12 Ways to be Green on the Eastside in 2012

As this 2011 year draws to an end and we look ahead at the fresh new year, it's that time to make some Eastside Resolutions for the New Year.   Here are 12 Green ways listed with descriptions further below:

1. Energy Management

2. Water Conservation

3. Adding Redesign, to the traditional Reduce, Reuse, Recycle triangle.

A great time to increase recycling bin sizes as prices for regular garbage disposal goes up in 2012!

4. Participating in Meatless Monday

5. Joining a local CSA-farm

6. Growing your own food

7. Being an informed consumer

8. Encouraging your favorite business to join the Eastside Green Business Challenge

9. Joining a local green group, green discussion or green event on the Eastside

10. Planning your own Earth Day Celebration at your organization or business.

11. Involving youth into Green Concepts and Initiatives

12. Checking back here for continuous Eastside Green Coverage in 2012!

The first two (1.) and (2.) have been around for decades packaged as efficiency and now have a big role in resource conservation management.  Organizations now have software and professionals available to establish baselines and use metrics and find out how much is saved by a few degrees here and setting programs efficiently there. Energy Star baseline programs have been put into effect in Seattle businesses this year and have general training webinars and programs for businesses elsewhere too.

Making recycling containers as accessible as garbage bins makes recycling easy!

Jack Johnson sings about 3 being the perfect number when it comes to Reduce, Reuse and Recycling.  Redesign has been linked on to this triangle to represent that "habit part" of this combination.  Which makes (3.) the perfect number for Redesigning home and business operations to maximize green efforts.

As an example of this, Stephanie, a resident of a condo community in Redmond has redesigned her kitchen recycling routine after her association began a community-wide Food Scrap Recycling program this past year.  Now, not only are her husband's Venti Mocha cups recycled, but they also double as the daily food scrap collection container.  She says that stepping up her recycling efforts has also increased her awareness in other environmental ways, like paying attention to what type of food containers the meat she buys comes in and whether they can be recycled afterwords.

And as more attention is being brought to climate change, the notion of Meatless Monday (4.) is becoming more popular as a way to reduce one of the greenhouse gases, methane  (aka cow flatulence.!:^)  Households and organizations take one meal a week to eat vegetarian.

Chef Desmond prepares his final entree for his weekly vegetarian night's meal.

Regular customer Sebastian, pictured here with guest Jordan of Kirkland and Chef Desmond, has been a regular weekly diner at vegetarian night for the past four years since it has been offered at the Sixty-01 clubhouse.

One of my favorite ways of being greener is number (5.) in the countdown.  For the last couple of years our family has been part of the Jubilee CSA farm.  The influx of healthy local and fresh vegetables has upped our nutrition at meals and impacted our knowledge of how food goes from farm to us.  My kids now eat a number of vegetables because they have tasted them on Farmer Erick and Wendy's farm school tours straight from the fields.  The Eastside is rich in nearby CSA farms with a variety of options to tailor to each household's needs.

A similar way to connect to the environment and the food we eat is the number (6.) way.  Connect with the environment by tending one's own garden, composting table scraps on-site, perhaps raising chickens and in general have some regular nature time and very fresh food to enjoy.

Jeff adds some food scraps to his kitchen container.  Later these food scraps will be composted at Cedar Grove composting and redistributed as nutrient soil back to the community.

The (7.)th way is keep a continuous stream of green information your way via social networking sites.  Some favorite local twitter accounts with regular tweets are Ecoconsumer, Kirkland Enviro and my own twitter account at darsif.

The (8.)th way includes the Eastside Green Business program starting right away in the New Year.  Similar programs have run in cities including Chicago and have had the co-benefit of saving their businesses and communities a bundle of money as well as reducing their overall carbon footprint.

There are some great groups (9.) on the Eastside that are already planning and discussing green concepts.  Sustainable Redmond will be having a meeting this upcoming January 23rd in the evening at REI.  Other's include Cascadia Green Building Council, Cascade Land Coservancy and a group that meets in different locations over drinks to name a few.

(10.) Earth day is April 22nd in 2012!

(11.) Recent teacher and youth happenings to inspire in the New Year....

Local STEM teacher Mike Town earned the inaugural Green Prize in Public Education from the NEA foundation:  http://redmondcity.blogspot.com/2011/09/school-board-journal-q-session-with.html?spref=tw

The Cedar River Watershed project where high school students narrate through film include stewardship and sustainable principles: http://www.cedarriver.org/programs/watershed-report

(12.) And finally, check back in 2012 for some coverage on how some local businesses have gone green.  Here are some topics coming up: How green can a local Organic Coffeehouse be?; A peek-in at our local recycling sorting facility; The green ways of a local Book Exchange shop; How a local Co-op preschool has added a green program to its core operations; A local transportation company leading in green initiatives and more!