I love composting. It is pure satisfaction for anyone remotely interested in growing things, and watching how things can grow, sprout, shoot up, and also decay, die and rot. When you turn the soil, and see the half-eaten tomato, or ear of corn, or artichoke leaves from a recent dinner, and know that they are […]
Finance Minister Ronni Bar-On has presented, today, the proposals of the committee on green taxation to the government. The proposal suggests a sliding-scale taxation model based upon how good the car is for the environment. A car will be given “green points” from 1-100 based upon how bad, or good, the car is for the environment. Based […]
It’s a yearly ritual in Israel: we worry about rain. We worry when we don’t have rain in the winter, when it is supposed to fall; and we worry when we get rain if it’s the wrong time for the crops. This is not a new phenomenon: the Jewish religion is richly interwoven with customs […]
Just in time for Tu B’shvat is a Sde Eliyahu organic gift package that you can pick up after an on-site bio tour. The kibbutz where’s yours truly spent almost a year, is home to Mario Levi, Israel’s grandfather of organic gardening.
We have never seen these “green police” in action, but we’d like to believe that they exist, if only in our dreams. This video is a cheesy commercial for Israel’s Environmental Protection Ministry police, and what they will do to you if you pollute. Watch out! It’s in Hebrew, which makes their Cops-esque slogan sound […]
A great place for marketing your handmade goods is the online arts and crafts website, Etsy. While standing in the rain selling your wares at arts markets, like Nachalat Binyamin can be fun, it can also be extremely time-consuming and boring. Take our word for it. We’ve been there. Enter Etsy: The online trading fare, […]
Timna Valley north of Eilat in the Arava Desert, believed to be the ancient site of King Solomon’s mines, is under threat. The pristine valley is in danger of being turned into a Disney-land style hotel complex and spa, and convention hall. Four hotels are planned for the site, Daniel reports in the Jerusalem Post. […]
The hot environmental topic this season, seems to be about banning the bag – the plastic bag that is.Zalul ‘s blog Clear has reported on it this week and has provided a link (in Hebrew) where you can sign a petition to get the plastic bag banned in Israel.San Fran has done it, so has […]
It’s Friday, and hey we like videos. Here is a short movie on an Israeli green achievement: the dud shemesh. Israelis were quick to adopt the low-tech technology which uses heat from the sun to warm sink and bathwater.We are pretty sure that the invention was pioneered elsewhere. But that doesn’t stop us from puffing […]
Some people call for Israel to be wiped off the map. We say, put us down on a Green Map. That’s just what a local NGO SPNI and students from Green Course in Jerusalem have done (see the above video). Green Maps is an international enterprise, that lets locals and visitors literally map out ecological […]
Andreas Weil, our friend from EcoOcean called us today excited about a new art event happening next Tuesday night in Dizengoff Mall. Apparently an Israeli architect/artist named Gal Gaon is opening an exhibit, complete with student works, called “Green In Me.” The exhibit is going to cover 100 square meters in a pavillion at Dizengoff […]
Hot on the heels (or should that be, ‘wheels’) of the news that bicycle use is on the rise in Tel Aviv, the municipality in Israel’s second city has just announced that it is launching a ‘pay and ride’ bike rental system.Last week, Green Prophet reported that bike use in the city shot up by […]
Traveling anywhere in Israel from the Holy City isn’t going to be easy on the day President Bush arrives, but it is a perfect day for experiencing the low carbon pleasure of train travel. For a start, Malcha station at 9 a.m is empty – it seems many commuters, tourists or day-trippers have left earlier, […]
“You can trace the recent history of Tu B’shevat seders like branches on a tree.” Nigel Savage, originally from Manchester, England, founded Hazon (Hebrew for “vision”) in 2000. Hazon works to create a healthier and more sustainable Jewish community — as a step towards a healthier and more sustainable world for all. In 2000 Nigel […]
It was neat to see the billboards are off of Ilan Pivko’s tower, in Tel Aviv today. The Ayalon Highway is pretty much free from all of the billboard clutter. In light of Ilana’s post yesterday, we thought we’d post this little ditty that we wrote for Heeb Magazine this summer, before they canned their […]
Look at My work, how beautiful and perfect is everything that I created. I created it for you. Be careful not to ruin and destroy My world. If you ruin it, there is nobody to restore it after you…” (Ecclesiastes Rabba 7:28) Those timely words written back somewhere between the sixth and eighth centuries pretty […]
One of my more vivid childhood memories is of the drive across the George Washington Bridge from New York to New Jersey, and zoning out to stare at what seemed like an endless procession of towering billboards displaying images of shiny cars, shiny models, and shiny promises of success. Seriously, is there a kid in […]
The Porter School of Environmental Studies at Tel Aviv University is looking for a few good green men and women. Think you have what it takes to become a fellow? The school is seeking fellowship candidates for a potential faculty position. The fine folks at Porter have sent us a note that they are advertising […]
Environmental Energy Resources, Ltd. (EER) is using Israeli-developed technology to set up Romania’s first plasma waste treatment facility. The system was developed by scientists at the Technion Israel Institute of Technology, and the claim is that it can handle radioactive and medical waste as well as the more conventional kinds. Cost of the project: $30 […]
Yael Mer’s “Evacuation Skirt” was designed tongue-in-cheek. Or was it? Conceived after the New Orleans hurricane and flood, says Yael: “The skirt keeps its glamorous look when it’s deflated on the one hand, and on the other, it inflates into a kayak with the right amount of volume to carry a grown up woman. She […]
Two Architecture lecturers from the Technion Institute in Haifa have designed a high-rise sustainable energy apartment complex that includes greenhouses for all its residents, and are building it in Wuhan Province, China. Tagit Klimor and David Knafo, who also run their own architectural practise Knafo Klimor, with offices in Tel Aviv and Haifa, believe in […]
Israeli designer Shay Alkalay is a man modeled after our own green heart. And with his cheeky invention, you will never have to say 'out, out, damn spot,' ever again.
With the panoramic view that I have from my window, I tend to find myself awed by the sunset. Often, I tell myself how incredibly artistically talented God is, the hues, the use of shadow, the definition… it’s beautiful. Oh how many times I wished that I could create such breathtaking scenes, on a […]
When I moved to Israel I started to understand, that not everywhere in the world things are going the same way. I grew up in Germany, where the convenience of a quiet and more or less unworried life, enables politicians to talk and act in terms of environment. Water saving, recycling and other environmental […]
It wasn’t that long ago when wild beasts roamed the earth. Lions, tigers, woolly haired mammoths and even elephants traipsed over the changing ecology of the Middle East up to the start of the early 15th century. Lions remain as the roaring yet watchful emblem of Jerusalem. Now humans are the wild beasts that dominate, […]