I circled at least a half dozen times to find parking near the Washington Convention Center on Sunday in order to attend the Green Festival. Since I live about 35 miles from D.C., Metro was not an option. Once inside, I learned from Ralph Nader that 65,000 people die each year from air pollution. So, I wondered, whose life did I endanger in order to attend an event about preserving the environment? The good news: exhibitors offered some earth-friendly solutions for getting where we need to go.

Before setting out through the maze, I spotted some tasty looking GMO-free cupcakes. I had already picked up two of them before realizing it would cost me $5 for the pair. Served in a plastic container. Puhleez. I soldiered on.

One couldn't help but notice the monstrous yellow Hummer in the room. It certainly seemed misplaced, until passersby were told it's filled with vegetable oil instead of gas. It got a lot of people talking to exhibitor Massa Green Enterprises (MGE), a Fairfax, Virginia company that converts diesel engines to burn recycled vegetable oil. "We get a lot of angry people coming over," one of the reps told me. "Then we tell them this is more efficient than their hybrid." Yeah, but it would take a whole lot of water to wash the thing, I was thinking. Turns out the average driveway car wash uses up to 100 gallons of water, according to literature from another exhibitor. Well, they offered a solution for that, too: waterless car polish.

And if you were interested in ditching your four-wheeled environmental enemy altogether, there was an electric bike display on hand. I decided I wasn't in good enough shape to trek 35 miles on two wheels. And, unfortunately, my Subaru doesn't run on diesel. But that car polish was pretty cool.