Archive for Toyota Prius

Welcome back to the Planet Forward blog for another edition of our weekly green news highlights. This week: the fight for food labels saying ‘genetically engineered’ so you know what you’re eating; 5 winners of 2012 Green Car Awards from the Detroit Auto show; and 5 awesome Apps for healthy green eating guaranteed to help your sustainable lifestyle.  Just click on the links to learn more.

On January 18, 2012, a new video by Food, Inc. director underscores the need to label genetically engineered food. We have previously reviewed the documentary Food Inc. from filmmaker Robert Kenner and we wanted to learn more about the Just Label It campaign that inspired the video and his participation. The Just Label It campaign “empowers consumers to fight for their right to know what is in their food. The video, “Labels Matter,” is the result of collaboration between the Just Label It campaign and Kenner’s new project, FixFood, a social media platform that aims to empower Americans to take immediate action to create a more sustainable and democratic food system.”  The Just Label It campaign has already assembled 500,000 consumer comments demanding the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) label genetically engineered (GE) foods. The video is an awareness campaign hopes to get one million consumers to comment to the FDA by mid-April. Check out the video at the bottom of this post.
 

Acura NSX Hybrid Concept (Image Credit: Acura)

It’s time for the 5 Detroit Auto Show 2012 Green Car Awards.  There are some pretty cool green cars on this list of winners.  For example: “The Can’t Miss Award: Toyota Prius C Hybrid - Americans have already taken to the original Prius, a sluggish, not-too-handsome lump of a car, so when Toyota begins offering the smaller, cuter, cheaper model C this spring, things can only get better. The C boasts an awesome 53 mpg, paint options including Habanero (!), Moonglow (!!) and Summer Rain (!!!) and a base price of around $19,000. Home. Run.”  Other categories included the ‘It Followed Me Home, Can I Keep It? Award’ (Smart), the ‘Maybe Next Time Award’ (Lincoln), the ‘Even Better As An Electric Award’ (VW) and the ‘Money No Object Award’ (Acura).

5 Phone Apps for Healthy Green Eating. A more sustainable lifestyle includes buying locally sourced organic foods.  Now, you can use your smartphone, iPad or iPod Touch to download apps that help you locate and choose fresh produce and local and seasonal fruits and vegetables.  Plus, you can learn about food additives and they’ll teach you what to make with your groceries.  Recommended apps include:  Harvest, Food Additives 2, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch and Locavore.

I don’t see how anyone can disagree with the Just Label It campaign; consumers should know what they are putting in their mouths to feed themselves and their families.  Are you going to download some healthy green eating apps?  How about those green car award winners?  Comment below and stay tuned for more green news.

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January 19, 2012
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There’s a lot going on every day in the green news.  We’ve decided to present a weekly segment offering green news of the week with some of the noteworthy green stories that we admired in the blogosphere from the past week.  This week, we range from reforestation to Leonardo DiCaprio to electric vehicles in New York to green living ideas for your kitchen at home.  If you see a headline that interests you, just click on it to read the full article.   

Mayor Bloomberg announces the addition of 70 new electric vehicles to the city’s fleet 

New York City is going greener as Mayor Bloomberg announces an important green initiative for city vehicles.  Many city agencies will drive one of the 70 new electric vehicles including:  the Department of Corrections, the Department of Environmental Protection, the Department of Parks and Recreation, the Department of Sanitation, the New York City Fire Department and the New York City Police Department, among others.   

Fisker Karma Plugin Supercar - photo courtesty of ecorazzi.com

 

 To quote Leonardo DiCaprio “we all have to do our part to raise awareness about global warming and the problems we as a people face in promoting a sustainable environmental future for our planet.” Now the infamous actor/environmentalist is promoting sustainability while he’s first in line to get the new Fisker Karma Plugin Supercar.  It’s quite an upgrade from his modest Toyota Prius that he helped put on the eco-cool map, but it’s still an astounding electric vehicle and kudos to Leo for continuing to drive green.   

5 Successful Reforestation Projects 

This article highlights 5 great reforestation projects from around the globe.  Reforestation “is the restocking of existing forests and woodlands which have been depleted, an effect of deforestation. Reforestation can be used to improve the quality of human life by soaking up pollution and dust from the air, rebuild natural habitats and ecosystems, mitigate global warming since forests facilitate biosequestration of atmospheric carbon dioxide, and harvest for resources, particularly timber.”   

Trashtivist: My garbage, in perspective 

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If you’re in the market for a hybrid or electric vehicle at the moment you may be best advised to wait a few months as prices that were already climbing due to the ongoing spike in fuel costs are likely to be further increased due to production shutdowns in Japan due to the tragic earthquake and tsunami just 10 days ago. In some cases short-term availability could be non-existent. Most likely to be impacted by short-term price hikes are the Toyota Prius and Honda Fit but the expectation is that cars that are considered eco-friendly will see a short-term increase as supply struggles to meet demand. Analysts have seen the Prius for example selling below invoice just a few weeks ago to an anticipated level above the sticker price by the end of the month. At present most Japanese automakers build many of the best-selling lines in the US but some models including the two have mentioned are still assembled and then shipped from Japan. To complicate that supplies were already limited due to a strengthening demand so far in 2011 as a result of rapidly increasing prices for gasoline.

Coincidentally Toyota, Honda and Nissan all have vehicles that are amongst their fastest selling models so far this year that are each being produced in Japan. The intermediate impact of electricity blackouts in Japan and the resultant backlog in production is still being observed so it’s a little early to determine how long the impact will last although it is having a similar effect in the semiconductor industry which like the automotive sector is also a huge consumer of electricity in the manufacturing process. The Toyota Prius may be most greatly affected in the coming weeks and months as there is less than a 60 day supply currently on US soil while the demand continues to grow. Crunch time is expected to begin the last days of this month and then into April with the continued changes in gas prices also likely to determine how lengthy the shortage is. According to online studies prices of environmentally friendly cars especially those manufactured in Japan have shown increases of greater than two percent so far in 2011 with almost half of that increase being over the last 10 days. Subaru in the US and Canada are also in a difficult position at the moment as lower inventories are maintained many models have less than a 30 day supply in North America ready to be sold. Either way you look at it the likelihood is that prices will continue to increase for at least the next month or two.

Meanwhile in Japan Toyota have said that the company is making every effort to minimize any long-term impact on the availability of any model and say that their current inventories are overall ‘still adequate’. The main contributor has not been damage to manufacturing centers but the process to assess the safety of all buildings is still ongoing, whereas the staggered rolling blackouts of electricity in all regions has caused bigger delays. Toyota has currently stopped production until at least today with the exception of parts needed for the repair business, while Nissan anticipates seeing two plants come back online this week and three more next week. According to an automotive industry study almost 200,000 vehicles that would normally be entering the market have not been built since the earthquake struck, in many cases building safety has not been the issue but a delay in components such as microprocessors. The automotive industry is ever more reliant on the semiconductor industry which has seen similar and in some cases larger impact in Japan since the event on March 11th.

Economically as you’d expect the implications of the disaster stand to be huge in tandem with the environmental impact which is far too early to even begin to assess. Strangely it also means that purchasing a vehicle that is more environmentally friendly will be more difficult or expensive in the short term.

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