 Welcome to the inaugural edition of EP News, a bi-monthly Earth Pledge e-newsletter. EP News will keep you up to date on special events, recent press, project announcements and more. We invite you to send questions or comments anytime. Enjoy. 
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Green Roof Symposium We launched our Green Roof Initiative in early June with a great kick-off, Greener by Design, the first symposium in New York exclusively dedicated to exploring the advantages and feasibility of building green roofs in New York City. Hillary Brown of New Civic Works, formerly of the NYC Department of Construction and Design, Steven W. Peck, of the Toronto based group Green Roofs for Healthy Cities, Dr. Hashem Akbari of the Urban Heat Island Group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Diana Balmori, landscape designer, were just a few of our exceptional speakers. Numbering over a hundred, our audience was composed of city government officials, regional planners, landscape designers, architects, real estate professionals, economic developers, environmental lobbyists, manufacturers and interested citizens. The day concluded with a lively working session, with the speakers and attendees discussing the next steps to implementing a comprehensive green roof program in New York. |
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is a Green Roof, Anyway? You might be imagining a heavy, haphazard, difficult to maintain collection of pots and planters high above the city. However, recent advances have led to what are now being called green roofs, also known as planted or vegetated roofs. These lightweight, durable systems are not only beautiful, but also provide insulation and help solve certain pressing urban environmental problems. Stormwater run-off, which carries contaminants, including dangerous heavy metals, from paved surfaces and rooftops to our natural waterways, has been identified as a major source of water pollution. Green roofs can reduce the negative effects of stormwater run-off by up to 75%. On summer days, cities can be up to seven degrees warmer than surrounding areas, becoming incubators for smog, threatening public health and creating a greater energy demand, known as urban heat island effect. By replacing heat absorbing tar and other dark roofing materials with cool plants and grasses, green roofs can also, over time, substantially mitigate the urban heat island effect. |
Good Eats Atop the Earth Pledge Green Roof Our
Green Roof Kitchen Garden is bursting with late summer goodies.
With herbs such as mint, basil, thyme, rosemary and sage and vegetables
including squash, lettuces, tomatoes, chili peppers, sweet peppers
and eggplant, our rooftop is fragrant and bursting with color, proving
how beautiful and delicious cooling our cities can be. |
We are pleased to announce a new partnership with the Watershed Agricultural Council (WAC), which will utilize FarmToTable.org as a vehicle for large-scale promotion of farmers in the Catskill region. The upcoming Catskills section will ultimately include hundreds of farmers and forestry product producers. We’ll also be working with WAC to create and execute a New York City publicity strategy for the Catskill region. These two initial projects constitute great steps towards the simultaneous development of FarmToTable.org and WAC promotional efforts. Supporting sustainable agriculture in the Catskills ensures delicious food and the protection of the NYC watershed for all of us. www.farmtotable.org 
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Pledge Publishes Our World in Focus: Moving Towards a Sustainable Future On August 26, at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, our new book, Our World in Focus, which both celebrates and questions progress made since the 1992 United Nations Earth Summit in Rio, will make its official debut. Our World in Focus highlights the current state of mankind’s relationship with the Earth, and poses the question, “Where do we go from here?” With dynamic and thought provoking essays by a range of authorities including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, her Majesty Queen Noor of Jordan, Alice Waters, chef and owner of Chez Panisse, Maurice Strong, special advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations, John Elkington, Economist and Chairman of SustainAbility, and Tom Lovejoy, Chief Biodiversity Advisor to the President of The World Bank, as well as a powerful selection of photographs from the prestigious Magnum archives, this book is a must have. |
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Farm
to Table Cooking Class and Lecture Series Join us this fall for the continuation of our successful FarmToTable Cooking Class and Lecture series. Chef and cookbook author Peter Berley, Saveur magazine’s Julia Lee, Catskills grassfed livestock farmer Amy Kenyon, and Café Boulud’s pastry chef Remy Funfrock are just some of the many great professionals that will participate. We hope you’ll join us for great lectures, thoughtful converstation and delicious food in our state-of-the-art, eco-smart kitchen. To receive information on cooking classes and lectures contact Mindy Fox 
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