CT Green Scene

Business Flights Down, Carbon Footprint up

Environmental News Network reports that many companies in the U.K. have decreased their business flights due to the recession. They claim they have remained competititve and reduced their carbon footprint. What's more, these companies have decided they may not need to bring back those lost business flights once the economy gets better.

See excerpt below.

Flying less is more, businesses say
March 3, 2011

"The report, Moving on: why flying less means more for business, found that nearly all companies who have reduced their flying say it’s possible to stay profitable and competitive while flying less.
The key findings of the report were:

• 47% of companies have reduced the number of business flights they've taken in the past two years
• Of those companies which have cut their flying, 85% do not intend to return to 'business as usual' flying
• 86% of companies are either reducing their carbon footprint from business travel or intend to do so
• 63% of companies that responded now have a policy in place to reduce business flights, or are intending to develop one

The main benefits cited by UK businesses of changing travel practices were cost savings and reduced carbon emissions, but these were quickly followed by the ability to work during travel disruptions, having less staff away from the office and greater staff productivity."

Click here to read more.

Image courtesy of Continental Airlines.

Don’t Let the Bedbugs Bite

By Brittany Shutts



Brittany Shutts is a senior Creative Writing major at Purchase College. Her hometown is in Upstate New York in the Adirondacks, where she spent many years reading books on high tree branches. She recently returned from a semester in the Czech Republic. Brittany loves to talk with her hands and also writes fiction, drama, and a blog about nothing in particular. Brittany is passionate about holistic health and non-toxic, sustainable living. She enjoys thrusting unfamiliar vegetables on unwilling family members and gazing wistfully at the organic chocolate section of the supermarket.

Bedbugs are nocturnal parasites that feed on human blood. Once they latch onto beds, furniture, or clothing or make a cozy home behind your wallpaper it becomes incredibly difficult to get them to move out. If, until recently, bedbugs seemed to be the stuff of nursery rhymes, it is because they virtually disappeared in the US with the use of pesticides after World War II.

Now these forgotten parasites are making a comeback and spreading as people travel and commute. Dormitories are especially prone to infestation due to the number of students and the rate of occupant turnover. Traditional methods of extermination often involve spraying harmful insecticides, a process that often needs to be repeated before the problem goes away. All it takes for a second infestation is a couple of bedbug refugees. Fortunately, there are a few preventative steps that can be taken to avoid sharing a room with a thousand of your closest friends. If you’re already battling the bite there are also many effective, pesticide-free methods of extermination.

Green B&Bs

by Eileen Weber

 

Thinking of making a last minute get-away for the holidays? You might want to consider a “green” hotel or bed and breakfast.

Increasingly, proprietors are trying to meet their clientele’s interest in greener practices. From organic foods to green cleaning practices to energy efficient amenities, your next stay could be more eco-friendly than stopping off at a roadside Super 8.

Kate Bauer, co-owner of Homespun Farm Bed and Breakfast with her husband Ron in Griswold, takes being green very seriously. They compost their organic refuse and use the eggs from the chickens they recently purchased. Bauer said on the B&B’s web site, “I hope this [green] movement is in time to save what is so important to us all.”

In a New York Times article dated June 26, 2007, Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants found in a survey they conducted in 2005 that 16 percent of guests choose their properties because of the company’s environmental practices. Kimpton, named for its founder Bill Kimpton in 1981, is a San Francisco-based collection of boutique hotels that leads the hospitality industry with its ecologically-sound practices.

Michael Depatie, Kimpton’s president and chief executive, was quoted in the article saying he got a lot of unsolicited letters from guests about the company’s green initiatives. “I’m a little surprised by how many mention our green programs. We’ve been doing this for a while, but it seems like it’s suddenly at a tipping point.”