Posted by Shannon Oliver, Associate, Google.org

In the spirit of Earth Day, I took a look at how the environmental movement can foster job growth. Here's what I found:

First, what exactly are ...Read More

Posted by Shannon Oliver, Associate, Google.org

In the spirit of Earth Day, I took a look at how the environmental movement can foster job growth. Here's what I found:

First, what exactly are green jobs and what can they do to spur the U.S. economy and stop climate change? Simply put, green jobs are jobs that are good for the environment, good for our planet, and pay a living wage. In a recent New York Times article entitled, Millions of Jobs of a Different Collar, the Sierra Club’s Carl Pope stated, “A green job has to do something useful for people, and it has to be helpful to, or at least not damaging to, the environment.”

Can the fight against global warming really create millions of these green jobs across America? With worry about the economy on the rise, it is certainly a hopeful scenario. A recent article in the Oakland Tribune suggests that experts envision just such a future: “If global warming is to be slowed, it will take wholesale change in how electricity is generated, how people travel and how they heat and cool their houses. That means installing hundreds of millions of solar panels, building thousands of wind farms and geothermal plants, engineering new ways to derive energy from renewable sources and weatherizing millions of homes. Green companies are rapidly hiring new workers and indications are they will continue.”

For those who want to dig a little deeper into the data, please check out my longer post on the potential number of jobs created by a cleaner, greener economy. And have a happy Earth Day!

Posted by Bill Weihl, Green Energy Czar

Happy Earth Day! I'm sure some of you are wondering how Google is celebrating, and we want to know what you're doing too. We work to make our business more environmentally sustainable throughout the year, but this month, we want to support the hard work you're doing to fight climate change. Last week we ...Read More

Posted by Bill Weihl, Green Energy Czar

Happy Earth Day! I'm sure some of you are wondering how Google is celebrating, and we want to know what you're doing too. We work to make our business more environmentally sustainable throughout the year, but this month, we want to support the hard work you're doing to fight climate change. Last week we blogged about some of Google's new green tools, and now we have even more ways to help you observe Earth Day 2008:

• Today we're launching the largest batch of new Google Transit cities yet. Travelers in San Francisco, Denver, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Rhode Island and other locations across the country can now use Google Maps to plan trips using public transportation.
  

• Google Checkout continues to help you and your friends and family team up and donate to environmental organizations. We have a new video to help you learn how to donate and see how easy it is to map your network of generosity.

• The Google Desktop team has developed a handy little gadget that will help those of you making Earth Day pledges to reduce your energy consumption. Install the Energy Saver gadget to enable and optimize your computer’s power management settings, putting it to sleep when you're not using it.
  
  
• Google SketchUp has created a new site for green design professionals, and Google for Educators has put together some [recommendations] for teachers who want to use Google Earth and Maps to teach about environmental issues in the classroom.
  
  
• Several more Google blogs are celebrating Earth Day as well, so be sure to read about the teacher who has cut his paper use by using Docs and Spreadsheets, advertising best-practices for environmental organizations, eco-trendspotting on YouTube and Google.org's tribute to the green collar economy.

Finally, I'll leave you with some photos of our team's trip to Washington, D.C. for this past Sunday’s Earth Day concert on the National Mall. It got a bit soggy, but we had a blast showing attendees how the Google Checkout donation campaign works. We're especially proud of our booth, which was made of sustainable materials and powered by energy from clean hydrogen fuel cells.

Posted by David Bercovich, Google Green Team

On April 22nd, millions of people around the world will come together to celebrate Earth Day -- a commitment to taking care of our planet, and to fighting climate change. In anticipation of Earth Day, Googlers from many of our offices have been looking for ways to demonstrate our commitment to sustainability. We also want you to have more ways to support the goals of Earth Day, and to share ideas on reducing your own environmental impact. Here are a few to get you started ...Read More

Posted by David Bercovich, Google Green Team

On April 22nd, millions of people around the world will come together to celebrate Earth Day -- a commitment to taking care of our planet, and to fighting climate change. In anticipation of Earth Day, Googlers from many of our offices have been looking for ways to demonstrate our commitment to sustainability. We also want you to have more ways to support the goals of Earth Day, and to share ideas on reducing your own environmental impact. Here are a few to get you started:

• If you use Google Checkout to donate to a non-profit environmental organization on behalf of anyone you know, we'll generate a personal view of Google Maps that includes a marker representing your donation. The people you donate on behalf of will get an email about your contribution, and if they follow your example, their donation will be marked on your map as well. We'll connect the markers, so that you can watch how your generosity spreads as more and more people donate. Visit Checkout's Earth Day page to learn more.

• Hot on the heels of last week's Google Transit launch in Chicago, a whole new batch of transit agencies have made their data available on Google Maps. From Lubbock, Texas to Walla Walla, Washington, people in communities across the country will now find it easier than ever to leave their cars at home.

• I hope you'll take a moment to download the newest version of Google Earth, which launched earlier today. While you're exploring its fancy new features, be sure to check out some of the latest Global Awareness layers (found in the left-side "Layers" panel) that celebrate the beauty and biodiversity on Earth, like ARKive's Endangered Species and Greenpeace's Stop Climate Change. And I encourage you to visit the Google Earth Outreach Showcase, which features a number of environmentally-focused KMLs that can be downloaded and viewed in Google Earth.

Tell the world what you're doing for Earth Day (and beyond) by uploading a message to our Earth Day '08 site. Get together with friends, family or coworkers, grab a camera, and take five minutes to put yourselves on the map. From the everyday to the extraordinary, we want to hear about your plans to take on climate change and make our planet a greener place.

Posted by Amy Luers, Program Manager, Google.org

The World Health Organization (WHO) has dedicated today, World Health Day 2008, to raising awareness of the health risks of global climate change. Health belongs in the climate change discussion, and we're glad WHO and its member countries are using today to bring the linkage to the forefront.

Climate’s effects on health are wide reaching. Climate affects the quality of air we breathe and the quantity and quality of water resources. It affects the productivity of agriculture, distribution of pests and disease, and the severity and frequency of heatwaves, droughts, floods, and wildfires. As a result, climate change is not just an environmental issue but fundamentally a human health and livelihoods issue.

We are already experiencing the impacts of climate change across the globe. In fact, a WHO report concluded the climate changes since the mid-1970s may have caused about 150,000 deaths in 2000. The impacts of climate change are disproportionately felt in the poorest regions of the world.

Read More

Posted by Amy Luers, Program Manager, Google.org

The World Health Organization (WHO) has dedicated today, World Health Day 2008, to raising awareness of the health risks of global climate change. Health belongs in the climate change discussion, and we're glad WHO and its member countries are using today to bring the linkage to the forefront.

Climate’s effects on health are wide reaching. Climate affects the quality of air we breathe and the quantity and quality of water resources. It affects the productivity of agriculture, distribution of pests and disease, and the severity and frequency of heatwaves, droughts, floods, and wildfires. As a result, climate change is not just an environmental issue but fundamentally a human health and livelihoods issue.

We are already experiencing the impacts of climate change across the globe. In fact, a WHO report concluded the climate changes since the mid-1970s may have caused about 150,000 deaths in 2000. The impacts of climate change are disproportionately felt in the poorest regions of the world.

Change in WHO estimated mortality per year (per million people) attributable to climate change by the year 2000. This map is based on WHO data for climate-sensitive health outcomes including: cardiovascular diseases, diarrhea, malaria, inland and coastal flooding, and malnutrition. Learn more about the link of climate and health.

If global emissions of heat-trapping gases continue, the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects that global temperatures could rise as much as 4°C more by the end of the century with an associated rise in risks to human health.

The global community is just beginning to understand the impact that continued climate change is likely to have on the distribution of infectious diseases. Check out the post by our mapping specialists where they describe the Google Earth layers they developed with scientists researching the affects climate may have on dengue and malaria transmission. You can also download these Google Earth layers here.

While some climate change impacts on public health and the environment are now unavoidable due to our past emissions of greenhouse gases, the severity of the impacts will depend on actions we take today to both reduce future emissions and prepare for the changes ahead. At Google.org we are working to reduce greenhouse gas emission by developing utility-scale renewable energy cheaper than coal and accelerating the commercialization of plug-in vehicles through the RechargeIT initiative, while the Predict and Prevent initiative team is working to help prepare the world's poor to manage the rising number emerging infectious diseases in our rapidly changing world.

Posted by Christiaan Adams, Google Earth & Maps Specialist, Google.org, and France Lamy, Program Manager, Google.org

With the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Health Day 2008 drawing attention to climate change and health today, we wanted to show you some cool animated Google Earth layers that illustrate how infectious diseases may spread as the earth warms. Warmer climates make good habitats for mosquitoes. Many diseases, such as dengue fever and malaria, are spread by mosquitoes. As the planet continues to get warmer due to greenhouse gas emissions, these diseases are projected to spread and add to the other burdens of climate change, especially in the developing world.Read More

Posted by Christiaan Adams, Google Earth & Maps Specialist, Google.org, and France Lamy, Program Manager, Google.org

With the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Health Day 2008 drawing attention to climate change and health today, we wanted to show you some cool animated Google Earth layers that illustrate how infectious diseases may spread as the earth warms. Warmer climates make good habitats for mosquitoes. Many diseases, such as dengue fever and malaria, are spread by mosquitoes. As the planet continues to get warmer due to greenhouse gas emissions, these diseases are projected to spread and add to the other burdens of climate change, especially in the developing world.

The Google Earth (KML) file linked below will show you projections for the changes in transmission of dengue fever around the globe and of malaria in Africa and specifically Zimbabwe. These layers were created in collaboration with a number of scientists whose studies provided the data, including Simon Hales, Frank Tanser and Kris Ebi. There's also a layer that shows the estimated deaths related to climate change in the year 2000.




To view the layers, download this KML file and open it in Google Earth on your computer. If you do not have the latest version of Google Earth (4.2) installed, you can download it here.

To see the animations, turn on one layer at a time in the Places panel on the left, by clicking the round button next to the layer name. Once the layer is on, you can play the animation by clicking the play arrow on the right side of the time slider (at the top of the screen).

Clicking the "start here" links or layer names will get you to more information and instructions. Be sure to look at all the layers to see how our warming climate will affect health in ways you might not have expected.