Hey US readers, do you Tweet? Are you a Twitterer? A Tweep, as it were? Well, if you’re following me, odds are this movie is right up your alley.

I love the tagline: “Can you save the planet without driving your family crazy?” It’d definitely on my must-see list.

Check out the trailer, then read below to see how you can get free tickets to see the film premiere!

No Impact Man is in theaters September 11, 2009. Click here for theater information.

In the following cities:
New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Berkeley, Chicago, Denver, Seattle, Philadelphia, Washington DC, San Diego, Boston, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Salt Lake City

Follow these two easy steps:

1. Follow them on Twitter
2. Tweet the following:

#NIMtix @oscopelabs is giving away tix to No Impact Man in theaters Sept 2009 www.noimpactdoc.com

Winners will be announced shortly.

Good Luck, readers!

For those who may be fans of Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers… whhhhy? All joking aside — she’s teamed up with Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato and… *squeeeee* the Jonas Brothers (like, OMGZ!!1!) to record Send It On an eco-pop song that’s part of Disney’s new Friends for Change: Project Green.

All of the proceeds from the iTunes sales of this track go to the Worldwide Conservation Fund. Groovy.

While I’m certainly not a big fan of Disney pop stars, I can appreciate the effort to get involved. Assuming they really are getting involved. What do you think — is this green to save the planet or green to bulk the funding?

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I’ll admit, a news story about cooking chicken poop caught my eye. Call me weird. Apparently charring fowl manure might not save the planet, but apparently when charred alongside beetle-killed pine trees, corn husks, and other organic matter it can help in the war on greenhouse gases.

According to researchers attending this years North American Biochar Conference, biochar (charcoal, more or less) is what remains when organic matter is burned in a low-oxygen environment. Biochar can last for thousands of years locking up globe-warming carbons in the meantime.

Humble biochar has uncharted potential for capturing and storing carbon dioxide, while simultaneously improving soil fertility and agricultural productivity,” Lakshman Guruswamy, head of CU’s Center for Energy and Environmental Security, said in a news release.

For more information, check out Laura Snider’s story on the first ever biochar conference.

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While cruising around the Captain Planet Foundation website (yeah, alright you caught me. I was reading up on my favourite eco hero), I discovered a link to watch entire episodes of Captain Planet and The Planeteers online!

And it’s not the seedy online that we’re all used to (well, not me… of course. Pfft. Like I would watch streaming television on the internet. That would be questionably legal, now wouldn’t it.) Mother Nature Network is hosting the videos for free in hopes that it will educate and entertain viewers.

For the next 12 months, MNN will unveil more than 20 episodes of Captain Planet and The Planeteers as well as never-before-seen bonus footage.

Check it out!

The last time I wrote about Captain Planet, BambiGoesGreen nearly quadrupled in readership — clearly people love Captain Planet! Spread this around, let people know that they can induldge themselves in a bit of free, streaming eco hero!

It’s really not fair – Hollywood gets all the cool stuff.

The world’s first eco themed amusement park just opened up there, in fact. The park is owned and operated by a company called Global Inheritance (super cool website, check it out).

L.A.’s Environmentaland has plenty of cool, eco-friendly exhibits, including an Energy Playground, a Mini-Bin Exhibit and Designing Station, a Planetarium, Desert Mini Golf Course, Recycled Paper Plane Takeoff station, and Alternative Energy Golf Carts.

“Global Inheritence is an organization working to reinvent activism for today’s young generations. Our initiatives focus on the power of creativity to comunicate and push for progressive social change while rejecting conflict.” (says their website)

I’ve never been to Hollywood, but if ever I do go – this will definitely be on my list of to-do’s! Apparently it’s located at Hollywood and Highland, which is a pretty prime tourist location. Let’s hope it gets some good tourist traffic.

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According to the Environmental Defense Fund, Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild their entire commercial fleet of airplanes every 3 months. Unbelievable!

Recycling anything is good for the planet, but recycling aluminum is great for the planet. Why? Because aluminum is one resource that can be recycled again and again without wearing out.

Remember — recycle those cans! But first, make sure to follow these handy steps:

• Rinse and place aluminum/tin cans, caps, lids and foil in the same recycle bin.
• Avoid recycling spray cans or cans containing paint or hazardous materials. Contact your local recycling program or city hall to learn where these can be recycled.
• Get in touch with the local buy-back center if you live in an area with bottle/can deposits and plan to drop off a large number of aluminum cans for cash.

Now, unlike Captain Planet, I did actually watch this show. I remember being quite concerned about the size of the characters heads… but that’s not the point. The point is that many children, myself included, learned some very valuable lessons about the earth and the environment — most specifically pollution — from the Smoggies and the Suntots.

This Canadian cartoon (woo! Go Canada!) began airing in 1988 but didn’t make it’s way to the US until 1994 (under the name “Stop The Smoggies”).

Almost every episode had the environmentalist Suntots outsmart the Smoggies in their latest scheme (usually involving dumping oil into the river or turning their smoke stacks on high and pumping out thick, black smoke), after which the Smoggies invariably hatched another scheme.

A recurring theme in the episodes is the Smoggies attempt to steal the island’s ‘magic coral’ (which they believe grants eternal youth), or find some alternative way to maintain youth. The show often implied that the magic coral did not actually exist, however, and were just manifestations of the Smoggies’ (mainly Emma Smoggie’s) greed and vanity.

Looking back on this now, I’m not sure how I ever kept these plots straight as a kid — I’m confused now! But apparently it was affective because admittedly, most of what I know about coral and water pollution comes from this very show.

Yep. That’s right. Today’s first eco-celebrity will be Captain Planet!

I was ‘too old’ for Captain Planet when the cartoon came out, but my kid brother Byron used to *love* this show, so I may have caught one or two in passing while busy being the cool older sister. You know, too cool for eco cartoons.

Captain Planet was the brain child of Ted Turner who wanted to entertain kids while making them more aware of the issues their immediate environment faced. The character was summoned whenever the five “Planeteers” combined the forces of their elemental rings. The show worked at demonstrating that people of all ethnicities and backgrounds needed to work together to protect the planet and provide solutions to environmental problems. Likewise, Captain Planet’s appearance did not identify him with any one culture or ethnicity, as his hair was Forest Green and his skin was Sky Blue — which made it easy to identify with him, no matter what part of the world you were in. Each episode ends with one or more Public Service Announcements which showed the dilemmas that face the environment in relation to the episode (such as radiation or ozone depletion).

The theme song was super catchy — even I, who barely watched it, can sing it word for word. And in my part of the world, the show definitely succeeded at being popular with kids as I remember several Captain Planet trick-or-treaters every year.

In searching for information on Captain Planet today, I’ve discovered for the first time that Captain Planet has it’s own organization called the Captain Planet Foundation who’s mission is to support hands-on environmental projects for youth.

“Our objective is to encourage innovative activities that empower children around the world to work individually and collectively as environmental stewards. Through ongoing education, we believe that children can play a vital role in preserving our precious natural resources for future generations.”

While I’m definitely glad there are shows like this for kids, maybe there should be shows like this for adults too. What do you think?

Hi, good readers — next week I’d like to turn the BambiGoesGreen microscope to Ottawa, my home base, and I need your help!

Live in Ottawa? Here are some questions for you:

What are we doing to keep the planet green? What initiatives — businesses, stores, parks, city buildings, transportation – are there in place to protect the environment?

I’d love to hear from you at: bambi (at) bambigoesgreen.com!

In the meantime, I’m going to be looking into it myself and learning a few things abour green initiatives and what it takes to be considered eco-friendly. And, of course, I’ll be reporting back to you, so be ready!

The other day, I received a comment from Jodi asking:

I heard that recycling one glass spaghetti sauce jar saves enough energy to power a tv for 3 hours, is that true?

After some digging around, emailing, and chatting with some folks in the know, I’ve come up with these interesting stats for you, Jodi, and I apologize in advance that this will be quite long-winded!

Recycling spaghetti sauce jars – the facts!