Watch the long video:

Energy-related economic, security, and environmental threats are intensifying the national conversation about how to regain energy leadership and competitiveness, restore jobs and prosperity, and build a secure and climate-safe energy system.

Yet America lacks a comprehensive vision of how a market economy can achieve these transformational goals.

RMI has that vision, and is now building its detailed roadmap, which we call Reinventing Fire™. This strategy will bring together RMIs 28 years of innovation and engage the world in our most ambitious and important work yet—using whole-system thinking and integrative design to move the U.S. off fossil fuels by 2050, led by business for profit.

Buy the book

The post Reinventing Fire appeared first on EcoHustler.

It seems that online shopping is becoming more popular each and every year, and some of the main reasons for the trend are easy to see. Most significantly, online shopping seems to simply be more convenient than retail shopping, as it allows consumers the ability to browse, choose, and order products from the comfort of their own homes. Additionally, online shopping can often end up being more affordable, as the discounts, coupons, and even base prices of many products online are often favourable. But there is a third reason that online shopping has become the preference of many people all over the world: it often has less of an environmental impact than retail shopping.

To most shoppers, environmental impact doesn’t really seem like a topic of concern with specific regard to shopping. However, there are several ways in which online shopping – whether at a large scale online store like Amazon, or a niche store like http://mysmartbuy.com – is the more environmentally responsible option. Here are a few details.

Less Driving
The clearest environmental benefit of online shopping is that it reduces driving needs. For many people, shopping is an activity that can take them all over town, stopping at a number of different malls and stores – which, of course, involves a good deal of driving and fuel consumption. Reducing fuel emissions and driving dependency is one of the most significant environmental efforts in the world, and doing a majority of your shopping online is a good way to contribute.

Less Packaging
Another key worldwide environmental effort is the reduction of material consumption. When you shop retail in person, the chances are good that you will end up with a number of different bags and/or boxes, which will simply be discarded once you get home. Shopping online is more efficient with regard to packaging – typically, everything you order will come in the smallest possible box, which means that ultimately fewer materials are used and ultimately disposed of.

Responsible Returns
Also with regard to the waste of materials, many people who shop online are more likely to return unwanted products. Sometimes it can be hard to find time to make returns around town at different stores, which means people who shop retail are often more likely to waste purchased goods. Returns can be done more conveniently and efficiently through online shopping, meaning you will be less likely to waste products that end up unwanted.

Purchase Of Green Products
Finally, it is also worth noting that it can be easier to find green products online, simply due to the massive selection of online stores. Environmentally responsible products are certainly available in many retail stores, but finding them can be more difficult in person. Shopping online affords you the opportunity to seek out and rely on these products. ‘

The post The Environmental Benefits Of Online Shopping appeared first on EcoHustler.

In the garbage, I see a rose.

In the rose, I see the garbage.

Everything is in transformation.

Even permanence is impermanent.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Two years ago EcoHustler explored the curse you put on your relationship by giving a Valentines gift with a dire ethical footprint in How Deep Is Your Love. The following year we looked at ethical alternatives in Turbo-Charge Your Love. This year we are keeping it short ‘n sweet with 3 reasons not to buy roses this V Day:

1. Ten thousand tons of roses are shipped from Kenya to England for Valentines Day. Kenya is a poor African country, highly susceptible to fluctuations in weather, prone to drought and last year suffered a serious famine affecting 10 million people. That gift to your lover is the biological capacity of Africa diverted from either feeding Kenyans or maintaining the local ecosystem distilled into a disposable product. As the roses rot in an English landfill vital goodness has passed from the Kenyan soil to a plastic lined cesspit via giant planes spewing greenhouse gas; nice gift!
2. The roses are grown in massive greenhouses on Lake Naivasha. The lake is withering away, the hippos are gone, the shore is crowded and polluted. In ten years the lake will have disappeared like the Aral Sea. The land will be dead and the multinational companies profiteering from the business will move to other similar lakes, for example in Ethiopia.
3. Your hard earned wages go into the pockets of unscrupulous English supermarkets and international agribusinesses that will do anything to turn a quick buck, including sticking a label on Kenyan roses saying ‘ethical’ despite the fact that the whole process is fundamentally unsustainable and absolutely immoral. Nobody benefits from the business apart from some corporate drones who manage to keep the suicide economy chewing up what is left of nature for a little while longer.

Don’t buy roses out of season. Give your lover something special. Like a meal, massage or ménage a tois!

“See roses really smell like POO-OO-OO
Yeah, roses really smell like POO-OO-OO”

The post Roses Are Shit appeared first on EcoHustler.

This fun animation provides a vision of what a post-consumer society could look like, with people working fewer hours and pursuing re-skilling, homesteading, and small-scale enterprises that can help reduce the overall size and impact of the consumer economy. Narrated by economist and best-selling author Juliet Schor (http://www.julietschor.org).

Animation by Squid and Beard: http://www.squidandbeard.com

Produced by the Center for a New American Dream. Learn more at http://www.newdream.org

The post Visualizing a Plenitude Economy appeared first on EcoHustler.

“Without our support the banking scam fails”

The post Banking – the Greatest Scam on Earth appeared first on EcoHustler.

www.energyautonomy.org

Short Trailer

Longer Trailer Here

The post The Fourth Revolution: Energy Autonomy appeared first on EcoHustler.