Steve A. Parker asked:


Going green? In the wake of films like An Inconvenient Truth, presenting a greener reputation to the public may be a matter of business survival. As environmental consciousness becomes a mainstream concern, proving your company’s commitment to green thinking involves adopting practices that make sense for your business and are earth friendly.

Selecting green products and adopting greener practices is not enough. For the most credible commitment and the greatest impact for your company’s reputation, certification is also required to present a best practices reputation for your company.

Greener Commercial Painting Products

A host of new products are entering the market every year to fill the green products niche for commercial buildings. Some of these products are cleaner variants of traditional paints, while others use high tech production techniques to achieve their effects.

100 Percent Acrylic Paint: Using this paint helps out a company’s performance on indoor air quality tests. From a performance standpoint, the 100 percent acrylic paints are a great choice for most indoor applications. They resist dirt and cracking and have a good dry time. From a green commercial painting standpoint, 100 percent acrylics have a very low VOC content, which helps in locations where chemical sensitivities are an issue.

Silicate Paints: For exterior commercial painting projects, silicate paints are a great way to make your facility a little greener. Silicate paints are made from natural materials and are suited for covering concrete, masonry or gypsum wallboard. Potassium silicate binders give silicate paints good adhesion capability, and additional natural minerals add color.

Soy Ester Paint Stripper: Commercial restoration projects are often big sources of toxic products. Thinning agents and chemical strippers create a soup of harmful chemicals. By using products that replace the harmful ingredients with soy esters, your painting project can help improve the green image of your building. Soy esters are also used to make more environmentally friendly graffiti removers. These products allow you to incorporate greener practices with everyday maintenance routines.

Certification for a Greener Commercial Building

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is an independent certification program developed by the United States Green Building Council (USGBC). The USGBC is made up of building and construction professionals who believe that greener buildings are viable and sustainable.

LEED publishes a set of procedural guidelines for commercial buildings. Participation in the program is completely voluntary. If a company chooses to take part in LEED certification, the company is graded according to its compliance with the LEED guidelines. Platinum certification indicates the highest level of compliance, and is a verifiable credential for companies wishing to establish a greener reputation.

Greener Commercial Painting

If you have questions or concerns about incorporating greener products and practices into your next project, contact your painting contractor for more information.



LIONEL

Anthony Fontanelle asked:


In the auto industry, the month of April is being celebrated as the National Alternative Fuel Autos Month, and in observing that, automakers reported the number of alternative fuel vehicles in the state of California.

It is widely known that the mentioned state is one of the major frontrunners in the battle against global warming in the United States. The numbers of alternative fuel vehicles on California’s roads were reported to have increased in the year 2006 as compared to the number of alternative fuel vehicles back in 2005.

R.L Polk and Co. undertook the study to find out the number of alternative fuel vehicles on the state of California. The research firm reported that in 2006, the number of alternative fuel automobiles in the state reaches 837,743. That number includes different alternative fuel vehicle types which includes hybrid electric cars, E-85 fuel vehicles, and vehicles running on bio-diesel. The said number shows a 17 percent increase in the number of alternative fuel vehicles in the state compared to 2005 figures. R.L Polk and Co. also reported that California has the second most number of alternative fuel vehicles on its roads for the mentioned periods.

The research firm also reported that the combined sales of auto manufacturers of alternative fuel autos reached 1.5 million for the year of 2006. That number exceeds the expected sales figures set by automakers in the country by 50 percent. That marks the most number of alternative fuel vehicles sold in the United States in a year. That also brings the total number of alternative fuel automobiles in the country to 10.5 million through 2006.

And considering the increasing demand for such vehicles and the sales figures for companies producing those vehicles, it seems that that number would continually increase over the next few years.

Dave McCurdy, the president of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, has this to say about the current trend concerning the sale of alternative fuel vehicles: “I am pleased to see that the sales of Alternative Fuel Autos are rising. The auto industry is a dynamic high-tech sector and manufacturers are committed to selling vehicles that can run on something other than just gasoline. Consumers are taking notice.” He also added that: “Automakers believe that consumer awareness, fueling infrastructure and government incentives all work together to help put more Alternative Fuel Autos on the roads.”

The increased number of alternative fuel vehicles on the country’s roads is the direct effect of the wide range of alternative fuel vehicles being offered by car manufacturers. This year, there are 60 models of alternative fuel vehicles available in the U.S. auto market. In 2000, the number of models offered to the public is only 12. The number of gas-electric hybrid, bio-ethanol, and bio-diesel engined vehicles has shown an increased number and more are on the way with car manufacturers move to address the demand for such fuel efficient vehicles.

Aside from these technologies, car manufacturers are also developing newer technologies which allow conventional gasoline engines to consume less fuel. In the case of Nissan, they are pushing the use of the continuously variable transmission to reduce fuel consumption. Deactivation of one or more cylinders of a vehicle’s engine while cruising is also another technology and technique which is currently being used by car manufacturers to reduce fuel consumption of their vehicles.

Regenerative braking is also another technology used by auto makers and this technology is complemented well with efficient brake components such as those found at EBC active brakes direct.

Although there are a huge number of alternative fuel vehicles on the country’s roads, there is still a lot of work that needs to be done. A concrete example of this is the practicality of vehicles which can run on E85 fuel. The use of bio-ethanol reduces the amount of greenhouse gases and also reduces the dependency of the country on foreign oil.

The most pressing problem though is the availability of bio-ethanol refilling stations. This means that there are a lot of alternative fuel vehicles which still runs on gasoline instead of the more environment friendly bio-ethanol.



ROBIN

m.jeya asked:


Katiewong made from the highest quality fragrance, organic soy and lead-free wicks, Kobo full-bodied candles are also environmentally friendly. The candles are decorative and reusable storage. Each candle burns approximately 70 hours and includes coordinating matches. Our soy candles are hand-poured. Our soy candles burn longer and cooler than paraffin candles. Our soy candles have 100% cotton/hemp wicks.

Santal pure soy candle offer a totally new experience in quality, beauty, and romantic light. Our unique pillar candle design in different sizes, with scrumptious fragrance and gorgeous color will enhance any room in your home. For those who are passionate about remarkable scents, the Santal candle is a magical experience. Made from the highest quality fragrance, this full-bodied candle exudes passion and charm.

KOBO line of soy candles are hand-poured with 100% domestically pure soy wax. They feature lead free, environmentally safe cotton wicks. Which are all candles are nice. We love earth-friendly products, we really do, but with scents as rich and complex and packaging this great, it’s easy to forget that one is saving the world. The candles are Cotton wicks to create the cleanest burning, most planet friendly candle on the market. The high quality candle is packaged in a beautiful printed decorative box. The Kobo candles are perfect for a gift.

Our Katiewongnyc.com soy candles are handcrafted for quality and elegant beauty in a wide variety of candle scents. Our jar candles and pillar candles come scented or unscented and are hand-poured with the finest pure soy candle wax. Soy candle characteristics include biodegradable, long burning, clean burning, complete burning, and virtually soot free. Candles are made of high quality, organic soy wax and 100% cotton wicks.

Kobo Santal Pure Soy Candle are created by and for those passionate about remarkable scents. Natural, clean and made from a renewable resource. It’s a perfect candle for a healthy and environmentally conscious lifestyle. Sometimes, good things come in beautiful packages. Each and every Kobo candle is hand poured using domestically grown pure soy wax and lead free, environment-safe cotton wicks to create the cleanest burning, most planet friendly candle on the market. Please purchase online www.katiewongnyc.com in Newyork.



VIRGINIA

Iprwire Staff Writer asked:


Our earth is everyone’s responsibility. We all want to have a healthy environment to pass on to our children, but it can often seem like eco-friendly behavior is difficult to attain. Environmentally conscious consumers will be happy to hear that more and more earth friendly product lines are being developed to make healthy living simple and convenient.

Living an earth loving life is not just good for the environment in the long run, it is also good for your health immediately. The chemical products that have become so ubiquitous in our society’s day to day life are making people very sick. Research is now linking chemicals found in everyday household products to a prevalence of allergic reactions, occurrences of asthmatic attacks, and even the rise of cancer. An earth friendly product provides a healthy alternative that will work great and not make people sick.

There are many harmful aspects of our homes that we have little control over. It is unfortunate, but many of us live in homes that were built in ways that are not ecologically friendly. Although many people are not aware of it, their homes are filled with pollutants in the form of paint, fabrics, and the very building materials that hold up the roof. These products emit fumes and gases that actually cause the air inside a house to be more polluted than the air outside.

Although homeowners tend to start in an environmental deficit, this does not mean that they cannot make their houses healthy over time. Natural home products have been developed for all aspects of life, including home building materials, chemical free cleaning products, organic foods, natural beauty products, and environmentally friendly fabrics. By always selecting an earth friendly product, consumers can ensure that everything new entering the house will contribute to the overall good of the family’s health and the environment’s future.

There is now no excuse for using chemical based products. First, it is easy to find retailers that carry natural products. Shoppers no longer have to go to specialty stores because the earth friendly product they desire is likely stocked on their local store’s shelf and can even be found online. Second, as the products gain strong fan bases, clear favorites are starting to stand out. Next time you are out shopping, look to see which products most people are reaching for. Finally, unlike before, natural products are very competitively priced, making them affordable for all budgets.



KENDRA

Gregg Hall asked:


There are many alternative fuels available on the market today. President Bush seems to be on a mission stating that Americans are “addicted” to oil.

Alternative fuel is quickly replacing gasoline, resulting in fewer pollution and cost efficiency. The U.S. Department of Energy is guiding the efforts due to a need to limit air pollution levels to protect human health and the environment. The following are a list of alternative fuels that are becoming more and more mainstream. Eventually, these fuels will replace our dependency on gasoline.

Ethanol is a fuel made from crop grain. It is a renewable fuel. Ethanol is used in 10 percent blends with gasoline to create gasohol. Ethanol is not considered an alternative fuel unless it is mixed at 85 percent with gasoline to create E-85. You will start to see E-85 being provided at all major gas stations in the very near future.

Another alternative fuel that is replacing gasoline is Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG). LPG consists mainly of propane, propylene, butane and butylenes in various mixtures. LPG is a byproduct of natural gas processing and petroleum refining. LPG can also be produced domestically; therefore, lessening our reliance on foreign companies to provide our fuel.

Methanol is an alcohol free fuel. A process using natural gas as a feedstock produces methanol. The alternative Methanol fuel is being used as M-85.

Biofuels are also beginning to enter the mainstream. Biofuels are chemicals made from cellulosic biomass such as herbaceous and woody pulp from agricultural and forestry residues. A majority of biofuels consists of municipal waste and industrial waste. Biofuels are also domestically grown, reducing our reliance on other countries to supply our fuels.

Finally, good old electricity is being tapped into to help power vehicles, known as hybrids. Batteries provide the electricity used to power these vehicles. The batteries are charged from electricity that is produced at a power plant. Power plants utilize fossil fuels to produce energy. There are no emissions from a hybrid, which is good for the environment.

We have listed several alternative fuels that are going to continue to replace gasoline on a massive level. These fuels are better for our health and for the health of the environment. They also will cut our reliance on foreign countries to provide us with our fuel. The end result will be lower costs at the pump.



MILDRED

Matthew Hick asked:


With soaring gas prices, and concerns about the effects fossil fuel use is having on the environment, researchers are scrambling to find alternative fuel options for America’s dependence on foreign oil. While others are being studied, there are currently several promising fuel options already in limited use across the nation:

Biodiesel:

One of cleanest, cheapest and easiest fuel options to implement, biodiesel, fuel can be made from vegetable and soy bean oils and animal fats, as well as recycled restaurant grease.

In its pure form (100%), biodiesel is a clean-burning fuel that emits very little air pollutants, and would help reduce dangerously high levels of hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and sulfates in the air, by limiting the use of traditional petroleum products.

Switching the average consumer to biodiesel fuel may be one of the easiest and cheapest transfers among all the alternative fuel sources available. Most cars and trucks built since 1994 are designed to already accept biodiesel fuel with little or no modifications. No new or special pumps are needed to make it available to the public, and according to a recent study by the United States Department of Energy, current U.S. stockpiles of soybean and other usable foodstuffs are currently available to produce nearly 2 billion gallons of biodiesel. That’s just 5% of America’s annual fuel usage.

Ethanol:

Once considered the alternative fuel of choice, ethanol has taken a back burner to other options in recent years as critics contend that it takes more energy to make it than Americans will save using it. Still, research continues to find ways to make this fuel option easier to make. Ethanol is a clear, colorless fuel that is made by distilling ground corn, and other high-sugar plants (such as sugar beets, grasses and even some fast-growing trees), into grain alcohol using a wet-milling process.

Electricity:

A completely clean fuel, interest in using electricity to fuel cars is rising. While storage capacity is small in most current models, limiting the amount of miles an electric car can drive before needing to recharge, solar and wind power may be a “recharging” option in the future, making the electric car more accessible and usable for the average driver.

Hydrogen:

Hydrogen is used to grow fuel cells that can be converted into electricity for cars. Although Hydrogen emissions are low, critics contend that since it is made from burning fossil fuels such as coal, gas and nuclear energy, it isn’t a viable large-scale alternative for lowering the country’s gas consumption.

Methanol:

Also known as wood alcohol, methanol can be used in an 85% (methanol) - 15% (gasoline), mix in flexible fuel vehicles. Blended with gasoline to enhance the octane and provide a cleaner fuel, methanol is produced by reforming natural gas to create a synthetic gas fed into a reactor to produce methane and water vapor. While the technology showed promise at first, most car manufacturers eventually stopped producing flexible fuel vehicles when concerns rose over contaminated ground water produced during the methanol production process.

While alternatives due exist for our country’s reliance on fuel, more research is needed to find the best source to replacing our dependence on fossil fuels.



SIMON

Don Willson asked:


A lot of things have changed since I was a youngster. I remember the day when I worked on the corner gas station pumping gas, cleaning windows and checking oil, the last two of which you find very few stations doing anymore. The whole idea of “full-service” is pretty much a thing of the past, however this is a subject for a different article. During those days I had the part-time job at the gas station, the ozone layer was something that astronomers and astronauts worried about and not something that he had to worry about breaking down thereby burning a hole in this beloved planet we live on.

The cost of gas was $.16 a gallon - yes you heard me - $.16 a GALLON! We drove cars that got on a good day 18 miles per gallon and it didn’t break the bank or increase the interest rate on your credit card just to fill up the tank. We would ask mom and dad for a five spot to go cruising up and down the main drag, not the credit card charge of $30 or more that it takes now. It’s no wonder that the old folks (like myself) who are now the parents of children cruisin’ the drag came up with the idea of alternative fuels to try and save ourselves a few bucks at the pump as well as save the planet that we so dearly love and yet manage to almost destroyed the last 30 years or so.

One solution to this has been to make engines smaller, cars smaller and sometimes I even wonder if they’ve made people smaller - because I sure can’t fit in these boxes. I actually saw a car that couldn’t have been more than a lawnmower engine with wheels, which were no larger than the ones I used to make my go carts out of when I was (once again) a kid! The car itself was boxy and it did sound a lot like a lawnmower going down the street but hey - I am sure it got great gas mileage!

Another solution is to change the gasoline we run our cars on. What does this mean? Well, we remove the lead, an anti-knock agent which was needed in the old days because we didn’t have super computers tuning our cars for us as we drive. We eliminated High octane fuel which to tell the truth pretty much killed a lot of the old muscle cars (Ahh.. the sound of a big V8 in the morning!). and then, we added ethanol (grain alcohol) to the gas to try to thin it out and help it run cleaner. A step in the right direction but personally, I always like my grain alcohol with a twist and just a plash of gin!

The other solution we have come up with alternative fuels. So far these consist of been added it to the fuels we’ve reduced or eliminated lead in the fuel which was an anti-knock agent but it did so pollute our atmosphere in which since replaced it with grain alcohol (funny I used to look at that as a kid to drink not to run my car on). The grain alcohol is supposed to reduce emissions while at the same time converting some of the emissions to water vapor that goes into the doesn’t do any good but it doesn’t do as much harm. But this is not the solution.

They did have come out with hybrid cars now which run on electricity the last word a combination of gasoline and electricity switching back and forth between the two is the load on the engine dictates. You have to admit this is a pretty smart idea however and makes for a maintenance nightmare because of the weight of the batteries carried in the car cancel out any real advantage of having a hybrid car in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, it does some good just not enough to make a difference.

You also have the companies and entrepreneurs that are working on pure electric cars. Unfortunately these haven’t made a big impact on the road right now because it requires so many batteries at the car is incredibly heavy and the batteries and the batteries don’t have a long life in the car so they have to be replaced sooner than any engine overhaul would take place. This is a very expensive ordeal as well as you have to find a specialty shop to that would be able to do it for you. They do have one battery that does show some promise -it’s called the “sulfur battery”. The only problem with this battery is it needs a key element in it out in the field to keep sulfur in its liquid state about 300 plus degrees. Not a good thing to have rumbling around in your trunk! Let’s face it batteries just have not made it to a level or place where they can take to the road as well as a gasoline engine.

One of the more exciting things that I’ve seen is called the hydrogen fuel-cell. This unique little device takes water and converts it to electricity by using special layers of chemicals and minerals to separate the hydrogen in the action from each other and causing his chemical reaction that generates electricity between the plates and thereby supplying electricity to whatever needs to be run-in this case the motor in the car. This is probably one of the more exciting developments as come along however it doesn’t create a lot of electricity only creating a few milliamps or a few apps here and there were ads running car can take hundreds of amps, especially during hard acceleration. So until they develop this little bit further its out as well.

Honestly I believe that at this point in time since we don’t have anything else to run our cars are than gasoline, I believe the hybrid engine is the way to go. But electricity doesn’t really seem the way to go to me and additives to the fuel make it inefficient or simply don’t exist at this time. There has been one promising area that I believe should be pursued…

The idea of hydrogen being injected into an engine is a good idea-they actually came up with this some time ago running an engine completely on hydrogen. Do have to admit it was pretty much a rolling firetrap if it ever got into an accident the hydrogen itself is very explosive in very small quantities so great care has to be taken in its care and handling.

Now comes the idea I read about. What if one were able to use water as a fuel? It’s plentiful it’s everywhere and it’s a renewable resource. “How is a renewable” you ask? Well it’s car word to runoff water were some component thereof it’s only product coming out of the exhaust pipe would be any guess? Water! The water goes up in the air, and comes down as rain. It’s renewed! It’s a wonderful idea and a few people are working on exactly that idea. Personally, I’m hoping some big corporation picks up on the idea and runs with it. It would be the best possible thing for a planet and face it possible thing for us as a race!



HOWARD