ZERO waste

Zero waste is a really cool concept....and there are companies implementing it. I work at REI, and as a company, we try really hard to help out the environment. The company is trying to go to ZERO waste within the next few years. It is awesome to be seeing it happen. When we unload boxes at REI, we send them back the distribution center to be reused. How cool is that?! That's just a little part of whats going on, but there is a lot more for sure

Green Jobs

I liked Joe's lecture. But, was it about green jobs? He told us problems, and not enough opportunities and solutions. It seemed like we discussed alternative energy, but not too much detail in actual green jobs. However, I liked Joe's speech. It showed us a lot of good things, and as far as jobs go, at the very least we know where NOT to get a job.

EARTH DAY

I think that Earth day is something important. It gives our world a chance to exchange ideas in an organized fashion. It promotes awareness about our world. Good things come from Earth Day. Earth Day at Sierra College was really fun. I met a lot of good people doing good things. Next year, I want to help make Earth day even bigger and more impacting. Earth day can be a refreshing moment for some.....I try to live every day like Earth Day, but on the designated day, I really reevaluate and rededicate myself to our home.....EARTH

Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Originally I was opposed to drilling in the ANWR (please forgive me for the acronym) due to sheer moral ideas. We were set it aside to protect it, so let's protect it. NOW, however, I have a different idea. The layout of the rigs and roads right in the calfing area........."only" 2,000 acres.....this would be devastating to this ecosystem. The water needed that would make the fish go extinct......insane! I wish the general public was educated on this, because I think it might change A LOT of people's minds.

When You Change The Way You Look At Things....

I am not sure how this class has affected me. I think that it let me know there are SOME people in our area that care about what's happening to our home, Earth. Like most things, I will know how this has changed me in the next few years, when looking back in retrospect. I gained some knowledge, however I feel like I am well versed in many of these subjects. Also, I really did enjoy a lot of the speakers. It's nice to hear from people who are well educated about diverse, yet similar subjects. I increased my knowledge here as well. In class, my goal is to increase my knowledge, and that goal has already been met in this class with a few more weeks to go.

How to Sustain Our Existance....

I think that this was a reasonably good speech. I do have a bone to pick with some things, however. Green energies and energies that save us money are both GOOD things. Much better than what we have now. But I think that we are missing something. If we could generate all the energy we need today by using green energy, I feel like everything would be covered by solar panels, every river would be dammed (or damned), and every open field would have windmills on it. We need an energy plan to reduce our energy. Technologies do indeed play an important role. But we as a society need to reduce our consumption of our energy. We can't leave our lights on just because they are compact florescent. We can't run the heater all day because our power is wind generated. We need to change our behaviors. Although windmills are a good way of generating clean energy, we still need to use land and invade habitats. Soon we will be fighting with ExxonWind to see if put windmills in ANWR. Green technologies are not THE solution, but rather a mere part of the solution. The biggest change needs to happen within us all and therefore, within society.

That being said, we can all benefit from green energies. It is very important for us as a community to support green energies and try to move away from dirty petro and nuclear energies to rally against global climate change.

BLACK GOLD!

Ughhhhhh. Can't we just use it all up so we don't have to hear about OIL anymore? Please make it stop! But honestly, oil is a huge issue in our world today. War, climate change, economic hardship, terrorism......it can be a contributing factor to all of these. Our speaker worked for exxon mobile.....funny. Although he seemed relatively neutral, we must ask our selves..."what does this person have to gain by me believing him...." as instructed to do so several times in our class. One of the best parts of this was the graph on plants that are most productive for making biofuels. I always thought ethanol from corn was a DUMB idea. So much of our grain goes to feeding livestock, and livestock is so subsidized by the government that it would be insane to give corn to our cars (unless we could all go veggie.......anyone? No? okay, just making sure people are still unwilling to give up their meat....). But seeing that certain plants might, and I say might, be able to lend us a hand with at least SOME kind of fuel addition.....thats at the very least encouraging. Lets grow that oil producing grass in Africa where it's native and promote a diverse ecosystem there while growing it, and having the people who own the land make money and make sure both parties on both sides are getting a fair trade. It's like shadegrown, organic, fair trade coffee, but for fuel and with grass. Now that's a decent idea. Our speaker told us that our energy needs are going to take REAL innovation. I am a optmistic realist. I feel like this will be hard, but.....uhhhh WE CAN FLY THROUGH THE AIR IN A F****ING CHAIR. We can go to the moon. Our cell phones talk to satellites in SPACE........in a matter of SECONDS. "Necessity is the mother of invention". Well, Earth, we need some new energy. Let's get our brains thinking