Welcome to the Blog

While many of us lose sleep at night grappling with the existential stress of our planet’s fresh water situation, West Michigan Environmental Action Council’s Director of Environmental Programs Carlos Calderon is doing something about it.

People will not stop building or consuming, but that doesn’t mean we can’t change our ways. Cutting-edge construction suppliers such as Hanover Architectural Products are helping to find the middle ground between excellent materials and a greener future.

If you take a quick tour through human history, you’ll notice that most engineering advancements seemed like science fiction until they became science.

We are at a global climate crossroads, and binary thinking dominates much of the conversation … except among green building experts, who prioritize balance above all else. Our interview with Chuck Gallo of Keene Building Products seeks to illuminate this thinking.

Too often in this modern age, sustainability and profitability are seen as opponents in some sort of global green cage match. It’s like the only choices are tree-hugging hippies or Hexxus from Ferngully.

We know how much you love to spend money, especially when you don’t have to. Unnecessary bills, amirite? Hooray!

Environmental sustainability is all well and good as a philosophy, but it takes more than good intentions and smiley face emojis to build a green roof.

Considering a green roof? That’s a big move, and it comes with a lot of hopes, dreams, and questions.

We recently got an introduction to the complex problems surrounding environmental equity. The very real connection between racial inequality and climate change is serious and the everyday problems people in our own communities are facing because of environmental inequalities are pervasive and persistent.

You’ve heard of a wetland, and you know what floating is. But how can a wetland … float? We’re here to answer that question, so grab that coffee and start scrolling.

No one needs to tell you that water pollution is a big issue.

(Or at least, we hope they don’t. Because it’s Kind of a Big Thing these days.)

The trouble is, water pollution is astoundingly common. Our lakes, rivers and oceans are devastated by chemicals.

We’re not just talking the toxic runoffs from water treatment plants or industrial factories, either. Nutrients from fertilizers, which are seen as “good” by the agricultural sector, also wreak havoc on waterways. They’re poisoning our drinking water and even dosing our fish with antianxiety drugs.

Why? Because those fertilizers that make plants grow also make algae grow, which then uses up all the oxygen and chokes out other plant and animal life. You know all those green lakes you see when you fly over Florida? Yeah, that’s what’s going on.

The result: Bodies of water that are chemical-ridden, inhospitable to wildlife and sometimes straight-up poisonous. And that’s before stormwater rushes in, carrying toxins and disease with it.

We need to clean our water bad … but which types of green infrastructure can get the job done?

Enter the floating wetland.

Modern landscaping relies heavily on turf and the inputs and activities needed to maintain it. Despite an automatic urge to denigrate those methods, the question that the environmentally conscious and sustainably-minded should be asking is this: Does traditional landscaping have a role in maintaining a healthy Earth? The answer is more complicated than you think.

Not much is simple these days, and nowhere is that truer than in landscaping.

On the one hand, environmentalists decry the use of fertilizers in lawn and grounds maintenance, citing eutrophication (the uncontrolled growth of plants and the death of wildlife) and pollinator die-off. They also point to poor stormwater management and urban monoculture, among other negatives. Each of these represents a clear and present danger to the environment.

On the other hand, more traditional landscapers and industry leaders point out that all plants, agnostic of type or origin, are better for the environment than the alternative of barren manmade surfaces like concrete and asphalt.

Unfortunately, disagreements and partisanship mean that various factions often have little to say to one another. Those who believe in traditional modern landscaping – well-shorn and bright green grass is the usual example – are irritated by those who insist that native gardening is the only way to ameliorate the many ills plaguing the planet. The opposite, of course, is just as true.

Andrew Bray, Vice President of Government Relations at the National Association of Landscape Professionals, doesn’t like that state of affairs. In this charged era, he calls for a bit more open-mindedness when it comes to landscaping and the environment.

We recently caught up with him to get his take on human health, stormwater management, the urban heat island effect, green infrastructure – and perhaps most importantly, the role of turf in all of the above.

The climate debate is turning heads, but is it changing minds? New climate “lukewarmers” argue that there’s a better way to think about the so-called climate apocalypse.

Turn on the television or head to your newsfeed, and you will eventually, inevitably, stumble across the climate debate.

Apocalyptic rhetoric blankets the news. Various groups claim various disasters, up to and including that billions will die within the next few decades. Greta Thunberg and President Trump shout at whoever will listen, engaging in a private (read: not private) Twitter war the rest of the time.

If you’re thinking Hmm, this doesn’t sound like a healthy way to make change, then you are correct. It’s not.

We need a new approach to the science of climate change. And if we want to take the right approach to environmentalism and green infrastructure, we need it now.

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