Recycling works for books, too.
"Seven Wonders for a Cool Planet", a new book by Eric Sorensen and the staff at the Seattle-based Sightline Institute, updates a 1999 book by John Ryan of Sightline (then known as Northwest Environment Watch).
With plenty of timely new stats and a 21st-Century sense of urgency about global warming, this book feels fresh and relevant. It's a quick read - just over 100 pages - but for such a slight book, it's deceptively deep and inspiring.
The clever premise made me wish I'd thought of it. The book highlights seven products, using each one to delve into a vital issue related to global warming. Those products are: A library book (reuse and resource conservation); bicycle (transportation); condom (population growth); ceiling fan (energy efficiency); "real" tomato (food production and distribution); microchip (information society) and clothesline (alternative energy).
Each product is covered in a 10- to 12-page chapter. Some will probably resonate with you more than others, as they did with me. Libraries have been a passion of mine for years, so I was thrilled to see the environmental benefits of libraries touted and documented.
I'm a more recent convert to ceiling fans - we had one installed in our dining room last year. Ceiling fans and other creative energy efficiency strategies can reduce or eliminate the need for air conditioning. Air conditioners now use up to one sixth of all electricity in the U.S., the book points out, but just a ceiling fan alone can make a room feel nine degrees cooler.
And the tomato chapter really rang true for me, since I've recently gotten addicted to Caruso tomatoes. They have that "real tomato" look - big and gnarly, not perfectly round like the mass-produced grocery store tomatoes. And they are sweet, juicy, and tasty as hell.
I was thinking I better get there early to get my Carusos next week - what do you want to bet that people will be flocking to the farmers markets for tomatoes now, after the grocery store tomatoes' food poisoning scare? It makes me sad that salmonella might be the reason more people turn to real tomatoes.
But if you read this book - or if you have ever tasted a "real" tomato - you might be there already. The environmental impact of factory-farmed food, shipped across the country or across the world, is significant. "Tomatoes can grow in all fifty states," Sorensen points out in the book, "but just two - California and Florida - account for two-thirds of the fresh tomatoes grown in the country. Along with the rest of our nation's fresh vegetables, they travel 1,500 to 2,500 miles to market."
If you're reading this blog, you may already know a lot of this stuff. But I still think you'll enjoy "Seven Wonders." It's a well-written, insightful reminder that it won't necessarily require rocket science to curb global warming - we can make a dent with a few simple products, and a lot of common sense.