I just received an excellent book by the noteworthy, bestselling author Bill McKibben called Fight Global Warming Now: The Handbook for Taking Action in Your Community.  And as I’ve done in the past, I’m giving a copy away.*  McKibben is the author of several books and with Fight Global Warming Now, he draws on his experience with Step It Up 2007 to explain what it takes to launch online grassroots campaigns, generate persuasive political pressure, and plan high-profile events that will draw media attention.  The book is a blueprint of sorts for the movement to battle climate change.  To give you an idea, one of the goals of the movement is an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050.  Feel free to visit Bill McKibben‘s website or Step It Up 2007 to learn more about it and Step It Up 2, which is planned for November 3, 2007.

*After 48 hours, I’m going to pick a number out of a cap and give this book away to the comment number corresponding to the number I pick.  Since you leave your email when you comment, I’ll email you for your address and shipping’s on me to anywhere in the U.S.  Not sure what to say in the comments?  Tell me where you’re commenting from: "SLC, Utah here!"

Just a quick note on a new book that’s out by Jerry Yudelson called Green Building A to Z.  I received an advance copy that I’ve read through and want to give away to a random commenter.*  As the preface explains, "[this book] is designed for you, intelligent reader, who may not be actively engaged in architecture or building engineering, but who needs a quick introduction to the rationale for green buildings and the language of the field."  I’d like to describe it as a dictionary of everything relating to green building, but it’s more than that.  Yudelson has an approachable perspective and breaks everything down nicely.  After reading through explanations of biophilia, thermal energy storage, and commissioning, you’ll be hitting on all cylinders.  I think this is a good book to have on hand as a reference, almost as a checklist of things to think about with a project.  It’s also a good book for building owners, investors, or lenders that want to know more about green building principles. 

*After 48 hours, I’m  going to pick a number out of a baseball cap and give this book away to the comment number corresponding to the number pulled from the hat.  Since you leave your email when you comment, I’ll email you for your address and shipping’s on me to anywhere in the U.S.  Not sure what to say in the comments?  Tell me where you’re commenting from: "Salt Lake City, Utah here!"

The publishing world is going crazy with good eco-friendly content.  I’ve added some new titles to the Jetson Green Sustainability Bookstore, in case you’re interested in keeping up with the latest trends and research on topics relevant to Jetson Green. 

• The World Without Us – Alan Weisman @ $14.97
• Ecological Design, 10th Anniversary Edition – Sim Van der Ryn @ $29.95
• The Designer’s Atlas of Sustainability – Ann Thorpe @ $29.95
• PreFab Now – James Grayson Trulove, Ray Cha @ $26.37 (release: 7/31)

I’m particularly interested in sitting down to The World Without Us near the end of the week.

I was excited to receive a copy of The Green Book in the mail from Crown Publishing the other day.  Actually, my wife took it over before me, so I had to wait for her to finish.  I’ve been interested in reading it ever since I saw that Will Ferrell had a part in there about his electric car.  I wasn’t disappointed either.  This book is excellent.  The celebrity asides really make the book shine I think.  I can just hear them talking as I’m reading it.  I’ve taken the liberty of including Owen Wilson’s commentary below–it’s a little long, but the guy just kills me.  He’s so casual and chilled out, it’s hard not to appreciate what he’s saying.  I mean, he’s absolutely dead on.  Go get a copy at the Jetson Green Sustainability Store, inside you’ll find tons of discourse on the small and big things we can do (with research references if you have more questions). 

"I started driving a Prius a few years ago, and I was surprised to find myself a little defensive about it.  ‘You know, aside from the whole environmental thing," I’d say, almost dismissively, "it’s actually a pretty cool car to drive.’  It was like I was halfway apologetic because I didn’t want to be aligned with any group, or movement.  Sort of like, ‘Hey, just because I’m driving a hybrid doesn’t mean I’m turning into Ed Begley Jr.’  But you know people say marijuana is a gateway drug?  That’s sorta what buying a Prius was for me…in terms of becoming environmentally sensitive.  Because before too long, I stopped wondering if driving it made me some kind of a preachy do-gooder and I actually started looking for other ways to ‘go green." 

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If you know me, you know I like to read.  You name it, I read it.  Books.  Magazines.  Newspapers.  Online.  Actually, I have a theory on book reading, which goes like this:  if you don’t pay reasonable market value for it, you won’t be motivated to read it.  It’s like a gym membership.  With this in mind, I’ve put together an online shop of sustainable books, The Jetson Green Sustainability Bookstore, in case anyone is searching for good material on environmentalism.  There’s a lot out there.  Let me know if I left something out that you think merits inclusion.  Here are the categories:

This isn’t a money maker for JG, I’ve never made more than $10 /quarter from Amazon…this is more intended to be a resource library for those of us at all levels in the journey towards living and working in a greener way.  Again, let me know if I left a good book out.  Also, I’ve gotten into Eco-Libris thanks to Victoria-E.  Eco-Libris plants a tree for every book that you purchase an offset for.  I’m not going to get into the offset controversy, but suffice it to say, I like the idea and will do it from now on.