We are partnering with:
Ethical Planting:
Why is investing in forestry so important? Some 13 million hectares of the world’s forests are lost due to deforestation each year. The annual net loss of forest area between 2000 and 2005 was 7.3 million hectares (equivalent to the net loss of almost 2% of the world’s forests).
Humans are largely to blame. The conversion of forests to agricultural land, unsustainable forest management, new roads and expanding towns and cities, pollution and climate change are all having negative impacts on forest biological diversity.
Forests used to be all about timber production. Now they are recognised as being important for biological diversity, maintenance of ecosystem services and the mitigation of climate change. That is what we mean by sustainable forest management.
In April 2002, the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity committed themselves to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss at the global, regional and national level as a contribution to poverty alleviation and to the benefit of all life on Earth.
This target was subsequently endorsed by the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the United Nations General Assembly and was incorporated as a new target under the Millennium Development Goals. Which is why by investing in forestry you can also play a part in maintaining the eco-system and saving the planet.
HostGator
1.3 Million Web Sites Now Powered by Texas Wind
Texas-based HostGator greens Internet and rises on North America’s fastest growing company list
A Houston-based technology company is exposing a dirty little secret of the IT sector — its huge impact on climate change.
HostGator.com, one of the largest Web site hosting companies in the United States, just made more than 1.3 million Web sites of businesses and individual consumers across the country green via Texas wind power.
HostGator.com purchased Green-e certified Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) from a Texas wind farm representing 130 percent of the electricity used to both power and cool all of its shared and reseller servers. RECs offset energy production through a renewable energy resource. The green energy is then fed into the electrical grid.
Inc. magazine’s 5000 list recently named the company as the 21st fastest growing company in North America. “We’re in a position to be part of the solution to climate change, rather than part of the problem,” said Brent Oxley, president and CEO of HostGator.com. “If climate change is happening because of people’s activities, then you have to wonder what kind of world we’re leaving to our children if we don’t change.”
The average server produces roughly the same greenhouse gas emissions as a 15 mpg SUV. Nationwide, some three to four percent of all electricity consumed in the United States goes to powering the IT sector.
HostGator’s service accounts for approximately 1.3 percent of all the domains on the entire Internet, and their green initiative is the equivalent of the following:
- Removing 444 cars from the road for a year, or
- Powering 321 homes with clean energy for a year, or
- Saving 5,654 barrels of oil, or
- Protecting 551 acres of forest for a year.
The IT sector has been conspicuously silent when it comes to admitting and addressing its impact on the climate. HostGator.com lives by a different mantra: Be the change you want to see.
Because HostGator is not raising prices to offset the cost of going green, the program represents a significant risk for HostGator.com. “From a purely financial perspective, it would be difficult to justify our greening program, especially given how far we’ve come to get where we are,” said Oxley. “But we cannot wait any longer for the government to fix the problem of climate change. All of us, including private companies like HostGator, need to do our part as stewards of the environment.”
“We also have a different planning horizon than many companies. We’re looking five, 10, even 20 years into the future. Both individuals and businesses are already beginning to look for ways to reduce their climate impact, and green hosting is a simple way to get started. We have faith that over time the public will respond to what we’re doing.”
