If you’re a foodie…
Green: Shun processed
Yet another reason to resist TV dinners: “It takes 10 calories of fossil fuel to produce 1 calorie of processed food,” says UC Berkeley’s Michael Pollan, one of the world’s leading experts on sustainable eating. Similarly, producing frozen food requires about 10 times more energy than making fresh food does.

Greener: Become a locavore
The average food item travels 1,200 miles to get to your plate. While recent studies say buying locally is hardly a silver bullet—a recent British study found that it’s four times more carbon efficient for Londoners to purchase lamb from New Zealand than from some local meatsellers—Pollan says going to the local farmers’ market or joining a Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA, delivery service (Full Belly Farm, perhaps) is still nearly always the cleanest choice. Full Belly Farm: 530-796-2214

Greenest: Make a meaty statement
It’s hard to believe, but livestock produces more green- house gas than the world’s entire transportation industry does. Or, as Grist.org’s Chip Giller notes, if every American gave up meat just one day a week, doing so would be the equivalent of taking eight million cars off the road. Eliminating meat consumption completely is comparable to trading in an SUV for a hybrid, and saying no only to industrial meat—meat produced on a feedlot or in confinement—is like exchanging your SUV for a sedan. Unfortunately, in the age of big-business organics, “industrial organic” meat does exist, so Pollan recommends looking for “grass-fed” or “pastured” meat.

If you’re an incorrigible shopper…
Green: Be like Zem Joaquin
Buying your way to sustainability may sound like an oxymoron, but it’s not necessarily so, says Joaquin, who founded EcoFabulous.com, a site that tracks “sustainable sexy stuff.” Follow her high-heeled, organic footsteps around the city, and you’ll be treading light as a feather. “Spring on Polk Street is an absolute must,” Joaquin begins. This stylishly spare store has everything from eco-friendly cleaning supplies to organic bedding, air purifiers, and non-VOC paints. When you’re done there, head to Wildlife Works on Union Street. The organic clothes at this safari-esque boutique (worn by celebs like Alicia Silverstone and Paris Hilton) are sewn by women in a beautiful, ecologically

constructed factory in Kenya, and some of the proceeds help to preserve endangered species, such as Arctic seals and African elephants. And if jeans are your uniform, Joaquin’s go-to is Del Forte’s all-organic denim, available in stores throughout the Bay Area. “They don’t sacrifice anything,” she says, “and they make your butt look really good, which is the most important thing, even with organics.” Spring: 2162 Polk St., S.F., 415-673-2065; Wildlife Works: 1849 Union St., S.F., 415-738-8544; Del Forte Denim

Greener: Shop like a Frenchwoman
Americans could stand to adopt the quality-not-quantity approach of les femmes françaises. You may even be able to buy that Marc Jacobs dress you covet—as long as it’s the only thing you purchase this season. Look at it this way: If everyone on the planet consumed like an American, we would need five Earths to sustain us, while if everyone consumed like a European, we’d need three.

Greenest: Shop vintage
Anything new, even if it’s made sustainably, is subject to dirty surprises (bamboo is usually good, but not when the crops replace native forests), so vintage is really the only ironclad way to buy with a clear conscience. And if you think you have to sacrifice style, recall Reese Witherspoon in her beaded and beribboned ’50s Dior dress at the 2006 Oscars. Affordable finds abound at local thrift shops, but boutiques like Ver Unica in Hayes Valley and Vendima in the Castro make vintage shopping a truly high-style endeavor. Ver Unica: 437 Hayes St., Ste. B., S.F., 415-431-0688; Vendima: 4100 24th St., S.F., 415-285-7174

If you’re a nester…
Green: Attack the vampires
Patching leaks in your

heating and cooling systems—in the ductwork, windows, and insulation—is the most effective way to reduce your home’s carbon footprint, says Matt Golden, vice president of Sustainable Spaces, a green-building company in San Francisco that charges $8,000 to assess your home and do the repairs. If that’s too much to bear, simply install carbon-fluorescent or LED lightbulbs (they use 60 percent less electricity) and attack your vampire appliances, says Collin Blackstone of Ultimate Control, a San Jose green home systems–integration company. Buying smart power strips and switching them off when you aren’t using your appliances can save you up to $20 per month on your electric bill, and a huge chunk of CO2. Or you can pay more for Ultimate Control to install a remote-control system that lets you kill all the vampires in one shot. Sustainable Spaces: 221 14th St., S.F., 415-294-538O; Ultimate Control: 6868 Santa Teresa Blvd., San Jose, 408-281-0250

Greener: Avoid the remodel craze
When homes are gutted and refilled, all that lumber and all those tiles stack up to about 12 percent of the trash in our overflowing dumps. Remodeling in keeping with green standards is much better, of course (and certainly preferable to moving and building from scratch), but don’t be fooled: It still uses astounding quantities of materials and energy. The best gift you can give to the earth is figuring out how to be happy with what you have.

Greenest: Live in the city
While you can always find creative ways to get close to nature and off the grid—Daryl Hannah has a carbon-neutral tepee in the Rockies—the average citizen is about twice as green in a high-density area. Each San Francisco resident puts out about 11.2 tons of CO2 per year, compared with the 24.5-ton American average. Cities with better public transportation are even more efficient: Fast-paced New Yorkers are down to 7.1 tons per person, while those vigilant Londoners emit just six tons.

If you’re a soccer mom…
Green: Carpool
We know—your child’s best friend’s parents are unreliable. But provided they’re not lushes, suck it up and share the load. The math tells the story: There are 82 million mothers in the U.S. alone, and the average car emits one pound of CO2 per mile. So if every mom drove even 10 fewer miles per week, they would reduce CO2 emissions by a whopping 42 billion pounds per year.

Greener: Discover underscheduling
We want them to be geniuses, too (we could use some eco-Einsteins right about now!), but, as University of Michigan child psychologist Michelle Kees says, the last 15 years or so have seen a huge explosion in the number of activities available to kids, which generally means more schlepping around for parents—and more stressed-out schlepees. Again, if every American cut out just one music, karate, or young-investors’-club commute per week, they could knock off tens of billions of pounds of greenhouse gases, as well as help their

children relax.

Greenest: Wield your clout
Moms are genetically wired to protect their prey, and Kimberly Danek Pinkson, founder of the EcoMom Alliance, has realized how to leverage that power. K–12 schools account for 7 percent of all commercial buildings’ energy use, so Pinkson suggests starting a “greening your school” committee and lobbying the administration for things like recycled paper, organic lunches, nontoxic materials, and streamlined energy usage. But if you like thinking macro, elbowing Uncle Sam may be a way for mothers to really shine (remember Cindy Sheehan?). You might as well join the EcoMom Alliance. The more members it has, the more mothers will be able to influence major brands and politicians.

If you’re an adventurer…
Green: Pay extra
There’s no way around it: Airplanes are really bad for the earth—or at least the stratosphere. The average flight spits out a whopping 1,700 pounds of CO2 per person. But if you must fly, offset your emissions by buying carbon credits at sites like TerraPass.com or CarbonFund.org. These businesses approximate the amount of greenhouse-gas emissions you’re responsible for creating during your flight, and donate your contribution to clean-energy projects, like wind farms, that will offset the damage you’ve caused. The jury is still out on whether this compensation amounts to a one-to-one ratio, but it’s certainly better than doing nothing.

Greener: Luxuriate in sustainability
When you see how affordable offsets are—$10 for a round-trip flight to New York, according to CarbonFund.org—you might be tempted to spend the additional $36.95 it takes to offset a trip to the five-star Jean-Michel Cousteau Fiji Islands Resort. And why not? With solar energy, organic cuisine, and Fiji’s first water-reclamation system, the resort seems to offer one of the most sustainable luxury vacations in the world. And that’s hardly your only green option. Check responsibletravel.com for thousands of other eco-holidays. The Jean-Michel Cousteau Fiji Islands Resort: 800-246-3454

Greenest: California, here we come
The difference is mind-boggling. While flying to Fiji will add about 4,200 pounds of CO2 per passenger to the stratosphere, a scenic coastal drive (in the average car) all the way down Highway 1, stopping in places like Big Sur, Morro Bay, and the vineyards of Paso Robles, then heading back to San Francisco via Interstate 5, would only add about 1,000 pounds. If

you still feel guilty, shut off all your electricity and go camping (without your speedboat and RV, that is).

If you’re filthy rich…
Green: Buy the big-ticket items
If you’ve got the cash, there’s really no excuse not to shell out $30,000 for solar panels or $90,000 for an electric car. About 50 percent of Californians’ greenhouse-gas emissions come from cars, and if you think you have to sacrifice coolness to go electric, check out the Tesla Roadster. While you’re at it, a geo-thermal heating system, to the tune of $150,000 when combined with solar panels, can take even the largest house down to just about carbon neutral.

Greener: Staff up
A growing number of eco-consultants can help you go carbon neutral in a style that’s

right for you. When it comes to household matters, Sustainable Spaces is known as the best in the biz: The company will advise you about optimum water usage, air quality, heating and cooling costs, remodeling, and whether to go solar, geothermal, wind powered, or none of the above. It’s potentially priceless knowledge. And if you really want to spend, you might be able to reel in one of the eco-consultants-to-the-stars, like Danny Seo or Zem Joaquin (if they can squeeze you in between TV appearances).

Greenest: Donate half a mil to your mama
Mother Earth, that is. Think of it as getting a great deal: You’re in the highest tax bracket (35 percent), so the actual cost of donating $500,000 to a nonprofit is only about $325,000. But how do you know your money won’t be frittered away in admin costs and gourmet snacks? Option one: Assess the politics, clout, and fiscal efficiency of the thousands of environmental nonprofits out there. Option two: Call Susan Hirsch, of Hirsch & Associates, and have her do it for you. Hirsch has advised both the Haas and Fisher families on their hefty donations, and she knows giving can be complex: “What we can do is cast a very wide net, and, through years of experience and contacts, we match a person with the best organization.” If advisers aren’t your thing, sites like CharityNavigator.org, a nonprofit that rates other nonprofits on their financial productivity, might help. Using the site’s advanced search, you can look at what percentage of a nonprofit’s annual budget went to actual programs versus administrative expenses. A quick local search reveals that the Earth Island Institute, Sustainable Conservation, and the Pesticide Action Network all used an impressive 79 percent or more of their budgets for environmental programs (their efforts get four stars). Hirsch & Associates: 1714 Stockton St., Ste. 400, S.F., 415-837-5408; Earth Island Institute: 415-788-3666; Sustainable Conservation: 415-977-0380; Pesticide Action Network: 415-981-1771

If you’re a couch potato…
Green: Grab the remote
First of all, stop beating yourself up for being lazy; even the slothful have a place in a greening world. (By lying around, you might even be using less energy.) This year, Discovery Communications launched Planet Green, a 24-hour cable channel dedicated completely to sustainability. Veg out all day long with a conscience, then share what you’ve learned with your friends. Who’d have thought activism could be so, well, inactive?

Greener: Patronize PG&E
Still on the couch? Then pick up your laptop, go to pge.com/climatesmart and enter your phone number, and PG&E will calculate the tiny amount of money you need to spend to “neutralize” your home’s CO2 emissions (for most people, it costs only $5 per month). As with all carbon offsets, whether this service really neutralizes your output is debatable, but every penny of your ClimateSmart payment will fund new projects that reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. And you hardly had to move. (If you have the stamina, you can also call 1-800-PGE-5000 and say, “ClimateSmart.”)

Greenest: Get a better couch
The one you’re on may very well be making you sick and a little slow—not a good combo for saving the world. A recent EPA study shows that polybrominated diphenyl ether, or PBDEs—flame retardants used on couches, electronics and other furniture since the late 1970s—may be associated with liver, thyroid, and brain development problems. Visit greensage.com, viesso.com, or astorecalledspring.com to get started on buying a healthy lounge mobile. Of course, the greenest option would be to find a vintage couch constructed before the late ’70s. Good luck.

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