The Other 4,000 Bees
If you ate a blueberry, a tomato, a squash, or an apple this week, a wild bee almost certainly had something to do with it—and that bee was probably not a honey bee. Honey bees (Apis mellifera) are...
Showing 174 articles
2026
20 issuesA Switch You Can Flip Tonight to Save Migrating Birds
On spring nights this time of year, the skyway above your house is busier than the roadway in front of it. Millions of warblers, thrushes, orioles, tanagers, and sparrows are passing overhead after...
No Yard? You Can Still Grow Food!
Walk into any hardware store or nursery in America today, and you’ll see the seedling tables loaded up—tomatoes, peppers, basil, lettuce—and people loading them into carts as if they all have a...
Plant One Tree, Cut Home Energy Use
National Arbor Day in the United States was Friday, April 24, and if you watched anyone plant a tree this weekend, you probably saw the same small ceremony: a hole, a sapling, a pat of soil, maybe a...
Find Your Local Earth Day Celebration, Or Make Your Own!
Earth Day is this Wednesday, April 22. If you don’t yet have a plan to celebrate it, today is the day to make a plan.
Pedal Power: Two Wheels, Three Wheels, Zero Emissions
The most energy-efficient vehicle ever invented might be leaning against a wall in your garage right now, tires soft, chain stiff, maybe with a fine layer of winter dust on the saddle. A bicycle or...
One Seed, Many Seasons: How to Grow a Garden That Endures
This is an extraordinary week on the calendar. Today is Easter for Western Christians (Orthodox Pascha follows next Sunday).
Less Work, Better Dirt in Your Garden
Spring is here in the northern hemisphere, and that means millions of gardeners are reaching for their shovels and rototillers, ready to “prepare” the soil for planting. It’s one of the most deeply...
The Water You Eat: What Your Dinner Has to Do with World Water Day
You probably know the basics of saving water at home: fixing leaky faucets, taking shorter showers, running full loads of laundry, and so on. Those habits truly matter and are worth cultivating.
When You Wish Upon a Bin…
You probably know someone—maybe it’s you—who hates to throw away yogurt cups, plastic bags, old phone chargers, and all sorts of other random things and thinks, I’m not sure, but maybe they can...
Spring Clean Your Water: A Cleaning Swap That Protects Every River Downstream
When you imagine what cleaning products do to the environment, your first instinct is probably to think about the air—that chemical smell you breathe while scrubbing the tub. But an even bigger...
Save a Bird Today: The Window Fix Anyone Can Do
If you’ve ever heard that sickening thud against a window and walked outside to find a bird on the ground beneath it, you probably assumed it was a one-off collision, unfortunate but rare. Most of us...
Your Home Deserves a Manual
Your car came with an owner’s manual. So did your dishwasher, your refrigerator, and even your electric toothbrush.
Eat the Season: Why Winter Root Vegetables Are a Win for Earth
Walk into most North American supermarkets this week, and you’ll find strawberries from Mexico, asparagus from Peru, and blueberries from Chile—all looking freshly picked under artificial lights....
Watch Together, Waste Less: Why Your Super Bowl Party Is Already Sustainable
Super Bowl Sunday generates an estimated 2,000 tons of food waste across the country—wing bones, guacamole scraps, paper plates, half-eaten sliders—almost all of it headed straight for a landfill....
The Warmest Air in Your House Is Trapped at the Ceiling
Right now, as temperatures plunge across much of the country, the warmest air in your home is hovering uselessly above your head. While you shiver on the couch and nudge the thermostat higher, a...
Teaching Kids Sustainability: Age-Appropriate Actions That Stick
Yesterday was the International Day of Education, an annual reminder that what we teach shapes the world we share. This year’s theme celebrated youth as agents of change—and research confirms they...
The Fix Is In: Finding Community Repair Help When You Can't DIY
Somewhere in your home, a broken item languishes. Maybe it's the holiday gift that stopped working by New Year's Eve, or the lamp that flickered out months ago.
Electrify Everything: The Climate Solution Already in Your Hands
What if you could draw a line from where you are today to a home that runs entirely on solar power. No natural gas bill.
New Year, New Tradition: Resolutions That Inspire Change
Happy New Year. We’re starting a new tradition here at One Step This Week: for our first issue every January, we’ll kick off the year with our New Year’s resolution edition.
2025
55 issuesBattery Wise: Your Essential Guide to Choosing and Disposing of Batteries Responsibly
At any given moment, a typical American household contains more than two dozen batteries of various kinds—some in remotes, flashlights, toys, and others scattered in junk drawers. Most end up in...
Forever Wild: How to Give Nature in Perpetuity
A white-tailed deer steps cautiously through a meadow that might otherwise have been paved for a parking lot. Overhead, a red-tailed hawk circles brush spared from a bulldozer.
A Secret Superpower for Sustainability Success (It's Not What You Think)
You matter. You have influence, and as a subscriber to this newsletter, you are connected to hundreds of people like you who are taking practical action to protect our planet.
The Free Returns Trap: What Really Happens to the Stuff You Send Back
That sweater didn't fit quite right, so you printed the free return label, dropped the package at UPS, and felt virtuous knowing it would find its way to someone else's closet. Except it probably...
What People Really Want: Gifts That Matter
What do people actually want when they get a gift. After decades of research, psychologists have identified four core desires that separate memorable gifts from forgettable ones.
Lighting the Way: Your Complete Guide to Sustainable Illumination
In today’s frenzied world, Americans rush in and out of rooms, leaving behind a trail of illumination, whether or not anyone actually needs the lights on. Our children live in homes that still have...
Reclaim Your Mailbox: The Surprisingly Simple Path to a Junk-Mail-Free Life
Picture this: you arrive home after a long day, open your mailbox, and instead of the usual avalanche of credit card offers, furniture catalogs you never requested, and “urgent” notices from...
Beyond the Feast: Your Guide to Sustainable Eating Throughout the Holiday Season
What does a typical week during the holidays look like for you. Perhaps you’ll be preparing for a Friendsgiving around Thanksgiving, baking pies or bread for neighbors you’re thankful for, then your...
How wise are you in the ways of sustainability?
The first Tuesday in November is voting day in the United States. How often have you found yourself in the voting booth, scanning your ballot and realizing you don’t know much about many of the...
Winter Homes for Tiny Heroes: Protecting Overwintering Habitat for Insects
Across North America, some neighbors are diligently devoting resources to neatly bagging every leaf, cutting every stem flush to the ground, and hauling it all to the curb. They’ve created what looks...
The Shopping Habit That's Good for You, Your Community, and the Planet
Have you ever been here: you pull into a parking spot at the grocery store, finish your shopping, drive three blocks to the pharmacy, circle for parking, drive two more blocks to the hardware store,...
Winter Is Coming: Your Complete Weatherization Checklist for Extreme Weather Resilience
It’s 2 AM on a frigid January night when the power goes out during an ice storm. Or it’s 3 PM on a sweltering summer day when a heat wave pushes temperatures past 110°F just as your air conditioning...
Clean, Quiet, Always Ready: Rethinking Home Battery Backup Power
What happens in your home during a winter storm when the lights flicker across your neighborhood, then go out. Do you wait in the dark, hoping power comes back on before the food in your fridge goes...
Fall Gold: Turn Your Leaf Pile Into Next Year’s Garden Treasure
Which paints a prettier picture: your neighbors stuffing bags full of gorgeous autumn leaves, hauling them to the curb for municipal pickup, or you gathering this “waste” into a pile to transform...
Fall Into Efficiency: Your HVAC Tune-Up Guide for a Sustainable Home
Your heating and cooling system is about to get a breather as the seasons turn. That “out-of-sight, out-of-mind” metal box in your basement or the outdoor unit getting covered in leaves is either...
Power Your Life to 100% Clean Energy: From Less Waste to Solar Freedom
Your monthly electric bill shows a credit instead of a charge, your home runs entirely on clean electricity, and you're no longer burning any fossil fuel to heat your home or drive your car. Sound...
Nude Food: For Back-to-School or Workday Lunches
That satisfying snap of a quality lunch container closing, securing a colorful array of fruits and vegetables—it’s a small sound that signals something bigger. You’re ready for the day, keeping money...
Labor Day of Rest: Give Your Appliances a Break, Too
Labor Day is meant to honor hard work, but it’s also about taking a well-deserved rest. While you’re taking time off this weekend, why not give your appliances and home systems a little rest, too.
Smarter Electronics Upgrades for Back-to-School
It’s that time of year again—new backpacks, sharpened pencils, and fresh devices. Laptops, tablets, and phones are now as common as notebooks for students, and back-to-school season often means an...
Preserving the Harvest: Your Guide to Sustainable Food Storage
Picture yourself in January, opening a glass jar of summer tomatoes you preserved yourself—their rich flavor bursting with August sunshine, no plastic packaging clouding the view. Or imagine reaching...
AI as Your Sustainability Study Buddy: Gaining Wisdom in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
Just this week, OpenAI launched GPT-5, their most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) model yet, promising access to "PhD-level intelligence" for everyone. Meanwhile, you’re trying to get up to...
The Hidden Climate Bomb in Your Home: How Cooling Our Homes Can Heat Up Our Planet
What's wrong with this picture: you’ve switched to LED bulbs, drive an efficient car, and put in heat pumps, which you keep topped up with refrigerant every year to maintain peak performance. LED...
Insight: How We'll Get More AI With Less Energy
Is artificial intelligence (AI) increasing our demand for electricity on power grids. And if it is, can we deploy solar power fast enough to keep up with demand, or will we need to build new coal or...
Permeable Pathways: Transform Your Driveway Into Nature's Rain Sponge
During the next heavy rainstorm, watch how water flows on your driveway. Does it cascade into the street carrying oil, fertilizer, and debris into local streams, or do you see rainfall puddling, then...
Don't Let Lightning Fry Your Electronics: A Homeowner's Defense Guide
You've just invested in solar panels, a smart home automation system, and all-new energy-efficient appliances to improve your environmental impact. Then a summer thunderstorm rolls through, lightning...
Making Waves: Protecting Our Oceans Through Everyday Choices
If you could make one small shift in your daily routine to help safeguard the home for over 80% of Earth's life, would you do it. Shark Awareness Day on July 14, amid the height of summer beach...
Plastic-Free July: Focus Your Efforts Where They Matter
You’ve just finished your morning coffee and realize you’re already stuck with a dozen pieces of plastic garbage before starting your day: the coffee pod, creamer cup, yogurt container, granola bar...
Chill Without the Bill: Sustainable Cooling
Consider this heat wave scenario: it’s 95°F outside, your air conditioner is humming at full blast, and your electricity meter is spinning like a roulette wheel. Across your neighborhood, dozens of...
Summer Solstice Energy Reset: Enjoying Natural Light to Save Power
We’ve just passed the summer solstice—the longest day of the year when Earth’s northern hemisphere tilts closest to the sun, delivering up to 15 hours of natural daylight. Yet as you read this,...
Father’s Day Sustainability: Tools and Skills for a Greener Legacy
Picture this: your vacuum cleaner starts making an ominous grinding sound, signaling its impending doom. Is your first instinct to start shopping for a replacement, or to channel your inner MacGyver...
World Oceans Day: Fighting Ocean Microplastics From Home
Picture this: you're standing on a “pristine” beach watching waves crash against the shore, yet those waves contain over 51 trillion particles of unseen microplastic pollution. Microplastics are...
Sprinklers, Streams, and Sustainability: Rethinking Lawn Irrigation
Picture this: it’s 6 am, and while you’re just waking up, your neighbor’s sprinkler system kicks on, sending water cascading not just across their freshly sodded lawn, but down the street in a...
Special Edition: The Clean Energy Crossroads
To understand what's happening, it helps to know the baseline: without special legislation, federal tax rates do not depend on a taxpayer’s energy or vehicle choices, and states generally cannot...
Memorial Day Mindfulness: Sustainable Summer Kickoff Celebrations
Picture this: millions of families gathered around grills this Memorial Day weekend, celebrating the start of summer with the people they love most. Now imagine if each of those celebrations...
Transform Your Commute and Your Health: Bike to Work Week
We’re glad you’re a part of our community of sustainability change agents; we hope our Handbook and other resources inspire and empower you to use practical sustainable technologies and techniques to...
Celebrating the Mothers Who Sustain Us (Including Mother Earth)
Happy Mother's Day. Today, millions of us are celebrating the extraordinary women who shaped our lives.
Water-Smart Gardening: Conserving a Precious Resource
We hope our Handbook and other resources inspire and empower you to use practical sustainable technologies and techniques to protect our Earth for the benefit of all. While we eagerly welcome...
Transform Your Lawn into a Pollinator Paradise: Nature's Solution to a Greener Future
We’re glad you’re a part of our community of sustainability change agents; we hope our Handbook and other resources inspire and empower you to use practical sustainable technologies and techniques to...
Earth Day Community Action: Building Connections for Lasting Change
It’s here. You can order an e-copy of Sustainable Practices: Your Handbook for Effective Action for $24.
Transform Your Bathroom, Transform Our Planet: A Guide to Zero-Waste Bathrooms
Note: Before we present today’s One Step This Week, we are announcing our Earth Day book launch of Sustainable Practices: Your Handbook for Effective Action. We expand the action steps shared in this...
Don't Feed the Duck (Curve)
What if your washing machine could help fight asthma. Or your electric car could stabilize the power grid.
You Matter: How to Prioritize Your Sustainability Actions for Effectiveness
Many people feel that individual actions are meaningless against massive global challenges. However, research demonstrates that the social contagion of sustainable behaviors is evident when our...
From Blocks to Bounty: Starting Seeds in a Soil Blocking Station
Have you ever marveled at how a tiny seed can survive even the darkest and dreariest winter, patiently waiting for the right conditions to sprout and flourish. Helping this miraculous transformation...
Tap into Sustainability: How Greywater Can Make Your Garden Thrive
In a world where freshwater resources face increasing pressure and wastewater treatment plants can’t always keep up with demand, redirecting household greywater to your house plants or garden offers...
PAWS for Thought: Your Guide to Sustainable Pet Care
Did you know that if American pets formed their own country, their meat consumption alone would rank fifth in the world. The collective environmental impact of our beloved animal companions is...
Powering Through Outages: Home Battery Solutions for Every Budget
When your neighborhood goes dark during a power failure, imagine your home with lights still on, your refrigerator humming, and your phones charging. No noisy generator, no scramble for...
Sow It, Grow It: Nutrient-Dense Food From Your Indoor Garden
Imagine walking into your kitchen on a snowy February morning and harvesting a handful of fresh, vibrant greens for your breakfast smoothie. No plastic packaging to throw away, no transportation...
Breathing Easier: A Practical Guide to Indoor Air Quality
As winter tightens its grip, we spend more time indoors, with windows sealed against the cold. This creates an important challenge: maintaining healthy indoor air quality.
Share More, Own Less: Your Guide to Tool Libraries and the Sharing Economy
What barely-used tools are lurking in your garage or storage closet. We all have them—from pressure washers that see daylight once a year to camping gear that dreams of adventure to food dehydrators...
Smart Moves: Your Guide to Earth-Friendly Transportation
Imagine your ideal trip for work or errands. Perhaps you're cruising silently in an electric vehicle, feeling good about the zero emissions.
Everything Under the Sun: Our Bright Energy Future
Almost everyone who owns or rents property that gets a little sunshine has started thinking about how to make their own electricity from free sunlight. Every business and family can get on the...
Creating a Sustainable Home Wellness Station
As winter tightens its grip and flu season reaches its peak, many of us find ourselves making trips to the pharmacy or doctor, accumulating plastic bottles, blister packs, and disposable medical...
From Drips to Dollars: Detecting and Fixing Water Leaks
A single hidden water leak can waste thousands of gallons of precious water and—worst of all—quietly cause devastating structural damage to your home. Undetected leaks in toilets and sinks can add...
Turn Your Home into an Energy-Saving Genius: The Smart Revolution
Imagine your home anticipating your needs and effortlessly optimizing your energy use in ways that would be tedious to do manually–cutting off power-hungry devices automatically, adjusting...
DIY Home Energy Review: From Simple Steps to Expert Insights
January can be a real shock when those post-holiday energy bills arrive. But instead of just digging deeper into your wallet, why not take practical steps to trim waste and improve comfort.
2024
56 issuesYour New Year's Energy Resolution: Smart Temperature Settings
Before reading about an ideal New Year’s Resolution, we at Sustainable Practice want to remind you that there are just a few more days to get 20% off a yearly paid subscription for the new year....
Holiday Travel Efficiency: The Pressure is On
Before reading about holiday travel, we at Sustainable Practice hope you’ll consider the most sustainable holiday gift you could give this year: 52 weeks of a digital copy of One Step This Week....
Lighting Up the Holidays: Your Path to Energy-Smart Celebrations
Before reading about holiday lights, we at Sustainable Practice hope you’ll consider the most sustainable holiday gift you could give this year: 52 weeks of a digital copy of One Step This Week....
The Greatest Gifts You Can Give: Moments that Matter More than Merchandise
Before Sustainable Practice presents detailed information about sustainable gift-giving for your holidays, we also encourage you to consider the most sustainable holiday gift you could give this...
Seal the Savings: Your Home's Holiday Gift to Your Wallet
Before Sustainable Practice presents information you and your friends and family can use for energy savings this winter, we want to encourage you to consider the most sustainable holiday gift you...
Wrap It Up: Celebrate the Holidays Without the Waste
The holiday season brings joy, celebration—and a massive surge in household waste. But this year can be different.
Planning a Sustainable Thanksgiving Meal: A Recipe for Joy
When autumn arrives, many families begin planning their holiday menus—a tradition that has a global impact, given that feeding ourselves accounts for over half of habitable land use and a quarter of...
Stress Less, Grow Stronger: Volunteering for Community Resilience
Here’s a simple, empowering, and positive step for sustainability this week: volunteer. “Local volunteerism is a fundamental resilience strategy and a property of resilient communities,” reports the...
Pane and Gain: A Guide to Window Performance
As the season turns to winter in the northern hemisphere, it’s time to check every window to make sure it’s tightly shut. In a superbly sustainable home, closed windows are a passive heating system,...
The Royal Flush: Upgrading to Water-saving Thrones
Before I opened my store for sustainable goods and supplies, I had no idea that replacing an old toilet was something most handy homeowners could do in an afternoon—and that it provides such a huge...
You've Got the Power: A Guide to Generating Solar Electricity Today
How fast we’ve ramped up solar electricity since 2014 has surprised experts: next year, the United States will generate more electricity from sunlight than from hydropower. My guess is we haven’t...
A Thank You Gift from Sustainable Practice for Paid Subscribers
We so appreciate your support, which enables us to provide empowering knowledge for people practicing sustainability in their own homes and organizations. To say thank you, we want to give you a...
Heat Smart, Live Cozy: Upgrade to Energy-efficient Heat Pump Space Heaters
Maine is making headlines nationally by taking steps to stop burning diesel fuel (called “#2 heating oil” to avoid the tax levied on diesel intended for on-road use) with no pollution controls in our...
Charge Ahead: Drive into a Sustainable Future by Leasing or Buying an EV
People started building electric cars long before they started making fuel-burning cars, and if current trends continue, electric vehicles will continue being made long after gasoline and diesel...
Get Cooking with Induction: Faster, safer, and More Energy-Efficient
If you haven’t discovered induction cooking, you’re in for a treat. This technology is three times more efficient than gas stoves, which means you can boil water and prepare meals in less time for...
Chill Smarter: Using Energy-Efficient Appliances
One of the easiest ways to save a lot of energy and protect our environment is to upgrade an old refrigerator. If your fridge is 15 years or older, give serious consideration to surprising your...
Air It Out: Dry Smarter, Save Energy, Protect the Planet
Hanging laundry to dry uses no fuel or electricity and produces no pollution, but takes a little more time than throwing a damp load in the dryer. Another way to save energy is to upgrade from a...
Pump Up the Heat for Hot Water with Energy-Efficient Heat Pumps
Heating water with heat pumps is much more efficient than other water heating technologies. Using an electric heating element to keep a tank of water warm can be used as the baseline for efficiency.
Cold is the New Hot: How to Save Energy by Washing Clothes in Cold Water
Washing clothes in cold water saves energy and can be more effective with the use of detergents specifically formulated for cold water. The active ingredient in cold-water laundry detergents are...
Go Native: Transform Your Yard for a Healthier Landscape
Our one step this week is Landscaping 101: Planting Native Species. Turfgrass lawns became popular in the United States in the 1870s and have since become the dominant idea in residential and...
It's Illuminating: How LEDs Contribute to Saving Earth's Resources
Our one step this week is Lighting 101: LEDs. Light-emitting diodes (or LEDs) were discovered at Marconi Labs in 1907, but it wasn’t until the 1960s and 1970s that red, orange, yellow, and green LEDs...
Seal the Deal: Boost Energy Efficiency with a Sealed and Insulated Attic and Basement
Our one step this week is Insulating 101: Sealing and Insulating Attics and Basements. Of all the areas in a building, sealing and insulating the basement and attic does the most good due to the...
Ditch the Disposable: Life Beyond Plastic
Our one step this week is Plastic 101: Avoiding Single-Use Plastic. Like other effective practices for sustainability (including Walking 101: Short Trips by Foot), this is deceptively easy to...
Clean Green to Transform Your Home: Cleaning 101 Provides Safe, Eco-friendly Solutions
Our one step this week is Cleaning 101: Using Safer Solutions. Like last week’s practice (Drinking 101: More Tap Water, Fewer Bottled Beverages), this is a practice everyone can afford—plus it would...
Drinking 101 - Liquid Logic: How Tap Water Wins Over Bottled Beverages
Our one step this week is Drinking 101: More Tap Water, Fewer Bottled Beverages. This is a practice everyone can afford; in fact, it’s one of the easiest ways to save money—hundreds of billions of...
Feast on Fresh: Savor the Flavor of Local, Organic Goodness.
Our one step this week is to buy local organic food in season. This is Eating 102, continuing our sustainable practices regarding food.
Sustainability Education: Learning Practices 101
How much better would our world be if everyone had a better understanding of environmental problems—and knew exactly what they could do to help solve them. We know from surveys that environmental...
In the Sustainability Olympics, this takes the Bronze
Choosing to eat delicious and nutritious plant-based meals instead of chowing down on burgers and steaks is really good for our health and pocketbooks—and our planet. Eating more plants, and less...
What's Your Favorite Environmental Day?
Add more fun to your years by celebrating our planet and its passengers as we circle our sun on our journey through the universe. Click on the underlined day to visit the day’s page on our website...
Head Over Heels for Walking 101: Short Trips by Foot
For most of us, walking is like flossing our teeth: we know it’s good for us, but we just don’t do it enough. Unlike flossing, making walking a healthy habit isn’t just good for us; it’s good for our...
Composting 101: Outdoor Pile Method
As a leader for sustainability in your community, you know that composting saves money, prevents pollution, and improves soil quality while meeting the daily need to manage waste. These benefits earn...
For Environmental Sustainability, Twenty Achievable Practices Are Most Important
You can most certainly protect our environment and help secure a future for everyone on Earth by achieving twenty sustainable practices in your home or organization: Compost organic solid waste....
Here's the Advanced Composting Scoop
You’re into the province of “advanced” composting any time you’re managing organic waste beyond the “basic” recipe. To recap the “basic” composting guide from last week: outdoors, during warm...
Yes! Try this at home!
Stinky garbage is a sign that we’re not being smart about recycling. Anything that can rot really doesn’t have to go to a landfill or a waste-to-energy facility.
The Answer is Composting. Here Are the Questions
Composting is part of a sustainable diet—putting water and nutrients back to work, and growing more food, paper, wood, and other organic goods. It’s probably the single most effective thing we can do...
Let Us Consider Lettuce--Sustainably
In 2015, Carnegie Mellon University professor Paul Fischbeckmade headlines by saying, “Eating lettuce is over three times worse in greenhouse gas emissions than eating bacon. ” Of course, the real...
The Example We Can Follow to Protect Biodiversity
This week’s action guide is my final dispatch from New Zealand. I hope you’ve enjoyed the ideas for sustainability from this fascinating country.
From Sushi to Tuna Sandwiches--Here's the Line
This action guide for tuna rounds out our three-part series on sustainable seafood. (See part one for sustainable salmon and part two for sustainable shrimp.
Electrifying Mining in NZ: It's Worth Its Weight in Gold
Gold and coal play a big role in the history of New Zealand—and both will probably continue to play a big role in the future of our planet. The lessons of the historic gold rushes and coal fields of...
Shrimp Is in the Sustainable Seafood Spotlight
This action guide is the second of a three-part series on sustainable seafood. Shrimp is by far the most popular marine seafood item in the United States.
One Easy Way a Country Can Encourage Citizens to Take Planet-saving Steps
After the conservatives won the last New Zealand election, there’s been some grumbling that the country is abandoning responsible environmental management. Labour and the Greens are no longer in...
Does clean energy require dirty mines?
Batteries are the key to our clean energy future, but what about the materials necessary to make them. How “dirty” are batteries.
Can Eating Salmon Be Sustainable?
This action guide is the first of a three-part series on sustainable seafood. Shrimp, salmon, and tuna are the “big three” for seafood in the United States.
Fishing in New Zealand: A Sustainability Story
If you see fish on a menu in New Zealand, chances are it’s salmon—which seems odd since all salmon are native to the northern hemisphere. If you see fish in a river in New Zealand, small ones might...
Can You Enjoy Dairy and Still Protect Our Planet?
How to enjoy “dairy” and save our planet depends on how flexible you are about the definition of “milk. ” If you feel that milk must be squeezed out of a cow, then you can’t enjoy very much of it...
Driving in New Zealand: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly
Every American traveling around New Zealand should know five important things: first, you need a car outside the big cities; second, they drive on the left; third, gas is about $3 (New Zealand) per...
Helping Farmers Save Our Planet
Thomas Malthus predicted in 1798 that population will grow faster than agriculture, condemning hungry humanity to a “perpetual oscillation between happiness and misery. ” Yet the rate of global...
Firsthand Observations of Renewable Power Options in Another Part of the World
The west coast of Te Waipounamu, New Zealand’s South Island, is one of the rainiest places on Earth; the Cropp River, which flows into the Hokitika River, has recorded an annual rainfall of 18...
Less Food Waste Posthaste
You may be surprised to learn that preventing food waste is one of the easiest ways we can mitigate climate change and ameliorate global hunger. In 2021 the United Nations estimated that “8-10% of...
Self-Serve Water: Thirst-Quenching in New Zealand
Sustainable living in the United States can sometimes feel like navigating an obstacle course—especially when dining out. Ask for water in a stateside café, and you might need to specify tap water,...
Encouraging Sustainable Diets
One of the most difficult habits to change is what we eat. But if we’re serious about sustainability, encouraging sustainable diets is a challenge worth surmounting.
Natural Gas: Don't Try This at Home
We’re starting to have a national conversation about the role of natural gas in our energy future. A recent story from Maine quotes politicians from both major parties staking out unwise positions...
Juicing Machine: Fresh Idea from Hokitika
The New World supermarket in Hokitika on the west coast of New Zealand has something I didn’t know I needed until I saw it—a self-serve juicing machine. I love orange juice but hate packaging waste.
Donating Effectively for Community Sustainability
As environmental champions, we can share our time, money, and property to achieve sustainability goals in our community. Effective donations improve human well-being, increase the value of existing...
Letting Nature Do the Work: Lessons from Hinewai
Dr. Hugh Wilson is one of the most delightful humans you’ll ever meet.
Achieving Goals for Household Sustainability
As a sustainability champion, you may be planning to take more steps toward sustainability in 2024, and we can join you. In this week’s action guide, I encourage you to decide how you will help...
2023
43 issuesManapouri Hydropower: Sustainable Awakening in New Zealand
In this week’s Dispatch from New Zealand, I want to share a sustainability story from the fiordlands of the South Island about the power of environmental champions to protect our world. Although this...
Reducing Microplastic Pollution
Microplastics are on the short list of our planet's worst pollution problems. Tiny plastic particles and fibers are now dispersed across our entire globe, from the air at the top of our highest...
Dunedin Gasworks: Sustainable Lesson from NZ
On Sunday afternoons in South Dunedin, New Zealand, you can see stationary steam engines in working order. The engine house, boiler room, boiler house, chimney stack, and the fitting and blacksmith’s...
Who's Crazy About 24/7 Green Energy?
Should you believe the idea that a “crazy rush to green energy will push us to endless blackouts”. Or is it actually wise to “rush” to green energy.
How to Phase Out PFAS 'Forever Chemicals' on the Pathway to Sustainable Goods
This Sustainable Practice action guide helps you phase out the ‘forever chemicals’ called PFAS, which build up in our environment, find their way into our bodies, and can cause cancer and birth...
Sustainability Office Half Hour with Writer Fred Horch, Wed., Dec. 6, 7:00 P.M. ET (U.S. and Canada) via Zoom
Peggy Siegle from Sustainable Practice is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting. Topic: Sustainability Office Half Hour with Fred Horch Time: Dec 6, 2023, 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada).
Predator-Free Islands: Sustainable Ideas from NZ
In the month we’ve been exploring the area around Ōtepoti (Dunedin), New Zealand, we’ve watched albatross flying (and landing. ), seen penguins nesting, observed sea lions arguing, and heard kiwi...
An Insight Into 'The Slow Demise of Green Energy?'
If you watch Fox News or read the Wall Street Journal, you might think that renewable energy and electric vehicles are not quickly gaining market share. Articles like “The slow demise of green energy.
Sustainable Clothing: Valuing Vintage
This week’s sustainability step along the sustainable goods pathway is part of a “shop wisely” strategy for clothing—recognizing that we often buy clothing we rarely wear. When we give away or sell...
Bikes and Mugs: Sustainable Ideas from NZ
Every other week I’m comparing sustainability practices in North America versus New Zealand, where my wife and I are traveling on sabbatical from our home in Maine. As one of the last places on Earth...
The World May Burn More Fossil Fuel, But What About You?
As the world prepares for the 28th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), journalists are filing reports on the failure of public...
Sustainable Gifts and Goods
In the quest to find the perfect holiday gifts, adding sustainability as a factor can either complicate or simplify our lives. This action guide helps you use sustainability to make your life easier...
Dispatch from NZ: A Yankee Among Kiwis
For the next six months I’ll be sharing sustainability dispatches from New Zealand, as my wife and I leave our home in Maine for a camper van and AirBnBs in Aotearoa me Te Waipounamu (the North and...
Affordable Solar: The Energy Game Has Changed
Ten years ago, a 6,000-watt solar electricity system cost $50,000; today, you can buy it for less than $21,000—and get a 30% federal tax credit on top of that. Going solar is now a wise investment:...
Buying Better (Big) Batteries: Part Three
This action guide helps you buy big batteries to power your electric car or home, an essential step to a clean energy future. But first, an important announcement: Since May, we have been sharing...
Buying Better Batteries: Part Two
This action guide explores choices for batteries that are powerful enough to start car engines and operate tools. In each of our action guides, we cram crucial details for sustainability that you...
Buying Better Batteries: Part One
I just want to say one word to you, just one word. Are you listening.
Electric Motors: Moving Us Into the Future
There’s a good reason massive machines like locomotives and mining equipment use electric motors instead of combustion engines: burning gas or diesel just doesn’t provide as much power with as much...
Heat Pumps: 3-to-1 Energy Winners
Before cold climate heat pumps were invented, people would get excited about increasing the annual utilization efficiency of their fuel-burning heating systems from 0. 8 to 0.
Super Insulation: Your Energy Hero
Heating a well-designed new home with a gas-burning furnace or boiler is like lighting birthday candles with a flamethrower. That might seem a little extreme, but consider the fact that a...
Better Indoor Air Quality, Less Wasted Energy
When we think about air pollution, most of us imagine a smokestack or a tailpipe. But according to a growing body of scientific evidence, we’re exposed to more pollution indoors than outdoors, even...
Keeping Cool in Sustainable Ways
This year, Texans and Californians have once again been asked to use less electricity during heat waves—and grid managers have prepared plans for rolling outages to prevent public power grids from...
A Window to Sustainability
Windows are responsible for 8. 6% of all energy used by buildings across the United States and 25% to 30% of the energy used to heat or cool residential buildings.
LED Lights: The Energy Game Has Changed
LED lighting is a beacon on the pathway to sustainable energy. Last century, the 60-watt, 75-watt, or 100-watt “incandescent” (glowing hot) light bulbs we could buy could double as electric space...
First Steps to Endless Energy
How quickly we use energy is one of our biggest net positive or negative impacts on our world. The slower we consume energy, the better.
Can we sustain our trains?
Bicycles are best for sustainability, but when pedaling is a problem, a good option is public transit—where it exists. Unfortunately, almost half of the North American population cannot take a public...
Booking a Sustainable Flight?
In the near future, we’ll fly on sunshine, using electric motors powered by batteries storing solar energy to move people and packages through the air. The “airspace blueprint” for all-electric air...
Is Driving an EV a Next Step for You?
In 2022, the United States crossed the tipping point of 5% of sales leading to mass adoption of fully battery electric vehicles (BEVs). Within ten years, not driving electric will be odd.
Embracing E-Bikes
Pedal power is phenomenal, but it’s even more fun electrified. Small motors and batteries can easily be added to bicycles and other lightweight vehicles.
A Brief on Bicycling
Every time I see a cyclist, I think of H. G.
Combining Car Trips: Improve How You Move
It’s summer, time to get outside and move your body. (Unless you’re in a scorched place on the planet where this could be hazardous to your health.
Creating a Garbage-Free Household
In a sustainable goods economy, we can close landfills and incinerators because we compost and recycle the materials we use. But until we reach the goal of 100% sustainable goods and 100% rates of...
Sustainable Composting: On Your Personal Pathway to Zero Waste
North Americans could eliminate about half of what we send to landfills, by getting better at just one thing. Thanks for reading Fred Horch's Field Notes for Sustainability.
Sustainable Community: Sharing the Journey
Sustainability is about making the world better for everyone, now and far into the future. We’re all on a journey to sustainability, together.
Sustainable Recycling: A Proposed Pilot Project
Do you wish your community were better at recycling. Here’s a proposed pilot project you can try in your own home, organization or neighborhood to show how recycling can be done well.
Sustainable Eating: The Big Three
No one likes to be told what to eat. What we put into our own mouths to grow our own bodies is the most personal of choices.
Sustainable Recycling: Practical Advice for Individuals and Governments
What actually gets recycled. Metal and cardboard, but not plastic no matter how much we may wish it so.
Sustainable Recycling: One of Five Ways to Manage Solid Waste
Here’s a quick take on recycling for Rotarians—and anyone else who is interested in the issue: it makes great sense to recycle metal and clean cardboard. The value of recycling anything else...
Sustainable Soap: A Deeper Dive
When I asked, “What are your sustainability goals. ” I wasn’t expecting, “Making my own soap.
Sustainable Soap
So last week when I launched Field Notes for Sustainability and let people know that I’m working on a Handbook for Sustainability, I asked friends and family, “What are your sustainability goals. How...
Have a Sustainability Question?
I know what I want you to know about being sustainable, but what do you actually need to know. Imagine you want to help save the planet.
Being Sustainable
Being sustainable is making the world better for everyone, now and in the future. If you are superbly sustainable, you leave the world better than you found it.
Please Go All Electric!
When are you switching to electricity for heating and driving. I ask because the sooner the better.
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