Clay Hill Farm announces Fundraising Fridays

By Marissa Lucas

Clay Hill Farm has started a brand new community outreach program, teaming up with local groups in the community to help them raise money.

In the coming weeks and months, Clay Hill Farm will be hosting what they call "Fundraising Fridays". On these Fundraising Fridays groups trying to raise money will receive ten percent of the money earned at the restaurant that night. The given group will typically be booked for two consecutive Fridays.

The idea was started in January of this year. As owner Jennifer Lewis-McShera recalls, “the restaurant was always brainstorming new ideas to demonstrate the philosophy of Clay Hill Farm, which is really about the importance of giving back. Also with the current state of the economy it is even more important to give”.

Clay Hill is interested in reaching out to a wide range of organizations, with a particular interest in promoting local efforts and the environment. Some of the recent groups include the Youth Center of Hilton-Win Farm, the York Food Pantry, and several regional Land Trusts.

Diners on Friday nights are made aware of the weekly recipient, as the servers discuss the event and the organization with patrons when seated and printed materials from the featured organizations are placed wth the checks.

Other restaurants are also beginning to participate in similar fundraising nights. Robert's Maine Grill, another Green Alliance Business Partner, also features a fundraising evening. These types of events not only improve a Business Partner's Report Card score; it also provides yet another way to use your Green Alliance Green Card whenever you visit the restaurant.

Clay Hill Farm promotes the idea that every green initiative matters, no matter how small, and that it makes a positive difference. Clay Hill works hard to weave together all their efforts, from the celebration of community (like fundraising Fridays), educational outreach, and working towards being as green as possible. An additional green initiative Clay Hill is taking is introducing a new spring menu that features many local products and ingredients.

EcoMovement Consulting & Hauling helps local restaurants come full circle

By Jim Cavan

It’s minutes past six on a frigid February morning, and Rian Bedard is picking through a yellow wastebasket full of garbage. He’s only had but a sip or two of coffee, and the truck he used to get here -- the white Chevy parked in the still-quiet alley behind the Portsmouth Brewery -- has been shut off, immediately liquidating the tenuous warmth inside.

The mercury flirting with zero, Bedard’s gloved hands are happy enough to find a warm, albeit brief relief as they rifle through a day or two’s worth of lukewarm restaurant scraps; everything from fruit rinds to pulled pork to near-rotten sauces and chicken scraps. The real culprits are harder to find: the coffee stirrers, rubber bands, crayons, plastic bags and bottle caps serving as the slippery needles in the slimiest of haystacks . Setting aside these undesirables -- they’ll come in handy later -- Bedard and his partner, Marcel Miranda, repeat the process up to twelve times, depending on how many Portsmouth restaurants have left the requisite yellow baskets outside their back doors.

What remains -- anywhere from 100 pounds to multiple tons of would-be waste -- is hauled off to Bartlett Farms in Eliot, Maine, where it is added to the mountainous mounds of compost waiting to be added to the 7 acres of chilled soil. In a few months, after “cooking” out any dangerous pathogens, these once land-fill bound buckets of refuse will ultimately end up in the hands local farmers and green thumbs in the form of plant-ready soil.

When imparting the science behind the scraps, Bedard’s explanations are like his demeanor: easy and laid back. “When it comes down to it, methane is a lot stronger than what’s coming out of that tailpipe over there,” says Bedard, pointing to his truck. “This way that methane is mixing with other gases like oxygen and nitrogen freely and going back into the soil, instead of going into the atmosphere, like at a regular dump.”

Miranda, meanwhile, is the more outspokenly idealistic of the two, viewing the tiresome task in a more philosophical light. “The world changed three years ago with the financial crisis -- everything changed,” says Miranda. “And that ultimately raised the question: what’s a better way to take care of the world? Clearly the system in place wasn’t and isn’t working, and we had to start asking ourselves, ‘wheres our food being grown?’ ‘Where are our jobs?’ ‘Where’s the money coming from?’ When looked at holistically, you realize it starts at home, right where you are, with the everyday things.”

Everyday things like the famous “Three Rs”; reducing, reusing, and recycling -- things that Miranda knows more than a little bit about: he spent years working in the construction and landscaping sectors, where he helped businesses both recycle and reuse everything from grass clippings to building materials.

For Miranda, nothing was to small to save. “The way I see it, everything has value, “Miranda exclaims. “What people need to realize is that you could actually make money by saving materials, especially if you don’t have to pay someone to get rid of it.”

Regeneration Park to be the future home for Green Alliance and Simply Green Biofuels

By Hope Saginario

Portsmouth's Regeneration Park will be the first sustainable commercial property created by Regeneration, a green realty trust. The former Toyota Dealership is now being demolished and rebuilt into one of the Seacoast’s first eco-friendly business parks.

Regeneration is dedicated to promoting sustainable business through the purchase and renovation of commercial properties. They plan on leasing to businesses and organizations who share the same passion for reducing our carbon-footprint. Simply Green Biofuels and The Green Alliance have taken advantage of this opportunity and are looking forward to making it their home in September.

Dover resident to drive veggie-powered car from London to Mongolia for charity

By Jim Cavan and Marissa Lucas

The summer has always been the perfect time of year for road trips. But while most teens and twenty-somethings look to cover a few hundred miles of North America – or perhaps if they’re really adventurous, going coast to coast – Dover resident Nick Supple plans to take the whole concept just a little further.

How much further? How about London to Ulan Bator, Mongolia?

If that sounds incredibly far, that’s because it is – 10,000 miles to be exact. To put it in perspective, that’s like driving from Boston to Los Angeles and back again. And even then you’d have to drive to Portland, Oregon to officially match the feat.

On July 24th Supple and two friends, Jenna Delp and Nick Dale, will join hundreds of others from all over the globe for the Mongol Rally, a grueling annual charity event that typically sees fewer than half the entrants actually finish. No wonder the event touts itself as “the greatest adventure on earth”.

But what’s perhaps even more incredible than driving across two continents over four consecutive weeks, is how Supple plans to get there: in a car run entirely on waste vegetable oil.

All participating vehicles must have engines no larger than 1.2 liters. However, to the best of anyone’s knowledge, Supple and his team – who call themselves the Non-Toxic Avengers – will be the only one driving a vehicle run entirely on veggie waste oil.

To say that Supple and company are excited would be a dramatic understatement. “The trip itself is going to be incredible,” exclaims Supple. “We’re all excited to see new places, meet new people, and see new cultures. I love to experience new things and just the fact that I'm a part of this great adventure, all for two causes, the environment and in memory of someone who I am lucky to call a friend, that hits home for me and there aren't even words to describe what I feel.”

Sustainable Portsmouth To Host Forum on Sustainable Seacoast Transportation

Sustainable Portsmouth, an organization invested in transforming Portsmouth into the epitome of ‘green’ society, is hosting a forum on sustainable Seacoast transportation from 6 to 8 p.m. on Monday, April 26, at Portsmouth Public Library. The focus will be on how to provide more affordable access to jobs, schools and recreation while reducing energy use and carbon emissions. State Senator Martha Fuller Clark, D-Portsmouth, will introduce the forum. An expert panel from the Rockingham Planning Commission, COAST, and Seacoast Area Bicycle Routes will address how to balance local transportation and improve sustainability, present the transportation component of the new Portsmouth 5 Year Sustainability Plan, and exchange ideas with attendees.

Guest Blog: Kittery to Host Earth Day Expo

As seen in Maine Partners for Cool Communities "Cool News April 2010"

The Kittery Energy Advisory Committee in conjunction with Spruce Creek Association and the Kittery Land Trust will be hosting Kittery's first Earth Day Expo at Autoworks (107 Government Street in Kittery) on Saturday April 24th from 10:00 am - 3:00 pm.

Workshops and presentations will enable the public to learn how home owners can benefit from the recent Efficiency Maine $500,000 regional block grant awarded to the towns of Kittery, York, Eliot, North and South Berwick, and Ogunquit. Many green businesses will be there with information about green practices and energy saving products.