Greenpeace paints 'hazardous products' on HP's roof

 

Let this be a lesson to electronics companies everywhere: If you don't heed demands to remove toxic materials from your products, Greenpeace is going to paint your roof.

Luckily, they'll use nontoxic finger paint. The negative advertising, visible to passing birds and helicopters, won't last longer than the time it takes to power-wash it away.

Unless someone snaps a picture. Or films it.

It took about 10 minutes for a handful of activists to complete the mission, Greenpeace International toxics campaigner Casey Harrell said. Dressed in haz-mat suits and armed with motorized paint-sprayers, they scaled the building with industrial-strength ladders and blasted the words "hazardous products" on the roof of Hewlett-Packard's Palo Alto headquarters. And they didn't even get arrested.

The action followed demands by Greenpeace that Hewlett-Packard fulfill a promise to stop using hazardous materials such as PVC plastic and brominated flame retardants, which have been linked to thyroid hormone disruption in animals.

"Greenpeace will not stand idly by while companies that commit to environmentally responsible action backtrack on commitments," Harrell said in a statement Tuesday. "As the number one seller of PCs worldwide, HP has both the responsibility and the ability to make sure the company no longer deserves the moniker 'Hazardous Products.' "

HP said in a statement that the company was committed to eliminating  brominated flame retardants and PVC from its PC products by the end of 2011, according to wire reports.

-- Amy Littlefield

Photo credit: Kim White/Greenpeace; used with permission

L.A. business leans green

Representatives of more than 500 businesses -- including solar panel installers, venture capitalists and green janitorial services -- crowded into the Los Angeles Business Council's Sustainability Summit at the Getty Museum today, attesting to a growing surge of corporate interest in save-the-planet issues.

Green-washing? Well, some of the interest may be attributable to image-building. But the message from business leaders on several panels was that conserving energy and conducting environmentally friendly business is good for the bottom line.

Kevin L. Ratner, president of Forest City Residential West, a unit of the $10.9-billion Forest City development firm, acknowledged that building structures to meet the U.S. Green Building Council's standards of the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) can add 1% to 2% to construction costs -- or up to 5% if one seeks the highest LEED "platinum" certification. But LEED buildings rent for 6% to 10% more, and tenants are less likely to leave, he said. Building green "enhances our public image and the image of those who occupy our buildings, and increases productivity of the occupiers.... It also saves you money."

With buildings responsible for 71% of electricity use nationwide, and 38% of planet-heating carbon dioxide emissions, it was no wonder that much of the summit focused on the built environment. Joseph Pettus, senior vice president of Safeway Inc., which owns Vons groceries, boasted that "we are putting solar panels on our roofs as fast as we can." He added that the company on Jan. 1 converted its fleet of vehicles to B20, a biodiesel fuel blend, but recently suspended the experiment "to take a look at it."

Michael Mahdesian, chairman of the Culver City janitorial firm, Servicon Systems, said using cleaning products that are less toxic, thus improving indoor air quality, can boost the points leading to a LEED certification by 26%. His firm, which cleans 70 million square feet a day in hospitals, aerospace factories and high rises, cleans "completely green," he said. "There are chemicals that are less harmful but can get the same job done.... We limit the use of water and chemicals.... We use paper that is post-consumer recycled." And even a small issue such as providing doorway mats will limit the dirt and moisture tracked into buildings, and limit inside air pollutants, he said.

Electronic-waste recycling: The cup runneth over

Leave it to Oregon. The state where recycling is practically an article of religion is having headaches with its new electronic recycling law: Way too many old TVs, computers and monitors have flooded in since the law took effect in January.

Mind you, it's a problem the state doesn't mind having. The more the better, state officials say. But the biggest manufacturers group participating in the program, the Electronic Manufacturers Recycling Management Co., or MRM, wants to call a bit of a time-out.

Warning that e-waste will substantially exceed its state-mandated target if the stuff keeps coming in at the current rate, MRM said it will limit collections to designated network collection sites and won't reimburse for e-waste collected at special events organized by neighborhoods, church groups or county cleanup events. In addition, the company is asking collectors to limit their promotions for e-waste recycling to signs designed by the Department of Environmental Quality.

Oregon has one of the most user-friendly e-waste programs in the country. Individuals can bring in up to seven items free of charge, while schools and businesses can bring in any number. Every county, and every city with more than 10,000 people, has a convenient collection site.

AT&T Center gets 'gold' environmental certification

The recently renovated AT&T Center in Los Angeles, formerly known as Transamerica Center, has received the first "gold" level certification from the U.S. Green Building Council for an existing downtown building. The owners also announced Monday that restaurant company Patina Group will move its headquarters to the 32-story main tower at 1150 S. Olive St. and open a restaurant there. AT&T Center, which also includes an 11-story building at 12th and Hill streets, recently underwent a $35-million renovation that incorporated upgrades to its power and water systems to make them more environmentally friendly. More noticeably, the makeover included new metallic facades around the buildings and an illuminated glass enclosure on top of the tower that added two floors of office space.

The skyscraper was the first in the city to surpass City Hall in height when it was completed in 1965, and for decades it had a restaurant and bar on the top floor. With that space now converted to offices, Patina Group’s new restaurant is being planned for street level.

Elleven, a downtown condominium tower completed in 2006, was awarded "gold" level LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council for new construction.

--Roger Vincent

Photo: At&T Center. Credit: LBA Realty

Earth Day 2009 around Los Angeles and the L.A. Times

Unless you're living under a rock (which is green, so kudos!), you probably already know that today is Earth Day -- a day to celebrate our planet and learn how to better take care of it. The Times has put together lots of articles to help you best enjoy this day. Here's a quick list:

Events happening today to celebrate Earth Day -- The Guide

More Earth Day events around Los Angeles County -- L.A. Now

Earth Day giveaways (lightbulbs, canvas bags, even fruit trees) -- Brand X

Maybe the government should give people Priuses to solve the oil problem -- Brand X

President Obama's White House message today will include wind power -- AP

Instead of nationalizing the green movement, we should think like Thoreau and keep it local -- Opinion

The ethics of eating green -- Food

A $100-million gamble on making fuel from trash -- California

Kenneth Turan reviews Disney's "Earth" -- Entertainment

-- Tony Pierce

Photo: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger tours a solar panel installation on the roof of a Sam's Club store with Kimberly Sentovich, Wal-Mart's California regional general manager, on Earth Day in Glendora. Credit: David McNew / Getty Images

Today: Climate talks, undersea noise pollution, CNN cuts, dirty phones

POZNAN UPDATE: Global climate talks are underway in Poznan, Poland, where the incoming Barack Obama administration is on the mind of many delegates. Representatives from China and India say they want the U.S. president-elect to demonstrate more commitment to tackling climate change. Obama has pledged to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. That's less than what the European Union nations have promised: a 20% cut from 1990 levels by 2020. “We don’t think it’s ambitious enough,” Su Wei, China’s lead negotiator at the Poznan talks, told Bloomberg. “We hope there will be movement.” The top U.S. representatives, Undersecretary of State Paula Dobriansky and chief White House environmental policy advisor James Connaughton, had a press conference today in Washington to talk about their plans for the event. And Greenpeace is making its presence known, too.

'COCKTAIL-PARTY EFFECT' AND WHALES: Human-made noises are drowning out the sounds that whales and dolphins make to communicate, according to U.N. officials and environmental groups. "Call it a cocktail-party effect," said Mark Simmonds, director of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society. "You have to speak louder and louder until no one can hear each other anymore."

CNN REDUCES FOOTPRINT: CNN is eliminating its science and technology unit, costing seven people their jobs, including veteran space reporter Miles O’Brien. The network says it was an editorial decision, not a financial one.

NOT-SO-GREEN PHONES: Mobile phones are great for so many things, except maybe the environment. A research firm reports that, despite most vendors offering recycling options, fewer than 5% of the world's handsets will be fully recycled.

-- Steve Clow

Photo: A polar bear dummy in the foyer at the entrance to the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Poznan, Poland. Credit: Alik Keplicz / Associated Press

Recycle your soon-to-be-obsolete TV set

On Feb. 18, little more than three months from now, your old analog TV may not work without a converter. Millions of Americans will be nudged into scrapping their old sets and buying digital.

But before you dump your old television at a landfill, where its toxic innards, including lead, mercury and cadmium, can contaminate your air and water, check out the Environmental Protection Agency's Plug-In To ECycle website to answer the question: What do I do with my old TV?

Not only will recycling help the environment, but the plastics, metals and other components in the old TVs can be reused, thus cutting back on greenhouse gases from manufacturing that are disrupting our climate. Besides factoids, podcasts, a video and a moderate dose of feel-good propaganda, EPA's website directs you to local programs to assist you in donating or recycling your old electronics. And that includes old cellphones and computers too.

If you're unsure whether you'll need a new TV, here's some guidance from our colleague Jim Puzzanghera, along with a handy explanatory illustration.

-- Margot Roosevelt

Photo: Worker disassembles TV sets at a Japanese recycling plant Credit: Yomiuri Shimbun/Freelance