If you need some help finding out how to get to your destination without flying, check out The Man in Seat 61. And there are plenty of ideas for eco-reponsible travel destinations at EcoTour if you need inspiration on that count.

The ETA are also giving away a free eco-friendly holiday in a yurt in the south of France. To qualify to be in the lucky draw, simply request a travel insurance quote from the ETA.

Photo credit: dichohecho

The survey will not take longer than 7-8 minutes, and to say thank you for filling in the survey, there is a prize draw to win £50 of Amazon vouchers.

We would very much appreciate your help on this score. Thanks.

Click here to go to the survey.

I can’t help feeling that the guy whose birth Christmas is supposed to be about celebrating would be appalled if he saw the amount of waste that was being created in his name. What do you think?

But, Christmas being what it is, we wake up from our excesses in January with an increased waistline, and wasteline. So, in full damage limitation mode, here’s what to do with all that stuff you don’t need anymore now that Xmas is over.

Firstly, all those unwanted Xmas gifts. You know, the sort that that you get from extended family who insist on buying something for everyone, no matter how awful. The peach nightgown, cheap perfume, desk toys that went out of fashion in the 80s. Pile them all into a big bag and head off to a local charity shop. This is such a good system because you get rid of what you don’t want without it going in the bin, and the charity gets to raise some money to do good.

If you’re finding it hard to part with the unwanted gift because it’s worth a few bob, give Recycle a Gift a go, or eBay it if you prefer.

Then there are those cards. A great pile of them. The Woodland Trust is collecting used Christmas cards for recycling at WHSmith, Tesco, TK Maxx and Marks & Spencer during January. Recycling cards generates money that is used to plant trees. In fact, if everyone in the UK recycled just one card each through this scheme, it would be able to plant 15,000 trees.*

Wrapping paper can be reused for any number of different projects like CD covers, origami or papier mache.

Cardboard boxes can be played with before recycling.

Remember, reuse comes before recycle.

*source: edie

Photo credit: claytron

Dutch creative communications company SPRANQ has come up with a font that uses up to 20% less ink than a regular font does when you’re printing.

“After Dutch holey cheese, there now is a Dutch font with holes as well.”

SPRANQ tested how much of a letter could be removed while maintaining readability? After trying different shapes, the best results were with small circles. And so the Ecofont was invented.

The Ecofont is based on the Vera Sans, an Open Source letter, and is available for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux. It’s free to download and use.

Of course, going mad at the sales is not a good idea, because it’s not very green to buy what we don’t really need. But if you’re going to be buying green and would like to take advantage of the sales, I wanted to point you in the direction of a few online retailers who are eco-friendly and sell just about all the green stuff you could want.

People Tree are offering up to 50% off.

Car Crunch London will reward those who can prove that they have sold their car with a two year membership of a car club and free driving time, which usually costs from £3.95 an hour.

The aim of the scheme is to reduce the number of cars by 100,000 on London’s roads before the 2012 Olympics.

A spokesperson for the Environmental Transport Association said: “For the one in three Londoners who do without a car, and for the many drivers who seldom use their vehicle, sharing schemes make perfect environmental and financial sense.”

How car clubs and car sharing can save you money

Many people now have an informal arrangement with friends or neighbours, but Car Clubs offer a slick, money-saving and green alternative to private car ownership. If you drive less than 6,000 miles per year it is claimed a car club could save you up to £3,500 a year. Many people don’t notice the true costs of running a car, but when you add up the cost of tax, MOT, fuel, servicing, repairs, depreciation and parking you could be looking at over a hundred pounds a week. National car share offers free advice to those who are interested in car sharing.
How can I claim the free driving?

How and when can people apply? The offer is redeemable by sending in a scan of sections 4-8 of the car’s V5 certificate with sections 6 and 8 filled in, proving the sale of the car and applies to cars sold since December 1, 2008.

How much ‘free driving’ is included? Up to £250 worth. Cars start from £3.95 per hour to hire.

ETA

The way it currently stands, London spends about £12bn on energy, but sends 500,000 tonnes of wood and one million tonnes of food waste to landfill.

The board believe that in the current economic climate, people will be receptive to a reuse agenda, and chairman Boris Johnson stressed the important economic case to be made for what they want to do. He believes that there will be an enormous economic advantage.

[via: edie]

I went to work on my mirrors and my car windows this weekend, and after a minor mishap with spraying soap all over my windows, the TerraCycle Window Cleaner wiped it all up streak-free and clan as ever, without the ammonia smell. As quoted on their website, the cleaners leave no residue and are thus hypo-allergenic!

At $3.99 per bottle (except for the draincleaner), this product is not only environmentally responsible but is affordable. I can’t wait to get my hands on the rest of the products.

This is a guest post by Carolyn Algar, our correspondent in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Now the votes have been counted and the judges have chosen their favourites.

Overall Winner: ‘Winberry Hill’

People’s Choice: ‘How to Boil a Frog’

Under 21 Winner: ‘A Day in the Spinney’

Read more about the winners at www.foe.co.uk/oneminute

With an estimated 83km2 of wrapping paper (which is enough to cover Guernsey and then some!) used in the UK alone every Christmas, the eco-friendly WrapSack is the ideal packaging for anyone looking to reduce their own carbon footprint this season and help others to do the same.

Available in the UK for the first time this Christmas, the responsibly-made, fabric WrapSacks defy the social faux-pas of reusing packaging by actively encouraging recipients to pass it on with the next gift they give. The ultimate aim is to keep the WrapSack on the move, creating an alternative to wrapping paper and eliminating waste in the process.

Available in a variety of designs and convenient sizes, including a tall bag for wine bottles, each hand-dyed bag has a unique number which means it can be tracked as it is given to one person from another.

Once a gift bag is registered (and given its own identity) on the Track-a-Sack system (accessed through the global WrapSack website www.wrapsacks.com), its journey is recorded – present by present – as recipients are encouraged to keep passing it on and update its former owners on the bags whereabouts.

Aside from logging on to the system, wrapping a present becomes effortless – all you do is place your chosen present in the bag and tie the integrated drawstring for attractive presentation. It also means there’s no wastage because there is no need for wrapping paper (most of which is still non-recycled) or fiddly adhesive tape.

The bags encourage reuse –the growing trend of “pre-cycling” –– which is even better than recycling, according to Dan Brousson who is behind the UK launch of WrapSacks.

“While recycling wrapping paper is a positive thing, the process itself still requires energy and chemicals, meanwhile the WrapSack encourages people to reuse a single form of wrapping and by doing so creates a shared experience as it passes from owner to recipient and so on,” he says.

Keeping unnecessary packaging out of landfill is a priority and Brousson who is the driving force behind the popular eco-carrier brand Onya Bags, is constantly on the look out for clever ideas which make being green easier for everyone. (Look out for a review of the Onya Back coming in the New Year).

WrapSacks are available in the UK through the Onya Bags website ( www.onyabags.co.uk) and selected stockists (see website for information). Prices start from £3.20.

So how do Wrapsacks work?

1. Choose a WrapSack (variety of sizes and designs) from www.onyabags.co.uk
2. Give your bag a name and register it on the Track-a-Sack system
3. Give your WrapSack (and present of course)
4. The receiver will admire the WrapSack during the present opening process, update the Track-a-Sack system and keeps the bag until the next time they need to give a present.
5. The receiver then becomes the giver and the process begins again.

Since the Track-a-Sack system launched, there have been nearly 27,500 presents given/received and the most extensively travelled WrapSack has done more than 46,000 miles to date.

The Track-a-Sack system not only keeps a record of how far an individual WrapSack has travelled it also lets its former owners find out what sort of presents it has carried throughout its journey. Once a user is registered they will also benefit from an intelligent reminder system which will send birthday alerts so that no special occasion is ever missed.

Why WrapSacks?

Christmas is a time of excess and wrapping paper is just one more element (alongside Christmas cards, excess food packaging and waste, trees, increased travel…the list goes on).

While some paper will be recycled (which although a good thing, requires energy and chemicals) many local authorities are unable to recycle paper unless all adhesive tape has been removed and, therefore, this waste will go to landfill.

A WrapSack will last for a countless number of presents AND will encourage each person it visits to think about the waste that comes from wrapping paper.