Here are some of the latest details for the upcoming Miami Living Green Expo on August 15-16, 2009 at the Doubletree Miami Mart Hotel & Exhibition Center (map).
Admission is $10 (there is a coupon for buy one get one free), but we have several free passes available. Please comment below with how many you would like and why. We’ll contact those we can for mailing addresses to send out the passes in time.
We often report on big events and actions happening in Miami related to the environment. However, there are a lot of smaller things happening in our individual neighborhoods that are harder to find out about.
In Brickell, where I live, a new 35 story office building is being built (1450 Brickell) and it is pre-certified as LEED Gold. LEED certified buildings operate at lower cost and have many environmental benefits compared to normal construction.
Also in Brickell, some local residents are working with their condo building to offer recycling for its residents. This is a challenge for many Miamians, including myself, even though it is the law for condos to provide recycling. Find more information on What Doesn’t My Condo Recycle?
Someone in Sunny Isles mentioned to us that their condo recently REMOVED recycling from the building, because it was such a mess. This is the big issue…if people do not put recyclables in the right spot, the entire process gets botched and all of this potentially recyclable material becomes trash. If we want to have recycling in our buildings, education to residents must be key.
We’ve also heard from friends in North Bay Village that a mom is driving around in a three wheel electric vehicle, and has managed to fit 2 car seats in the back! Now that’s green.
What’s going on in your neighborhood? Can you recycle in your condo (what building is it?)? Let us know in the comments section! Also let us know if you’d like to see this as a regular feature and would like to keep your eye out for green in your area!
The City of Miami’s Office of Sustainable Initiatives is looking to expand their team! They currently have three open positions. Short summaries of the expected duties are below. The complete job description can be seen by clicking the name of each position. If you would like to apply, please send a cover letter and resume to Edith McClintock.
Examples of projects/programs include, but are not limited to: implementing City of Miami Tree Master Plan; developing or coordinating production of communications or educational materials; coordinating committees, summits, events or forums; functioning as liaison with nonprofit organizations receiving funds or working on projects with MSI; delivering community and departmental presentations and trainings on sustainable initiatives; monitoring and evaluating MSI projects.
The duties of the position include, but are not limited to: analyzing, implementing, and evaluating long-term plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from city operations; compiling and preparing detailed reports and making recommendations for operational improvements; performing statistical and financial analysis and hypothesis testing; identifying system and organizational difficulties hindering the accomplishment of MSI goals & objectives; assisting in the installation of new procedures and management techniques; conducting research on national environmental trends; performing analysis of departmental practices and policies and comparing them to industry-wide best practices; researching legal and policy issues related to MSI goals & objectives; drafting memorandums, ordinances, and a variety of other correspondence; conducting community and departmental presentations and trainings; assisting with improving community relations and responsiveness to issues raised by citizens.
In addition to the two positions noted above, the office is also looking for an Administrative Assistant.
This post was contributed by a local resident. greenerMIAMI will actually be attending the Summit and will bring you up to date information as quickly and as often as possible! Stay tuned!
Well, to those of us who have been pushing for what seems like eternity for Florida to take action on global warming, the last couple months have been flat-out surreal. First we have our newly elected Governor, in his first State of the State address, actually declare that climate change is not only real (duh) but that it is “one of the most important issues that we will face this century.”
That’s a real quote. From the Governor of Florida no less. I’m not kidding – look it up yourself if you like. You could have knocked me over with a feather.
Now top that with not one, not two, but three conferences either hosted or attended by Florida Cabinet members over this summer on the very issue of Climate Change. It’s like someone flipped a switch (or made a really popular movie out of a slide show) and now everyone wants to be green. Kermit’s day has finally arrived!
Anyway, the point of this post is really to let you know that the big show – a star studded event that so far includes union pariah, turned greenest governor ever, Arnold Schwarzenegger, the environmental super-dude Robert F. Kennedy Junior, and Theodore Roosevelt IV – descendant of The Teddy himself and the Chair of the Pew Center for Global Climate Change – will be hosted in the “canary in the coal mine” for climate change. Yep, Miami. Tomorrow. Check it out yourself at myfloridaclimate.com.
The agenda page of the website just published and includes a pretty good compilation of experts in various fields. Unfortunately not too many from Florida. The State may be slow to realize the importance of this problem (better late than never at least), but we have some great people with lots of experience in academic circles and local government. Hopefully we’ll hear a bit of that in the late Thursday session.
Although the cynic in me wants to make this conference no more than a tour of the next Atlantis, I’m truly hopeful that we can focus this event (and the inevitable international media spotlight) to finally get our Country on track and join the rest of the world in trying to come up with a real plan. And quick.
We’ve promised an updated greenerMIAMI site for some time, but have had a lot on our plate. However, we’re excited to announce that we are able to move forward with growing the voice and the team of greenerMIAMI.
As you may know, I’m co-Founder and Editor of Ecorazzi.com, a popular "green gossip" website - eco-friendly paparazzi, if you will. On Ecorazzi, we’ve got team members all over the world contributing content to our site. Not just writers, either: field reporters, photographers, videographers, and more. I’ve always treated greenerMIAMI quite differently than Ecorazzi, and I’m beginning to wonder why.
Sure, greenerMIAMI is a sub-topic of an already small subject, but there is a lot going on in the environmental arena locally, and a lot of people that are interested in hearing about it. So, we are now officially looking to grow the greenerMIAMI "staff", if you will. Please note that all of these positions are VOLUNTEER, but will be a lot of fun, and interesting to say the least. If you have written us before regarding an interest to contribute, please write us again - there are a lot of emails coming in and we don’t want to or mean to skip over you.
Positions available include, but are not limited to:
The possibilities are endless. If one of these ideas doesn’t float your boat but you’ve got one of your own, let us know! Do eco-experiments and write about them! Blog about your daily experiences riding the bus! Go on a quest to recycle!
If you are interested in any of these volunteer positions with greenerMIAMI, please send us an email. If blogging is what you are after, please send a sample post that is relevant and appropriate for the site. Please be aware that if it is accepted, it will be posted to the site with credit to you. If you are with a non-profit environmental organization, consider having a monthly column on greenerMIAMI that you post yourself.
We look forward to hearing from you and have you help make greenerMIAMI.com a resource FOR the community, BY the community!
Last night the Village of Key Biscayne held a Town Hall Meeting on Energy & the Environment. MC’d by David Adams of the Fueling Station, the meeting was kicked off with Mayor Robert Vernon conducting a ceremonial signing the US Mayors Climate Protection Agreement. He officially signed the agreement at the April 10 Council Meeting where it was a resolution on the agenda. The agreement had already been signed by his predecessor, but we’re happy to see that he’s on board, as well.
Additionally, Roberta Fernandez, an environmental consultant and climate change messenger came with her presentation from The Climate Project. This is the program that Al Gore helped create to train messengers to deploy into their communities and teach people about climate change. If you’ve seen An Inconvenient Truth, it was very similar information, but presented right in front of you and without all of those slow shots of Al Gore on a plane and on his farm.
Finally, we heard from Tim Center of Council for Sustainable Florida, which I don’t think I knew about until last night. A cool guy, and a great organization that I can’t wait to learn more about. He gave us some crazy statistics about the kind of growth we should expect in South Florida over the next several decades. (Five million today to 10 million in 2060.) He pointed out that this is an amazing opportunity. "Most of the build environment that will exist is 2030 has yet to be built…it’s an amazing opportunity…to look at how to do things."
Super Bowl in Miami. It was a wet one. Of course, I watched it in the comfort of my own home. However, we did go out looking for trouble and a sense of Super Bowl Weekend Madness the day before. We headed down to South Beach to see what was going on…and we brought our camera!
Welcome to the greenerMIAMI tour of pre-Super Bowl festivities. Surprise, surprise, there were some things we didn’t like. The good news? We have suggestions on how to make the 2010 Super Bowl in Miami even greener.
Attire: I went decked out in my organic tee from ReusableBags.com that says Plastic Bags Blow. If not that day, then when, right? Number of positive comments received = 1. Number of interesting looks = several.
Favorite Publicity: I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the most eco-friendly advertising was from Flagler Dog Track. Animal-friendly, not really…but their marketing was carbon neutral!
Worst Publicity: So many planes! What a waste of fuel! Oh, and don’t even get me started on the fliers. Get rich quick idea - create an effective publicity company that doesn’t burn up tons of gas or require mass amounts of paper to be thrown on the ground.
Moment I Was About To Throw Down: When the girl working at the Motorola throw-a-football-through-the -hole-and-get-a-free-inflatable-vinyl-chair-place (we threw, but didn’t want or receive the chair) started putting trash from their stage onto the beach. I said, "You should throw it in the trash can." She said, "We don’t have a trash can, and I don’t want it on the stage." I said, "You should go find a trash can and throw it away." She said, "I didn’t put it there." Argh! Recommendation: Make sure all vendors have trash cans!
Worst Trash Moment: Several companies were giving out free drinks on Ocean Drive - bottles of water, energy drinks, etc. Now, I’m not going to say this shouldn’t happen, because at a mass event like this, it’s just not feasible for everyone to BYOBottle. Plus, free non-alcoholic drinks sounds like a public service. But come on - not enough trash cans and no recycling? If you allow these companies to set up on the street and hand out products, require them to have recycling bins and a plan to get them recycled!
This is what we need to see our local kids doing! Dream in Green…this could be a good idea for your schools! How is it that an English accent makes even little kids sound so professional? I love it! Video link.
Via - Hugg
Last week I attended the Simple Solar Solutions workshop at MDC Wolfson Campus. It was a full house with about 200 people in attendance, with another 100 watching over webcast at the Kendall campus. The first presenter was Dr. Roger Messenger, a very smart and very funny man, and now semi-retired from FAU. After that, we heard from John Kimball and Dan Morris of Sun Electronics. Finally, the event was finished up with a panel including Dr. Messenger, Commissioner Katy Sorenson, and Stuart Bazerman of the County.
For simplicity’s sake, I’m going to type my notes up here, with a bit of commentary mixed in. Please note that PV = Photovoltaic = Solar power technology.
Wow, anyone else out there starting to feel like they live in a city that really cares about the environment? The amount of green events in Miami lately has been overwhelming. Today, I have even more information about another upcoming green event.
FIU, Biscayne Bay Campus, is holding a Green Building Conference on Friday, November 3. Called, Green Buildings & Sustainable Construction: A Road Map for the Future, you will need to pre-register for the conference. It costs $50 per person, with a discount for USGBC members.
The conference is being hosted by FIU’s Institute for Technology Innovation & Canadian General Consulate of Miami.
The event is described as follows:
This event will bring together corporate leaders from our community in industries such as real estate, land development, construction, and architecture, as well as experts in climate, green technology, and the environment, focusing on three areas:
• New technologies and construction practices that decrease the energy footprint of buildings. This will cover construction materials, energy and water use, and management practices.
• The future of government environmental regulations at the local, national, international levels as well as emerging industry standards and certifications.
• The future of global climate change and the effects this has on construction and building management strategies
View more event details and RSVP. The view the flier above, simply click on the image.
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