popular education curriculum on the Harvesting Justice website. Harvesting Justice was created for the US Food Sovereignty Alliance, check out their work here.

Read more from Other Worlds here, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Copyleft Other Worlds. You may reprint this article in whole or in part. Please credit any text or original research you use to Tory Field and Beverly Bell, Other Worlds.

Reclaimed wood is one of the hottest eco-friendly trends to come out of the interior design world. With products like reclaimed wood flooring and veneer paneling, the options and uses available with this type of lumber are limited only by your imagination. By learning more about this type of eco-friendly material, you can make educated decisions about the home design products you choose.

On many occasions, old lumber gets discarded simply because a person or company doesn’t have a use for it. The truth is that much of this lumber is still usable – and in many cases, it is stronger and more durable than virgin wood. When someone makes the effort to collect the used lumber and fix it up for repurposing, it becomes reclaimed wood.

The reclaiming process starts by collecting discarded lumber that’s no longer needed. These sources can include:

After harvesting the wood, salvage crews separate it from other materials, such as nails. They recycle the products they don’t need to keep waste at a minimum and sort the wood according to quality. Low-grade wood becomes bio-fuel or firewood, while the premium pieces get processed.

Processing involves cleaning the lumber, drying it in a kiln and milling it so it looks beautiful. At this stage, the reclaimed lumber is ready for installation and finishing.

If you can build something with virgin wood, there’s a good chance you can also build it with reclaimed wood. Some of the more popular uses for reclaimed timber in homes and offices consist of:

Flooring. Reclaimed wood flooring comes in several different blends – from light to dark and refined to rustic – so you’ll always find something that matches your style.

Tables. Tabletops made from reclaimed lumber are gorgeous, durable and affordable. The characteristics of the wood are so interesting to look at that you won’t want to use a tablecloth. Reclaimed lumber is also great for counter tops.

Decking. Some blends of reclaimed wood come from tropical forests, so they naturally withstand water, humidity and the sun’s heat. This strength means they’ll have no problem enduring heavy foot traffic. Look for a company that offers reclaimed wood deck boards with eased edges or a hidden clip system so installation is a cinch.

Veneer paneling. With the veneer-making tools available today, a reclaimed lumber specialist has no problem making veneer wood paneling from this eco-friendly material. Use veneer panels for cabinetry, walls, desks or the front of a reception counter.

In the U.S., the norm is to buy products and materials that are new, but choosing reclaimed over virgin wood offers the following benefits:

If you’re looking to purchase reclaimed wood instead of sourcing it yourself, look for a company that’s certified by the Rainforest Alliance and FSC (Forest Stewardship Council). With these certifications, you can trust that the company sells products that are genuinely green and that the materials were harvested using sustainable methods.

This post was contributed by Viridian Reclaimed Wood, a company that is owned and operated in Portland, Oregon and provides eco-friendly, unique and affordable reclaimed wood flooring, veneer, paneling, tables & counters across the nation.

Image credit: Tony Faiola via photopin cc

Who doesn't love a "largest wind farm" or "largest solar farm" story? Here's the latest I'm aware of, via CleanTechnica sister site Green Building Elements. Congrats to Siemens. (Note: if the article doesn't load fully, simply refresh this page or click on through to Green Building Elements.)

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has awarded a contract to Siemens Government Technologies, Inc. (Siemens) to construct the federal government’s largest wind farm. The Pantex wind farm is expected to save an average of $2.9 million annually over the 20-year contract term. The installation…

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This article was originally published on RenewEconomy.

Image Credit: Flag of China on Yangtze River via Shutterstock.

According to news reports from China, the powerful National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has proposed setting absolute caps that would divorce the growth on emissions from growth in the economy, and will also set a peak in its overall emissions in 2025, five years earlier than planned.

China has already pledged to cut its emissions intensity – the amount of Co2 it emits per economic unit – by up to 45 per cent by 2020. The significance of an absolute cap is that it promises to reign in emissions even if the economy grows faster than expected.

Furthermore, Point Carbon reports, at a recent NDRC meeting, its vice director Xie Zhenhua said China should set long-term emission targets for 2030 and 2050 in a bid to decarbonise its economy. China, like Australia is heavily dependent on carbon-intensive coal to generate electricity – just over 82 per cent. But it has also proposed a cap on coal consumption of 4 billion tonnes.

Lord Nicholas Stern, the chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics, described it as “exciting news”, and said it should encourage all countries, the US in particular, to take stronger action.

“And it improves the prospects for a strong international treaty being agreed at the United Nations climate change summit in 2015,” he told The Independent in the UK.

Of course, the move has major implications for Australia, both in its policy development under a Coalition government, and for the hopes of mining magnates such as Gina Rinehart and Clive Palmer to dig up large tracts of central Queensland in the hoping of exporting that coal to China.

As we reported on Tuesday, and previously, the Coalition is basing its plan to repeal the carbon price on the principal that China and other big polluters are doing little to address emissions.

Its climate change spokesman Greg Hunt is still peddling nonsense that China plans to lift coal consumption to 7 billion tonnes, and suggests that Tony Abbott, armed with a fig leaf of a policy that includes its $300 million emissions reduction fund and a 15,000 strong, litter collecting “Green Army”, can somehow encourage China and the US to intensify their efforts.

Such a scenario is laughable given that US moves to impose severe restrictions on coal emissions and China itself moves to a carbon trading mechanism, and imposes its own restrictions on big emitters.

Indeed, many argue that Australia should already be lifting its emissions reduction target. Ross Garnaut said last week it should be 17 per cent, instead of the current agreed target of 5 per cent. The problem with the Coalition’s Direct Action is that it is simply not scalable to meet such an effort.

The implications for Australian business in abandoning carbon pricing as its biggest trading partner embraces its own are enormous. And so is the move to limit coal production. Deutsche Bank, for instance, estimates that China will cease to be an importer of coal within a few years – reducing a major source of demand for Australian coal and causing a slump in international thermal coal prices that will make even these new investment uneconomic. Over half of Australia’s thermal coal mines are already losing money, according to a recent survey.

The UK’s Climate and Energy Change Secretary Ed Davey told The Independent that China’s changing attitude to climate change made him increasingly confident that a global deal on climate action can be reached in 2015.

“At the end of last year the Chinese leadership changed and started talking about creating an ‘ecological civilisation’. This doesn’t mean they have signed up to every bit of the climate change talks, but it means they recognise that their economic model has to take account of pollution and the environment and that damage that it’s doing to people’s health,” Mr Davey said.

“I’m really much more confident than many people about our ability to get an ambitious climate change deal done in 2015. Obama in his second term clearly wants to act on this and there has been a fantastic and dramatic change in America’s position. Taken together with China’s change, the tectonic plates of global climate change negotiations are really shifting,” Mr Davey added.

Interestingly, Davey said he wants the UK to take a leading part in the global climate change discussions as part of the European negotiating block. However, he said he was concerned that the rise of the climate sceptic Ukip party could drag members of the Tory right in that direction and damage Britain’s credibility in debate on global warming.

The same concerns could be said of the Australian Coalition, given that it is led by a man who owed his elevation to the conservative right that sought to prevent the introduction of a carbon price in 2009. This remains its policy position.

Erwin Jackson, the deputy CEO of the Climate Institute said it was clear that the timeline for the implementation of the Coalition’s promised repeal of the carbon price means it would be occuring just as China and South Korea are introducing their own emissions trading schemes, and an international agreement was being forged by the deadline of 2015.

He says there will be intense scrutiny on Australia which, unlike its decision to back out of Kyoto under the Howard government, would find itself without any powerful allies if it stood in the way of international progress.

“It is difficult to imagine that Australia could stand on the sidelines,” Jackson told RenewEconomy. “China’s emissions super tanker is starting to turn. So is Australia’s, but the reason China will continue to be successful is because that they can give investors confidence that they are serious about driving low carbon development. The lessons for developed countries like Australia is that we risk being left in its wake, and washed up against the rocks if we are not careful.”

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