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Ecobees - Saving the planet one item at a time |
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"If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe then man would only have four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man." - Albert Einstein
The environmental virtues of the three R’s, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle are commonly espoused, and rightly so. In the case of Reuse there are many different initiatives available such as the Freecycle (TM) network that has been around for a number of years and EcoBees that was launched in Spring 2010. In essence Reuse networks such as EcoBees allow members to easily Offer items that are no longer needed/wanted to other people that will be able to put the items to good use. This has a number of benefits, firstly it prolongs the useful life of an item which reduces pressure on refuse collection/landfill; secondly it reduces the demand for new items which means fewer resources are consumed. Both of these are obviously good from an environmental point of view and another, often overlooked, benefit is that it is simply just good and heart-warming to gift things to people. So what makes EcoBees at the fore of the new generation of Reuse initiatives? To start with EcoBees has no Groups or Areas to join... this may sound a little counter-intuitive but it makes perfect sense given that Members can define their ‘radius of interest’ and in so doing are only ever being notified about gifts available locally – this means that carbon footprints can be kept down and also that email inboxes will not get filled with emails about items that are too far away. Linked to this is the inclusion of interactive maps so Members can see where free items are located and also so people that have Offered items can see how far away different people would be travelling and so can choose the closest e.g. if wanting to keep carbon emissions to a minimum. EcoBees also easily integrates with Twitter and Facebook accounts enabling the friends and followers of Members to witness all the gifting / reusing that is taking place and hopefully will become inclined to follow suit and mimick these good deeds. Rather than trying to compete with Freecycle, EcoBees sees itself as being a complementary route to getting people interested in being more environmentally conscious and responsible... the more options people have to Reuse the easier it is to do and the more people will do it, and that benefits everyone. With this in mind EcoBees encourages membership of other Reuse networks and even interfaces with Freecycle and Freegle so items Offered via EcoBees can automatically be submitted to the other Reuse networks at the same time... more bang for your buck, more green for your click! Whether a green newbie or a hardcore dyed in the wool environmentalist, with EcoBees and the other reuse initiatives only a click away it has never been easier to be green.
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