sustainable practices blog

http://www.redefiningprogress.org/

http://www.ecouncil.ac.cr/rio/focus/report/english/footprint/ranking.htm d

My final project will be the visualization of data about the use of resources at NYU.
The data itself was already collected for the “Greening the Urban Campus” report and will be used in a “Green Living” guide and a web site. I hope I can contribute to the aim of the “Green Living Guide” to make students aware of the small things that sum up to more sustainablity.

In my project the user is going to characterize his/her behavior in a mask, similar to the “Global Footprint” web site. Then the user can observe the different results of his/her energy consumption on a dynamic graphic. I hope to help individuals to apply abstract numbers and statistics on their daily lives and give information about what could be changed to make NYU more sustainable and energy effective. These data visualizations will be written in processing, I might implement flash animations.
The mask at the beginning of the application will hopefully consider in which building the student lives, how much waste is produced, Transportation, which kind of food he/she buys and where and how much energy is needed on an average day at the campus.

There is a new web project developed between different departments at NYU. Goal is to send information to student’s mobile phones on request, giving them a map how to get to close sustainability aware shops, restaurants and services. The web site is not launched yet, but maybe my visualizations could also be of use for them.
As Tom Igoe showed me there are several libraries in processing that are focusing on how to design a good interface in processing e.g.

» controlP5
by Andreas Schlegel
Custom GUI elements with the ability to show/hide and move while the program is running.

» MyGUI
by Markavian
Implements buttons, radio button, checkboxes, sliders, and scroll bars.

» Interfascia
by Brendan Berg
Provides a toolkit of standard interface widgets like text fields, buttons, checkboxes, sliders, etc.

» SpringGUI
by Philipp Seifried
GUI library that wraps around the java.awt components.

INTRODUCTION

It might be interesting and challenging to do a project on my own, but when I consider the size of our topic and the complex issues involved with sustainability, I think its a good idea to cooperate with other people.

“Plan A”
I contacted Julio, because I think that a guide to green living on the NYU campus makes a lot of sense. I could contribute with

1. research (for example compare to similar approaches on european campuses and alternative resources they use, or recommentable shops and infrastructure around NYU)
2. with graphic design and visualization
3. I could establish a website, to exchange information or upload documentaries to certain points.
I would like to use drupal, the open source content management software, because I think it would be ideal in this case and also because I want to learn more about the software myself.

“Plan B”
If this team can’t really use my help (I haven’t met them yet) I would like to research on shops in New York that sell fair traded goods, not only coffee or carpets, but also food, clothes (“clean clothes”) and sanitary products. There are a couple of publications about companies and organizations distributing already, but most of them are only selling online.
Basically I’m searching for the part of the market, if it exists, that emphasizes on the “equity” part of the triangle ecology-economy-equit that is mentioned in “Cradle to Cradle” page 150.
Products that are produced with fair wages to workers in developement countries have had a big rise in Austria. I hope that I could contribute to their awareness in NY as well.

http://www.fairindigo.com/

http://www.eva.ac.at/(en)/projekte/ren-in-a10.htm

http://www.fairtrade.at/phps/index.php

http://www.oneworld.at/cck/start.asp

http://www.fian.at/

http://www.alpha.co.at/regional/

http://greenopia.com/

http://www.greenpeace.org/apple/

hey, I think its great that ITP offers this course. I’m happy I got in. I guess sustainability is the most important topic in politics since oil business is getting too risky and water is also becoming a reason for transnational conflicts. The speed in which new cities are build in asia and the emirates is amazing, the need for more resources is huge. And the big company’s practices of exploiting workers in poorer countries are also not something that will be accepted forever. A lot of reasons to create tools, which are well designed enough to motivate western people to use, understand, love and demand sustainable ways of living. To avoid more provocation and destruction. It is possible I think. For me it is important that there is information about the effort behind products. Who made them? Where? How? Out of what? I have the impression that my influence as a consumer is bigger then the influence I have as a voting citizen of my country. International conglomerates have more impact on politics then single states or unions. They don’t care how they produce as long as we buy it. I believe they will also change the harmful or dangerous impact their product have on the environment (or people) if only the consumers’s demand for such products is high enough. I want to make it easier for people to find out about what negative or positive effects their every day consumptions can have. So they make economy produce sustainable goods, provide sustainable energy. Or at least have enough variety out there to choose from.
This is a project Shan Yin Hung from Ravenbourne in London did as a final project, I wish I could do something as helpful: http://www.lo-co.org.uk/
I’m going to review and read ” The clock of the long now” by Steward Brand

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