Science Exploration and more

Love the Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park - quite an extraordinary place. After ten years and $500 Mill, its finally here. Complete with 4-story rainforest, among many other wonders including the architectural design.

Besides all of the fun you can have learning and testing your science, every Thurs. night (feb-Oct) the venue is transformed into a lively urban center for music, science, mingling and other such provocations.
Schedule of events on-line


If you're in the Bay Area or NYC you may wish to catch one of Richie Havens upcoming shows at the most select venues, including the Napa Valley Opera House (3/6), Great American - SF (3/7) or Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC - 5/15. His new record out - Nobody Left to Crown.
Ray Manzarek and Robby Kreiger also play an evening at Napa Opera House this spring.

Environmental Heroes

The EPA has awarded so groups Hero Status for their efforts to reshape our future environments, bless them. For more info on the awardees


Here is an Update on our Trashy Habits posting: since have discovered the JUNK Ship project by the Algalita Marine Research Foundation - this project was among the HERO Award winners.


The Junk Ship Sails The Ocean O Plastic

Departing from Los Angeles on June 2nd for Hawaii, Algalita staff set sail on "Junk," a raft built on 15,000 plastic bottles. Their 2,100 mile journey will take them through the plastic-plagued Northern Pacific Gyre. Designed by Dr. Marcus Eriksen and Joel Paschal, the raft boasts an airplane fuselage, discarded fishing nets, a solar generator, and a wind turbine. This ambitious journey will bring further public attention to the plastic marine debris issue.

You can be a part of the journey and project via the Message in the Bottle Campaign

Other Interesting Environmental Quality Stats for those living and breathing in CA.
State Of The Air

Trashy Habits

There are still people I talk with who know nothing about "The Great Pacific Garbage Patch" . Now wondering, what has happened to this thing?

Here's the background 411

The size of this mass believe it or not equivalent to that of the continental United States.

This huge garbage island is actually two different but linked areas – The Eastern Garbage Patch, is located between Hawaii and California and said to be the size of Texas. The Western Garbage Patch, spreads from the east of Japan to the west of Hawaii.

The patches are connected by a thin 6,000-mile long current called the Subtropical Convergence Zone. The patches are a mess and mass of debris and junk, human and otherwise collected from all corners. From discarded electronics, to children toys...it is a profusion of waste. The chief concentration though is as usual - plastic, abundant and unbiodegradable.


STATES TIDY UP

A look at the states that yielded the most coastal trash collected in the 2006
Trash (in pounds)
California 989,646
North Carolina 511,647
Florida 487,290
Texas 369,380
New York 272,157
Georgia 186,827
Virginia 151,432
Source: The Ocean Conservancy

In very recent news:
According to San Francisco Chronicle,
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom Plans to Institute Policy that Would Fine for bad recycling practices.

If residents or businesses don't separate the coffee grounds from the newspapers, they would face fines of up to $1,000 and eventually could have their garbage service stopped.

The plan to require proper sorting of refuse would be the nation's first mandatory recycling and composting law. It would direct garbage collectors to inspect the trash to make sure it is put into the right blue, black or green bin, according to a draft of the legislation prepared by the city's Department of the Environment.

"If we're truly going to be the city we promote ourselves to be, a world-class, 21st century city that advances its values and principles, we're going to have to try new things," Newsom said Thursday. "People are used to doing things a certain way. And when you change that, they say it can't be done. Well, we've proved them wrong."

Intention Media's Water

"Water is the driving force of all nature."
Leonardo da Vinci

This film is about water, the most amazing yet least studied substance. From times immemorial, scientists, philosophers and theologians tried to understand its explicit and implicit properties, which are phenomenal, beyond the common physical laws of nature.


Apparently Coming to a Theatre Near YOU

Trailer

Bohemians Making Wine

Sampled the BOHO Chardonnay from at the Producers Guild mixer last night, very interesting wine from Bohemian Vineyards

Packaged in eco-friendly 3-L bag-in-box wine casks made from unbleached, natural brown, chlorine-free kraft cardboard containing recycled paper.

The Soul of Architecture

While many of us would love to live or work in an architectural wonder, few of us have the opportunity.

If William McDonough's Cradle to Cradle (C2) is any indication of a future life, we might have the experience.

Below is an excerpt from Architectural Week about C2C along with the winning design.

In 2002, architect William McDonough and chemist Michael Braungart published Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, in which they argued that energy efficiency and waste reduction are not sufficient as sustainability goals. Architects should instead aim for waste avoidance. To explore possibilities for implementation, an international Cradle to Cradle Home Design and Construction Competition called for submissions with innovative approaches to materials and systems for sustainable residential design. The winning team, from Seattle, presents their design that reflects the paradigm and vision laid out in the book. — Editor

The Cradle to Cradle (C2C) standbased on the premise that the "three Rs," reduce, reuse, recycle — all preferred alternatives to ards are simply dumping waste — are mere Band-Aids. McDonough and Braungart say we should instead eliminate waste in the first place by crafting our modern systems and patterns of living to more closely mimic natural systems, where waste does not exist.

Our design for the C2C competition doesn't just eliminate waste in its operation; it creates energy to share with neighbors and the community at large.

BoonDoggles

Writer Jeff Goodell (RollingStone) quips that the ethanol boom is just another manifestation of America's blind faith that technology will solve all our problems.

His article here