Clean Health: Eat the Sauce

A Per Day, Keep the "Cancer" Away!

People who munch on apples, eat applesauce or drink apple juice are 27 percent less likely to develop metabolic syndrome -- a combination of health problems, such as increased blood pressure and blood-sugar levels, that can lead to heart disease and diabetes, research shows. Other studies suggest that eating apples may reduce the risk of breast cancer.

Clean Earth: Spread The Message

Leveraging Your Environmental & Social Commitments

Surveys show more U.S. citizens are joining the growing ranks of environmentally concerned consumers around the world, with high expectations that companies be good corporate citizens. As the green market grows exponentially, leveraging your environmental and social commitments will help you gain and keep market share. Being “on-message” in your marketing is crucial.

Start by sharing information with customers. Comprehensive product disclosure helps lead them through the maze of competing for product claims and educates them about the impacts of their wider consumption. Empower them to make more informed purchasing decisions--not only when it comes to your product category but in others as well.

Clean Health: LOL Laughing Eases Stress

Bring Some Humor Into Your Life

Laughing not only eases stress, promotes social bonding, and lowers blood pressure, it may also boost your immune system. So bring some humor into your life, whether it's through friends or even a new TV show.

Clean Earth: Green From Go

Green Workspace Begins with Effective Management

Designing a green workspace begins with effective management, taking a whole-of-building approach that accounts for the interaction between structure, systems, and external environment. Simple measures, when integrated in a comprehensive plan, can contribute to significant energy savings. A sensor system to control lighting, for instance, also reduces heat generation and the need for air conditioning.


The potential of this holistic approach is shown in buildings such as the City of Chicago’s Center for Green Technology, one of the nation’s first buildings certified platinum, the highest achievable level, by the U.S. Green Building Council. Along with comprehensive greenhouse and waste management plans, green features of the building include rooftop solar energy panels, rainwater collection for irrigation, recycled building materials, sensors to control lighting, and a vegetable roof.

 

Clean Health - Brushing is Not Enough

The dangers of skipping Flossing

If you plan to spend your later years eating more than yogurt and applesauce, invest in some floss. No matter how thoroughly or long you brush your teeth, you're missing a good portion of their total surface. That's like washing one armpit after a workout. But the dangers of skipping floss go beyond hygiene: The bacteria that linger can increase your risk of heart disease. I use Reach Ultraclean floss, which stretches to glide between teeth.

Clean Earth: Calculate Your Footprint

Becoming Carbon Neutral 

By aiming to become carbon neutral you make your business stand out from the crowd, manage the risk of being left behind in an area set to become common practice, and position your business to profit from carbon trading.

Before you can decide on the most effective way to become carbon neutral you need to measure accurately the greenhouse emissions caused directly by your own operations and indirectly by your suppliers and the use of your products. An assessment is best done with the help of an experienced carbon consultant and specialized assessor.

For information on calculating your carbon footprint visit the website of Greenhouse Gas Protocol (www.ghgprotocol.org) and initiative of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development.

Clean Health: Go Herbal

Try Horse Chestnut

Studies show to strengthen veins and reduce swelling for varicose veins, try horse chestnut, an herbal extract.

The herb is also available in topical creams, though there's not as much evidence for these.

Clean Earth: "STAKEHOLDERS" Suppliers

Prosperity Depends On Many Stakeholders

Your business prosperity depends on many stakeholders--employees, customers, suppliers, contractors, regulators, and lobby groups. Think of it less as a chain than a web--one that sometimes demands a delicate balancing act. Consider your suppliers, for example.

Just as you hope your own environmental efforts will help attract and retain customers, your own purchasing power is a means to influence the network of businesses you buy from.

It may be necessary to swap to new suppliers that share and support your enthusiasm for green business practices, but that’s not always possible or even desirable: there’s also a place for persuasion and education, using your relationships to coax the less committed along the path to sustainability.

Clean Health: Take a Deep Belly Breath

A Dose of Oxygen Will Make You Feel Happier

Do this anywhere, anytime. Push out your bellows and suck air through your nose until your lungs are full. They'll fill with nitric oxide, a chemical found in the back of your nose that opens up blood vessels. The dose of oxygen will make you feel happier and more alert. This is my secret technique for calming down before a show or a tough stitch in the OR.

Clean Earth: The New CEO

Environmental Performance at the Center of Your Working Culture

Green business means putting environmental performance at the center of your working culture, expressed through your company values, business objectives, performance measures, and management structure. If not made a core part of your company’s strategy, environmental goals can end up being tacked on to decisions after the financial and technical experts have had their day.

Leading corporations address this disconnect by appointing a chief environmental officer at the executive level, with authority equal to the chief financial officer, chief operations officer, or chief information officer. Any size business can profit from hiring an eco-leader. The point is not to create a green bureaucracy but to sharpen focus on implementation and show staff that sustainability is pivotal to business strategy.




#thenewceo #greenbusiness #environmental #strategy #financial #technical #chiefenvironmentaloffice #chiefoperationsofficer #chiefinformationofficer #executive #ecoleader #cleanearth #sustainability #createdbyearth

CLEAN HEALTH: Wash Up

Washing Your Hands Well & Often 

To fend off colds, washing your hands well and often is the best step you can take. Use plain soap and water and scrub for as long as it takes to sing "Happy Birthday to You" twice.

#wash #scrub #cleanhealth #sustainablehealth #createdbyearth

Clean Earth: Team Effort

A green business begins with personal commitment.

Without individuals doing the right thing--whether at their desk, on the shop floor, or out on the road--no environmental policy will work. But the inverse is also true: what any individual can do is limited without a team approach. To achieve optimum environmental and financial outcomes you need shared goodwill plus workable systems. Help create a green office culture with a management plan that harnesses the commitment of everyone in your workplace--starting with simple things like making recycling easy by ensuring everyone has collection bins at their desks or workstations. Provide briefings, signs, and other information to explain and encourage ways to conserve energy and minimize waste.

#teameffort #team #cleanearth #sustainability #createdbyearth

CLEAN HEALTH: Go slo-mo

Doing tai chi regularly not only improves your endurance and flexibility but may also help control blood sugar and improve your immune system. The exercise increases levels of certain bacteria-fighting T-cells in your body, research shows.

#taichi #endurance #flexibility #bloodsugar #immunesystem #bacteria #tcells #cleanhealth #sustainablehealth #createdbyearth

Clean Earth: Natural Advantages

The business has always profited from nature, creating the conditions for more a comfortable existence by exploiting the earth’s resources. When those resources seemed limitless the process of “taming” nature was acceptable, even necessary, but the conquest is turning into a hollow victory. Now, as Tachi Kiuchi and Bill Shireman write in What We Learned in the Rainforest, the real value of nature must come not from extracting its physical resources, but from the lessons it teaches and that includes learning how it works.

Take a cue from biologist Allan Wilson’s studies of birds: create a learning organization by working together as individuals, not apart in isolated territories. Have a culture that encourages sharing information and new skills both within your own team and across the business.

#naturaladvantages #existence #resources #sharing #cleanearth #sustainability #createdbyearth

Clean Health: Embrace Bitters

Combat a yen for sugar by following a Chinese medicine approach: Eat foods such as endive, radicchio, cooked greens, and olives.

bitters #chinese #medicine #cleanhealth #sustainablehealth #createdbyearth

Clean Earth: Waste Audit

A waste audit helps your business understand the nature of its waste streams and the different options for transforming them into something useful. By closing the production loop you maximize resources, reduce waste-disposal costs, and create a more efficient organization. An audit involves collecting all waste generated over a week, then sorting through it to determine composition, quantities, and the effectiveness of existing waste management strategies.

For best results, you need well-defined objectives, committed management, and a plan that gives ownership to those who will implement systems and strategies. Contact your local solid waste utility or state environmental agency for advice or information about finding qualified waste auditors.

#wasteaudit #transforming #reduce #waste #disposal #implementsystems #cleanearth #sustainability #createdbyearth

Clean Health: Taste the Colors

Foods with bright, rich colors are more than just nice to look at. They're also packed with flavonoids and carotenoids, powerful compounds that bind the damaging free radicals in your body, lowering inflammation. (Sadly, skittles do not count.)

 

Eat nine fistfuls of colorful fruits and vegetables each day and you'll reap the benefits without having to give up other foods. Whenever I shop the produce aisle, I'm reminded that these foods are often more powerful than the drugs sold in pharmacies. My favorites are arugula and blueberries.

#foods #bright #colors #inflammation #flavonoids #carotenoids #colorful #cleanhealth #sustainablehealth #createdbyearth

Clean Earth: ISO 14000 Environmental Assessment Systems

ISO 14000 is a series of environmental assessment methods developed by the International Organization for Standardization, covering systems from environmental management, certification, and eco-labeling.

The series defines three types of eco-labels. Type I labels (ISO 14024) are arguably the most valuable--for both producers and consumer--as they denote selective, multi-criteria-based, third-party-certified endorsement of a product. Type III labels (ISO 14025) provide quantified but non-selective product information based on independent verification against established benchmarks. Less valuable Type II labels (ISO 14021), which are self-declared claims.

Appreciating the relative merit of different labels will enable you to maximize the environmental benefit of your procurement decisions. For information about ISO 14000 go to www.iso.org. For more on eco-labeling go to www.gen.gr.jp, or eco-labels.org.

Clean Health: Benefit From Bilberry

Studies are mixed, but some have found that bilberry, a relative of the blueberry, may improve night vision. During World War II, fighter pilots reported better night vision after eating bilberry jam. Take 25 to 50 milligrams of bilberry extract; expect the best results within the first few hours.

#bilberry #nightvision #cleanhealth #sustainablehealth #createdbyearth

CLEAN EARTH: Start Green From Go

Designing a green workspace begins with effective management, taking a whole-of-building approach that accounts for the interaction between structure, systems, and external environment. 

Simple measures, when integrated in a comprehensive plan, can contribute to significant energy savings. A sensor system to control lighting, for instance, also reduces heat generation and the need for air conditioning.

The potential of this holistic approach is shown in buildings such as the City of Chicago’s Center for Green Technology, one of the nation’s first buildings certified platinum, the highest achievable level, by the U.S. Green Building Council. Along with comprehensive greenhouse and waste management plans, green features of the building include rooftop solar energy panels, rainwater collection for irrigation, recycled building materials, sensors to control lighting, and a vegetable roof.