Happy Earth Day @ Your Library!

Check out these great green reads at your Charleston County Public Library!

Children

*J O' Connor - Fancy Nancy: Every Day Is Earth Day by Jane O'Connor

J 333.9542 Forier - Endangered Animals by Elise Forier (We Both Read Beginning Reader Series)

J 363.7 Mckay - True Green: 100 Things You Can Do To Save the Planet by Kim McKay and Jenny Bonnin

J 363.7392 Sechrist - Air Pollution by Darren Sechrist (Saving Our World Series)

J 363.73874 Rockwell - Why Are All the Ice Caps Melting? The Dangers of Global Warming by Anne Rockwell

Teens

Y Greenwald - My Life in Pink and Green by Lisa Greenwald

Y Hiaasen - Scat by Carl Hiaasen

Y 333.72 Sivertsen - Generation Green: The Ultimate Teen Guide to Living an Eco-Friendly Life by Linda Sivertsen

Y 597.92 Hickman - Turtle Rescue by Pamela Hickman (Firefly Animal Rescues Series)

Adults

261.88 Gottlieb - A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and Our Planet's Future by Roger Gottlieb

333.7 Goleman - Ecological Intelligence: How Knowing the Hidden Impacts of What We Buy Can Change Everything by Daniel Goleman

363.7 Humes - Eco Barons: The Dreamers, Schemers, and Millionaires Who Are Saving Our Planet by Edward Humes

635.0484 Lovejoy - Ann Lovejoy's Organic Garden Design School: A Guide to Creating Your Own Beautiful, Easy-Care Garden by Ann Lovejoy

Coming Soon - Do One Green Thing: Save the Earth Through Simple Everyday Choices by Mindy Pennybacker

Close to Home: Charleston International Airport Recycling Program Takes Off!

Charleston Internation Airport became a Lowcountry environmental business leader in July 2009 when they kicked off a recycling program. Click here to read the Post and Courier article about this exciting initiative!


WCIV News Story

For more travel info for planning that special getaway or to find out more ways to have a great staycation check out CCPL's collection of travel books. Click the links below to see a selection of these resources.
Ecotourism

Travel and Guidebooks

Frommer's Travel Guides

Lonely Planet

South Carolina Travel

Charleston Travel


*Picture from http://www.wciv.com/news/stories/0709/640724.html. Accessed 8/10/09

Go Local

Charleston County Public Library's Websites of the Week offers some great links for info on local and organic food. CLICK HERE to check it out!

There is also a movement here in Charleston to encourage locals to buy goods and services from locally owned businesses called the Lowcountry Local First (CLICK for Charleston City Paper Article) (CLICK for Post and Courier Article). Lowcountry Local First is starting a grassroots movement called the 10 Percent Shift to get consumers in the Charleston area to buy at least 10 percent of their purchases from local businesses. Doing business locally has positive environmental impact because it reduces transportation costs and helps the local economy by creating more jobs here in the Lowcountry.*

CLICK here to visit Lowcountry Local First's website at http://www.lowcountrylocalfirst.org/.

*For help with job seeking, career building tips, money management tools, and information about local economic resources like social service agencies, CLICK HERE to check out CCPL's new Recession Resources page.

Close to Home: Charleston Battery Soccer = Environmentally Conscious Fun!

The Charleston Battery soccer team's efforts to make their organization and facilities at Blackbaud Stadium more environmentally friendly made their website the "Website of the Week" for June 17th, 2009, on South Carolina Educational Radio's Business Review.
Click the link below to read about the changes the team made in this interview with Tony Bakker, the Battery's CEO and majority owner, on the Go Green Charleston website or click here to read about solar power usage in Blackbaud stadium from the Post and Courier.

http://www.gogreencharleston.org/2008/01/22/tony-bakker-from-the-charleston-battery/

Checkout their website at www.charlestonbattery.com! The Charleston Battery is one of the many generous sponsors of Charleston County Public Library's 2009 Summer Reading Program. CLICK HERE for more info on ALL-AGES Summer Reading fun and prizes at CCPL!

Learn more at CCPL! CLICK HERE for books on the subject, "environmentalism", from the CCPL catalog! CLICK HERE for books on the subject, "soccer", from the CCPL catalog!

Great Earth Day Links From CCPL's Website of the Week!

CLICK HERE to check out CCPL's Websites of the Week for April 12th through 18th; they're all about Earth Day!

Click here to see all of CCPL's Websites of the Week!

Is "Smart" the New "Green"?

Read and recycle: get a book at a Friends of the Library "That BIG Book Sale"!

"Smart" is a word that is frequently used to describe devices that are energy saving and/or environmentally friendly, like the Smart Car or the "smartgrid". Like the food labeling term, "light" in the early 1990's, the term, "smart" may be used somewhat loosely to suit the purposes of advertisers so, as always, remember that old chestnut, "Let the buyer beware."

Public libraries are "smart" because they save library patrons lots of money by providing free access to a wonderful array of informational and entertainment resources. Public libraries are "green" because they help communities "reduce" consumption and instead "recycle" and "reuse" library materials.

The Friends of the Library also practice the three "Rs" by collecting unwanted books from generous donators and then reselling them to the public at awesome booksales at the CCPL Regional libraries and at two BIG booksales (www.thatBIGbooksale.com) each year.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE FRIENDS OF THE LIBRARY!

Sunday, September 28th: Charleston Green Fair

Join Charleston County Public Library at the Charleston Green Fair on Sunday, September 28th, 2008 for some environmentally-friendly fun! The Charleston Green Fair will be held at Marion Square in downtown Charleston (corner of Calhoun and King Streets) from 1 PM to 6 PM. There will be live music, exhibits, and children's area with lots of fun activities for the kids!

The CCPL booth will be located in the children's area of the festival and will feature storytime read-alouds, displays of environmental books for kids and adults from the library's collection, library card sign-up (September is National Library Card Sign-Up Month), and more! Stop by and say hello and see just how green our library is!

Mayor Riley endorses the Charleston Green Fair!

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Green Theme Flicks

Wall E is the latest hot, environmental feature film.  Check out some of these other great titles on DVD from the CCPL collection!

For Kids (DVD J)
Ferngully
Arctic Tale
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind
Hoot


For Adults (DVD)
Soylent Green
Logan's Run
The China Syndrome
Silent Running
The Day After Tomorrow
Zardoz
Waterworld
March of the Penguins
Erin Brockovich

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More Green Goodness From CCPL!

***Brown Bag It!

Charleston County Public Library now offers patrons Earth-friendly paper bags to use to transport their library materials from the library to home and back!

***Two Ways to Save Gas: Placing Holds and Returning Items to the Branch Nearest You

Be sure to use one of the most energy-saving services the library offers: our book shipment services. Place a hold for any library item at any library branch and have that item sent from any branch to the branch closest to you! When you return library materials, return them to the closest branch and let the CCPL book truck take them back to their home branch. CLICK HERE FOR CCPL LOCATION INFO.

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Paperless News

Newspapers are going electronic. This requires reformatting and rethinking the medium in order to compete in the online environment. Increasing use of social networking/web 2.0 technologies, staff downsizing, and evaluating ways of generating online revenue streams in the face of fierce competition are among the strategies used by newspaper publishers as they struggle to survive.

Social networking/web 2.0 technologies used include podcasting, blog-like formats, and social-networking in the form of commenting. Suscribers become users and newspapers become interactive in this brave new world of journalism.

The internet provides users with incredibly easy access to up-to-the-minute national and world news because of the proliferation of news media content providers like Google, Yahoo, and CNN. Becoming a provider of more detailed local news appears to be one of the most promising niches for newspapers to fill.

Click here for Charleston newspapers online.

Click for SC Newspapers online.

• Click here for links to newspapers online.

Magazines are also going digital. Some magazines, like Salon and Slate, exist only on the internet. Ezines (online magazines) range from slick counterparts to print publications to solo blog journals.

• Click here for ezine (online magazine and newspapers) links.
  
  

Reading news and magazines online is environmentally-friendly and economically sound because it saves money and creates less waste. Still want to read print copies? Visit the Periodicals section of any branch of the Charleston County Public Library and enjoy free access to some of the most popular magazines and most respected newspapers in print. Using library materials instead of purchasing individual items is always a greener choice!

CCPL's electronic resources also offer access to periodicals from around the world including Grolier's World Newspapers, Newsbank, Sirs Knowledge Source, and General Onefile periodical databases.

• Click here for periodicals from CCPL's Electronic Resources.


• (Click here for access instructions.)

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Environmental Series for Children

Charleston County Public Library has a great selection of children's nonfiction series on environmental issues!

Click to see more!

Earth Friends

Our Environment

Early Bird Earth Science

Infosearch

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DIY: An Idea Whose Time Has Come...Again

The "do it yourself" or DIY concept fits in nicely with environmentalism. Making things rather than buying them or making something new out of things already on hand is a great way to reduce waste and packaging and to reuse and recycle.

DIY is not a new concept but a return to an older, practical lifestyle that existed before post-WWII hyper-consumerism spawned the current excess of malls, megastores, and specialty shops. In those days the average American was familiar with floursack dresses, jury rigging, and jokes about Rube Goldberg contraptions, humorous caricatures of DIY run amok.

DIY resurfaced in the late 1960's and early 1970's as part of the same "back to the land", self-sufficiency movement that also spawned Earth Day and recycling. The Whole Earth Catalog, a directory of environmentally-friendly DIY resources and activist info, which was last published in 1972, is considered a forerunner of the internet.

Today's DIY trend is considered by some afficiandos as artistry because of the handcrafting involved and also, perhaps, because it is more often a personal lifestyle choice than a necessity for many trend followers. DIY may also be considered useable/wearable/edible "art" because of the unique characteristics of each individual piece or product as compared to the soulless consistency of store-bought, manufactured goods.

Click for DIY Weblinks

Some DIY Subject Headings (Click for Catalog Links)

DIY

Handicraft

Sewing

Knitting

Canning and Preserving

Fruit Preservation

Cheesemaking also Cheese Cookery

Herb Gardening

Beer Brewing

Soap and Handicraft

Herbal Cosmetics

Household Supplies (make your own cleaning products) and House Cleaning - Environmental Aspects

Rube Goldberg Pencil Sharpener

Rube Goldberg gets his think-tank working and evolves the simplified pencil-sharpener.
Open window (A) and fly kite (B). String (C) lifts small door (D) allowing moths (E) to escape and eat red flannel shirt (F). As weight of shirt becomes less, shoe (G) steps on switch (H) which heats electric iron (I) and burns hole in pants (J). Smoke (K) enters hole in tree (L), smoking out opossum (M) which jumps into basket (N), pulling rope (O) and lifting cage (P), allowing woodpecker (Q) to chew wood from pencil (R), exposing lead. Emergency knife (S) is always handy in case opossum or the woodpecker gets sick and can't work.

From http://www.rubegoldberg.com/. Accessed 5/30/08.

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Greener, Better: Health Info @ Your Library

Thinking about taking "green" to a personal level and making changes in diet and exercise? Want to know more about how to do it and maximize the health benefits? The Charleston County Public Library provides library users with access to top-of-the-line health information through the CCPL Electronic Resource Databases. These databases are also available at home, paper-free, via the internet and provide different selections of information to meet the varying needs of library users. This is the real deal, so don't rely on questionable sources like Google and Wikipedia, let CCPL provide you with access to the best information available!

(Click here for database access information.)
(CLICK HERE to go to the Health and Medicine Databases)

Here are descriptions of a few of the databases:

Hands on Health provides health information specifically for South Carolinians.

The Health and Wellness Center provides health reference information for the general user about diseases and conditions, alternative medicine, and other health topics, and includes a dictionary and a directory of high quality health websites.

The Health Reference Center Academic database allows you to take charge of your health by accessing information from the same academic research sources used by medical providers like Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), The Lancet, and others.

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Farmer's Markets: Fresh, Local, and Green

Cooking with fresh, local food is a key component of "green" living and the Slow Food movement. This is because local food that is unprocessed has not been shipped, refridgerated, or stored, therefore less energy is used from the time it leaves the farm until it gets to your table. If the food is organic, then it is even "greener", because producing it has not caused as big an environmental impact as food grown with the use of agricultural chemicals.

Post and Courier article on local Farmer's Markets - 4/2/08 (click here)

Farmers Markets in the Charleston Area

Charleston Farmers Market

James Island Presbyterian Church Foundation Farmers Market

Mount Pleasant Farmers Market

North Charleston Farmers Market

Summerville Farmers Market

Slow Food and Fresh Food Selections From the CCPL Menu

*Slow Food

*641.5973 Madison - Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating From America's Farmers Markets by Deborah Madison

*Vegetable/Vegetarian/Vegan Cookbooks

Charleston Farmer's Market in Marion Square Music Video!


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Check Out These "How To" Guides to Green Living

Going green is a hot topic right now. The library has guides for making small or large lifestyle changes to make your home more environmentally friendly.

Here a few suggested items from the CCPL collection and subject headings to check out.

363.70525 Riley - The Complete Idiot's Guide to Green Living by Trish Riley (Complete Idiot's Guide Series)

618.2 Greene - Raising Baby Green: The Earth-Friendly Guide to Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Baby Care by Alan R. Greene and others

648.5 Sandbeck - Organic Housekeeping: In Which the Nontoxic Avenger Shows You How to Improve Your Health and That of Your Family, While You Save Time, Money, and, Perhaps, Your Sanity by Ellen Sandbeck

Green Subject Headings

Environmental Home
Organic Living
Slow Food
Renewable Energy
Recycling
Composting
Ecological Houses
Architecture-Environmental Aspects


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Current Information + Environmental Friendliness = CCPL Electronic Databases!

Scientific knowledge about environmental issues is rapidly growing and changing. One of the hottest, most controversial topics in this field is the theory of "global warming". This theory is constantly being debated and scientificly tested with new issues, changes, and challenges emerging all the time.

Stay on top of the "global warming" debate and other environmental issues from the comfort of your home by using the CCPL electronic databases! Electronic databases are green because they are paperless and because most of the databases are enabled for home-access with a CCPL library card, which saves library patrons time and the transportation cost of traveling to the library. They are also extremely current because they are updated so frequently and are very user-friendly. (Click here for database access instructions)

(Click here to go to CCPL's Ask-A-Question Services link
for help with CCPL electronic resources and all your other reference needs!)

Some databases to check out for current info on global warming and other issues are the Science databases and the Magazines, Newspapers, and Journals databases.

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CCPL Email Notification: Save a Tree

Sign up to be notified about your library account by email! It is faster, more economic, and green.

Click here to sign up!

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Green Documentaries @ Your Library!

Check out a documentary film on environmental issues at your library!

No matter whether the film supports or challenges your personal beliefs, one thing is clear: sharing DVDs and books and other library materials with fellow library patrons rather than buying individual copies is a greener, more environmentally conscious way to keep up with hot topics like green and/or organic living, global warming, and wildlife conservation. Libraries are naturally green!

Feature Documentary Films

Who Killed the Electric Car? (film website)

An Inconvenient Truth (film website)

Koyaanisqatsi = Life Out of Balance - An artistic take on environmental issues with a soundtrack by composer, Phillip Glass.

Nova Television Special

Dimming the Sun (WGBH Nova Program website)

More Hot Green Topics on DVD

Global Warming

Conservation

Environment

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Rachel Carson: Green Pioneer

Rachel Carson (1907 - 1964), a biologist and nature writer, published Silent Spring in 1962. This groundbreaking, well-documented book revealed that widespread environmental devastation was being caused by unchecked use of chemical pesticides (Carson called them "biocides") in post-WWII United States. The furor and controversy over the issues raised by Silent Spring triggered federal inquiries into the impact of pesticide use. It also gave birth to the environmental movement.

Rachel Carson's work stressed the importance of remembering that all living things are part of the same web of life. What effects one part of that web will also impact the whole. Forty-six years after the publication of Silent Spring, this is still one of the main themes of current environmental thinking.

Rachel Carson Tribute website - http://www.rachelcarson.org/

Rachel Carson in Time Magazine's Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century

CCPL Research Database Articles

(click here for database access instructions - after clicking on article and logging into databases use the "back" arrow to come back to this blogpost and then click on article link to read article.)

Children - Rachel Carson - Kids Infobits

Teens - Rachel Carson article from Sirs Knowledge Source

Adults - Rachel Carson Biography from Biography Resource Center

Note: CCPL's Research Tools electronic databases provide library patrons with paper-free, current informational resources that are accessable from anywhere with internet access; home, office, or school.

Check out the CCPL Ask-A-Question Services for even more "away from the library" reference help!

Picture of Rachel Carson from http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/whatsnew/events/carson/agenda.cfm. Accessed 3/23/08.

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Check Out Something Green!

Green is the color for environmentalism. Look for green goodness @ your library!

Click here for some GREEN selections from the CCPL Catalog

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