As long as people continue to want gold rings, Mark Parent said in early 2008, there will be a place for mining. The former provincial environment minister was referring to his department’s controversial approval of the Moose River gold mine in the Musquodoboit Valley district of HRM. This month, however, Haligonians are getting a closer […]
Environment
Posted inNews + Opinion
Earth day attack
Earth Day is next Wednesday. Check your local listings to find out how you can celebrate the bountiful beauty of Mother Earth, the sacredness of all her life and living systems, right here in Hali. Then we can go back to beating the shit out of her on Thursday. Earth Day has always reminded me […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Green is the New Normal
Items like CFL’s were already off the list when we put together last year’s Green Halifax guide. As P’lover’s co-owner Liz Crocker told us: “When we opened, we sold compact fluorescent lightblubs. Now you can get them everywhere.” This year we’re more stringent. There are plenty of practices and behaviors we’ll acknowledge, but aren’t worthy […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Wolfville: the small town example
The first page of the Wolfville municipal website shows the importance the town of a little under 4,000 puts on being ecologically sustainable. Along with the budget planning notifications and community services guide is a column dedicated to green initiatives: A green mobility forum meeting and a town council sustainable community planning task force unveiling […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Halifax cycling coalition
One of the most prominent pro-cycling organizations in Halifax, the approximately 200 members of the HCC take their two-wheeled transit seriously. Steve Bedard, director of education and advocacy for the group, says the membership even includes people who don’t own bicycles but are “interested in taking steps to ensure Halifax is planned in a more sustainable […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Vegetarianism and the environment
In January 2008, Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change, made headlines when he asked the world to cut back on meat consumption, pointing to UN-based research that shows the production of livestock is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than all forms of transportation combined. The plea was […]
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Eco-grants
The ecoENERGY Retrofit Program Natural Resources Canada offers a residential energy efficiency assessment service for homes. Owners can qualify for federal grants by improving the energy efficiency of their homes. The maximum grant is $5,000. For more information, visit: oee.nrcan.gc.ca. The provincial arm of the program, the EnerGuide for New Houses and EnerGuide for Homes, […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Eco-Schools
Nova Scotia Community College: What you pack in, you pack out at the Dartmouth Waterfront campus of NSCC. There are no garbage cans in the classrooms just a recycling container. There is a reason for this. With a new school progressive ideas follow. Two students at the campus, Jennifer Hynick and Tanya Massey, both licensed […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Living off the grid
Sue and Simon Melrose live in an extremely rural area of Nova Scotia, on a beautiful treed property with waterfront views near Musquodoboit Harbour, some 400 metres from the highway in a 1,500 square feet, one-and-a-half storey Cape Cod. They’re one of the few people in the province not tied into the power network, provided […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Bottled water versus Tap
In an article published in a 2007 issue of the Air Canada in-flight magazine enRoute, their food critics put together a list of positive trends in the food industry. Next to the environmental benefits of blackboard menus, they listed the return of tap water as a great thing, saving them from having to spend money […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Canning, preserving and drying
A century ago, fresh strawberries would have been unheard of in the depths of winter. Instead, each fall our grandmothers worked for hours on end over hot stoves, sterilizing Mason jars and canning, drying and pickling to preserve their harvest and ensure their families had food on their plates when farm fields were white with […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
100 Mile Diet
It started only 5 years ago, with a couple in Vancouver. Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon, who, discovering that the average North American eats food with ingredients that have travelled at least 1,500 miles (2,414 km.), set out to spend a year only eating food that came from within 100 miles of where they live. […]