By: Richard Read, The Oregonian

Actor Larry Hagman was all about petroleum when he played oil magnateJ.R. Ewing in television’s longrunning“Dallas” series.

These days, he’s pitching solar energy with a new slogan — “Shine, baby, shine,” — soon to air on a television near you.

Hagman is the face of a new ad campaign for SolarWorld, the German company making solar cells in Hillsboro. He admits the slogan is a jab at Sarah Palin‘s “Drill, baby, drill,” refrain during the 2008 presidential campaign.

“‘Shine, baby, shine’ is an inexhaustible source of energy,” said Hagman, who plans to address the Intersolar trade show today in San Francisco. “When affordable oil gives out, we’re in real trouble — I mean the collapse of civilization, within 15 to 20 years.”

Hagman, who also acted in “I Dream of Jeannie,” is a longtime renewable-energy advocate who has installed what he believes to be the country’s largest residential solar system at his eco-estate north of Los Angeles. He’s served on the board of the Solar Electric Light Fund, or SELF, a nonprofit that brings sun-powered projects to developing countries.

Solarworld plans to donate 100 kilowatts of panels to SELF, destined to power at least five additional health clinics in Haiti.

For Hagman, though, the move toward solar is bigger than one ad campaign. “We’ve got a work force that’s looking for jobs,” he said. “We’ve got a long line of people returning from wars.”

Hagman, 78, says, “I’m well and happy and living in California, which has lots of sun.”

We’ve come a long way since the first Earth Day in 1970. Technology has made Americans more efficient and greener without even realizing it, thanks to advances ranging from cleaner car engines to LED light bulbs to programmable thermostats.

Most are cost effective, in addition to being green, which is why many of these products and ideas have stuck, says Simon Graduate School of Business Dean Mark Zupan, who studies energy and sustainability issues and the economy.  ”Whenever there’s an increase in the price of energy, concerns over the environment go up.”

Here’s a look at several everyday technologies that have made us greener over the past 40 years:

Direct deposit: It wasn’t until the late 1970s when the U.S. government began its employees directly into their bank accounts, according to Bill Dunn manager of government relations at the American Payroll Association.

Other employers began offering direct deposit in the 80s, after realizing how much money could be saved if they avoided printing checks. Today, some 66 percent of American’s whose employers offer direct deposit are using it, says Dunn. Paper checks can use more than 674 million gallons of fuel and add 3.6 million tons of carbon dioxide into the air per year as they make their way through the payment cycle, according to the Electronic Payments Association.

Cleaner cars: In the mid 1970s, catalytic converters were added to automobiles to reduce emissions following stricter regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency.

As gas prices dropped in the late 90s, the size of vehicles increased as consumers gravitated towards large, gas-sucking SUVs. Today, smaller cars and hybrids are in demand, and major automakers, such as General Motors,Ford Motor and Nissan are readying electric cars for release this year.

The progression of more fuel-efficient cars has reduced emissions 90 percent in the past 20 years, says Nabil Nasr, director of the Golisano Institute for Sustainability at Rochester Institute of Technology.

Air travel: Like cars, updates in airplane engines have made them use less fuel and fly more efficiently. Airlines have also done other tricks to save on fuel, such as not painting the body of the plane to reduce the weight of the aircraft, reducing fuel use, says Zupan.

Energy Star: Introduced in 1992 by the Environmental Protection Agency, Energy Star labeled products—ranging from computers to appliances to televisions—are appliances built to reduce energy use and cut down on greenhouse glasses.

“It also makes economical sense as well as makes the product more efficient,” says Nasr.

Energy Star says that products with their label on them helped consumers and businesses save some $17 billion in energy costs in 2009.

LED lights: Light-emitting diode bulbs, better known as LED bulbs, use less energy and last longer. Cities around the country are switching incandescent bulbs for LEDs. The city of Denver, Colo., for example, began retrofitting its traffic lights to LED in the late 1990s, a move that the city says will save them $800,000 per year in energy and labor costs and cut their carbon dioxide emissions by 2,937 tons a year.

Recycling: Hard to overlook this one. After the first Earth Day, recycling became more accepted as more Americans began separating their trash. Today, most towns and cities have recycling rules.

Technology has played a role in sorting commingled recycling—when recyclable are mixed together. They are “often separated today by mechanical equipment that uses lasers, magnets and weights of materials to accurately sort items,” says Laura Fieselman, sustainability coordinator at Meredith College. “There are usually a limited number of people involved in the process to catch any errors.”

Programmable thermostats: They’ve been around for decades (the first one was released by Honeywell in 1906), but it wasn’t until the 1970s when they became a mass-market product, says Joe Puishys, president of Honeywell’s environmental and combustion controls. The average user can save $250 to $500 a year on their energy bills, says Puishys.

From paint and batteries to wine corks and hair (really!), a little patience (and a search on Earth911.com) can make recycling these items a little easier. The list of qualified recycling candidates was long, so we figured we would feature a few more.

Blue Jeans
You know the regular routine. When you no longer need, like or fit into your jeans, you can always donate them to a charitable resale organization like Goodwill or The Salvation Army.

Blue jeans as insulation? Even top celebs are jumping on the bandwagon (way to go Adrian Grenier!). Photo: Flickr/suttonhoo
You’ve heard it a million times, so let’s not make it a million-and-one. We’re actually talking about physically recycling your jeans. After all, some clothes are just too far worn or damaged to head to a resale shop and deserve a proper [recycling] burial.

Enter pioneering companies like Green Jeans Insulation and Bonded Logic, which manufacture insulation products from recycled denim and cotton fibers. Based in Madison, Wisc., Green Jeans Insulation accepts donated jeans from the public, which are recycled into natural fiber insulation used for interior and exterior walls and ceiling applications.

The “Cotton. From Blue to Green” campaign works with schools and retailers to collect denim for processing into UltraTouch Natural Fiber Insulation, manufactured by Bonded Logic, and is donated to help rebuild communities in need. To date, they have received more than 180,000 pieces of denim, used to insulate homes with Habitat for Humanity.

Automotive Fluids
Are you a DIYer when it comes to car care? Many of the fluids that power your car are actually recyclable once you change them out, most notably used motor oil and antifreeze.

Used motor oil can be re-refined into brand new product that can go back into your car, recycled into clean lubricant or burned as fuel. As long as the used oil hasn’t been contaminated with other fluids, most oil change service companies or auto parts stores accept used motor oil for recycling from the public.

Used antifreeze can also be recycled by filtering out contaminants such as lead, then restoring the original properties through stabilizing additives. The recycled product is not only excellent quality, but it can also be less expensive to purchase and has a smaller carbon footprint. Antifreeze should never be left out or dumped as its sweet taste can poison animals and children.

Gift Cards, Hotel Key Cards and Wallet Waste Galore
A five minute clean-out of your wallet, purse or junk drawer is likely to yield a lot of plastic, from used gift cards to old library cards. Insignificant as they may seem, those cards are typically made of a plastic resin called polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which is infinitely recyclable yet most often landfilled, contributing to more than 75 million pounds of PVC entering the waste stream each year.

In the past, the magnetic strips in the cards made recycling a challenge, but more companies are beginning to accept the PVC cards to convert into new ones. Cleveland-based Earthworks System accepts PVC cards for recycling from consumers and retailers via collection and mail-in programs. The PVC cards are chopped up and melted into PVC sheets which are then sold to create new cards.

Cooking Oil
Cooking oil recycling has grown leaps and bounds in the last few years as its value to the biofuel industry has increased. While it may seem natural to pour your leftover cooking oil and grease down the drain, it can actually be harmful to wildlife and the environment and damage your pipes and local sewage systems. In fact, cooking oil and kitchen grease in our plumbing is the No. 1 cause of stopped-up sewer pipes.

Commercial facilities already contribute substantial amounts of used oil to alternative fuel programs, but there are household cooking oil recycling programs as well. Make a designated waste oil container, label it and add to it each time there is leftover oil from your cooking. Then search for a recycling location on Earth911 or contact local restaurants to see if they accept the cooking oil for recycling.

Six-Pack Beverage Rings
Those plastic six-pack beverage rings have definitely received their share of criticism over the years. Like any packaging material, however, they are not meant to end up in waterways or public spaces at end of life.

While they often get a bad rap, plastic six-pack rings are meant to be properly recycled in order to avoid contaminating the waterways and choking wildlife. Photo: Flickr/Louis Abate
The rings are made of plastic #4 (LDPE) and can be recycled in programs that accept low-density polyethylene resin. If your curbside recycling program is limited to plastics #1 and #2, or limits the types of LDPE accepted, consider getting a group collection together and participating in the Hi-Cone Ring Leader Recycling Program.

Hi-Cone’s Ringleader program will accept the six-pack rings in large quantities for recycling through various school programs, as well as through the mail. The company has worked with more than 12,000 schools and groups to collected and recycle the used rings.

A little known fact: Six-pack plastic beverage rings are actually photodegradable. Federal law has required the rings to be 100 percent photodegradable since 1989, meaning that, over time, the sunlight will break down the plastic into tiny pieces.

Makeup Containers
If you’re anything like said author, you have makeup in drawers and cabinets that you haven’t touched since the crimping iron was a regular part of your morning routine. OK, bit of an exaggeration there, but the truth is that many of us keep makeup around long after its expiration date has come and gone. (Check out our “360: Cosmetics” to find the average shelf life is for your makeup products.)

Cosmetic and toiletry bottles, tubes and containers are commonly made of plastic #5, which is not a common material collected for recycling.

Origins was the pioneer nationwide cosmetic company to offer consumer cosmetic packaging recycling, regardless of brand. Empty cosmetic tubes, bottles, lipstick covers, jars and caps can be brought to an Origins retail store or department store counter nationwide for recycling or energy recovery. As an added bonus, customers will receive a free sample of an Origins skincare product for bringing in their empty containers.

MAC cosmetics accepts its packaging back for recycling either in-store or online, and you receive a free MAC lipstick with the return of six containers.

Snack Wrappers, Drink Pouches and Chip Bags Galore
Any idea what material candy wrappers, drink pouches and chip bags are made of? If you answered “no,” you’re not alone as this is a common question we get asked a lot. This confusion is usually what makes these wrappers and bags so difficult to recycle. These items tend to be made of mixed materials, making the recovery of useful plastics and other materials difficult and expensive. In other words, most recyclers don’t want to touch the stuff!

But upcycling company TerraCycle has made a name of creatively reusing these snack wrappers, drink pouches, candy wrappers and chip bags. The company turns them into school supplies, bags, toys, pet products, household cleaner bottles and even materials for your garden.

Consumers can make some extra cash by sending in their “trash” to Terracycle. Drop it off at one of the thousands of participating locations or join a brigade to raise money for a school or nonprofit organization.

Sports Items
Similar to clothing, we all know the drill. There is always an organization or school out there that is eager to accept your unwanted sports items. But what about those old tennis balls that have simply lost their bounce? Or those running shoes you know wouldn’t make it past the sorting area of your local thrift store?

Let Fido have those tennis balls with the teeth holes or slobber on them as they are usually not accepted for recycling if not in better condition. Photo: Flickr/TCL8TO7
Tennis Balls: Rebounces accepts old tennis balls for recycling and refurbishing. The company will even e-mail you a prepaid shipping label to cover your expenses. Those brightly colored tennis balls should still be of reasonable quality, and you should wait until you’ve saved up a large amount.

Golf Balls: According to Arizona-based Dixon Golf, more than 300 million golf balls are discarded in the U.S. each year. That’s enough golf balls to make a solid line from Los Angeles to London! You can bring in golf balls to a Dixon Golf retail location or mail them in for recycling. Added bonus: Recycling Dixon brand golf balls will earn you a $1 towards a new ball (or 50 cents for other brands).

Ski Equipment: When your skis or snowboards just aren’t cutting (or carving) it anymore, consider recycling them instead of tossing them. Vermont-based Green Mountain Ski Furniture will recycle those old skis and snowboards and turn them into furniture and art. If you happen to live in Vermont, they’ll even pick up your old equipment for you!

Colorado Ski & Golf aims to keep obsolete ski equipment out of the landfills by accepting skis, snowboards, bindings, boots and poles for recycling or refurbishing. Also, newer organizations like Montana-based Ski Recycling and Promotion (SKRAP) are growing in popularity as sustainability and landfill diversion awareness grows in the industry.

Appliances…Recycle Them While They’re Hot
In case you haven’t heard, Cash for Appliances is the next government-funded program offering cash incentives for green improvements. If you trade-up your dishwasher, refrigerator or clothes washer, know that the old one is recyclable. In many cases, power companies offer free pick-up of your old appliances and provide you a cash rebate in return.

Appliances are largely comprised of steel, which is the most commonly recycled material in North America, according to the Steel Recycling Institute. In the recycling process, the appliances are shredded and the metal is removed for reprocessing. In some cases, the plastic components are turned into new material, but they can also be used as landfill cover.

The key challenge with appliances is the presence of Freon, which is DuPont’s trade name for the gas that cools appliances like air conditioners and refrigerators. For appliances that contain Freon, there can be a fee to properly remove it.

Keys
Keys, keys and more keys. We have keys for our front door, our cars, filing cabinets and more. And most of us are guilty of throwing them in a junk drawer or tossing them in a box in the garage when we move or change locks. Keys For Kindness is a small, family-run program designed to raise money through metal key recycling for the Multiple Sclerosis society. Though the shipping expenditure is on your own dime, we’re sure the good karma will be worthwhile.

Source: Earth911
By: Lori Brown
Photo: Suttonhoo

According to the National Household Travel Survey by the U. S. Department of Transportation, 90.8% of us drive to work during the week, and the average vehicle occupancy is a mere 1.14. Our commute averages about 12.10 miles.

But adults age 35 to 44 spend over 80 minutes each day in a car! Thanks to more solo drivers on the road, it takes longer to get anywhere. Surely a few of us can drive together, especially during peak commute hours.

Check out the real costs of commuting by yourself. Pretty high, huh? What if you cut out one day a week?

Try starting with Fridays so you’ll begin the weekend feeling refreshed. Alternate who drives, and track how much gas money you save. Once you and your carpool partner get in the habit, add another day. Edmunds.com has useful tips for setting up a carpool.

This directory has links to online rideshare databases where you can find people to carpool with. You can even use tools like ZimRide or GoLoco to find carpools on Facebook.

The University of South Florida has a summary of the tax benefits available to commuters and employers. Large companies may have carpool programs already. If not, show your HR department this info. and help set up a rideshare list.

Want to go a step further? Try public transportation, or see how walkable your town is. Encourage your kids to walk or bike to school. Use a bike for your commute and errands.

Try living without a car completely. Sound crazy? Well, you’ll save money, and you’ll eliminate tons of harmful CO2 from the atmosphere. And you don’t have to live in a big city either. I live in suburban California (notorious for poor public transit), and I’ve never had a driver’s license or owned a car. I take the bus, walk, and carpool everywhere.

It’s not the simplest way to live, but neither is having four kids or being vegetarian, which plenty of people do. When you don’t drive, you have to plan some things in advance. But you’re also freed from car insurance and registration fees, and you don’t care about gas prices.

Just start small with a weekly carpool. You’ll be surprised at how much you don’t need a car on hand.

Source: Yahoo

More than 1 million U.S. households now receive reports on how their energy consumption compares with their neighbors as utilities encourage conservation, some with smiley faces for those doing well.

The reports — deployed by 25 utilities, including six of the 10 biggest — have resulted in households cutting energy use an average of 2% to 3%, says Alex Laskey, co-founder of Opower, which provides the reports.

While that may sound small, the savings add up. The Sacramento Municipal Utility District, which started sending the reports to 35,000 households in 2008, says the households saved enough energy in a year to power 800 homes for a year.

Dozens of companies provide products to help consumers manage home energy use, such as websites to monitor use. Opower is somewhat “unique in that it discusses the social norm,” says Teresa Mastrangelo, analyst with researcher Smart Grid Trends. “Everybody gets a utility bill. Few understand what the numbers mean,” she says.

Opower’s reports don’t reveal specifics on how particular neighbors use energy. Instead, they compare a household’s use to 100 similar-size homes in the same area. Opower, founded in 2007, also gathers such data as the home’s age and construction type, which may reveal how well insulated it is, along with the number of people in the house or whether it has a pool, which drives up energy use. With data, Opower can personalize conservation tips. For instance, houses with heavy air conditioning use may benefit from more fans.

Utilities use different ways to tell consumers where they stand. The Sacramento utility sent its first reports with frown faces for those consuming more energy than their neighbors. “They didn’t like it,” says project manager Alexandra Crawford. The utility dropped the frowns.

In Minnesota, Connexus Energy first told consumers they were “below average” if their energy use exceeded that of their neighbors. “We learned people don’t like being called below average,” says Bruce Sayler, manager of regulatory affairs for Connexus. Now, consumers are told they use more energy than neighbors.

While some consumers have objected to the reports as too Big Brotherish, complaints are few. In Massachusetts, National Grid started sending reports to 50,000 customers last year. Project manager Monica Ibrahim says fewer than 20 customers have opted not to participate. National Grid saw a more than 1% drop in home energy use in the first two months and expects that to climb, Ibrahim says. National Grid expects to expand the program this spring to a territory in Upstate New York.

The privately held Opower had 11 utility clients at the end of 2008. In the past year, it’s more than doubled the number of households served, Laskey says.

Source: USA Today Julie Schmit