Green Daily

I'm continuing my preview of featured speakers at Chicago's Green Festival, a large environmental conference sponsored by Global Exchange and Co-op America that will also be visiting Seattle, Washington D.C. and San Francisco. The conference runs Saturday May 17 to Sunday May 18 in Chicago.

I spoke with Annie B. Bond, editor of the Healthy and Green Living section at Care 2. Care 2 is a social networking site aimed at "people who want to make a difference in the world," and the site provides oodles of information about green living. I spoke to Annie B. Bond about her role in the green living advice world.

Leslie: Could you describe your role at Care2 a bit for our readers?

Annie: Over the last eight years I've posted or overseen 8000 tips on green living at Care2 . They are very practical-that seems to be the difference [between us and other sites]. We have everything from literally how to clean the kitchen sink to how to give yourself a natural manicure to what to do about ticks. I had to learn to live without toxic chemicals in the 1980's because of chemical sensitivities

People are very well intentioned toward the environment but they don't know what to do on a very practical level sometimes. That's been my contribution, I've been able to provide the practical help.

Leslie: You mentioned that you started your green living practices in the 1980's. Where did you look for information then?

Annie: That's what's great about now. I have become obsolete. When I wrote Clean and Green in 1989 there were no "green" cleaning products on the market. At this point there's something green on the market for just about everything.

Leslie: I know one of the things you'll be talking about at Green Fest is plastics; could you say a little more about that?

Annie: That's a tough one socially as well as practically. I finally convinced my teenage daughter that it was ok to have a stainless steel water bottle ... after she got older and wasn't so worried that all of her sports teammates had the regular plastic bottles. I bought a ton of stainless steel water bottles and give them as gifts

I try to store things in glass as much as I can. The answer is that I sort of prioritize it and there are tricks, like don't store hot fatty food in plastic, there should be no plastic in the microwave, and you should keep acidic drinks away from plastic. Glass storage for food is really important I think. Certainly if I had a baby I would be miles away from polycarbonate.

Leslie: Going back to Care2 for a minute, what's your favorite part of the site?

I now use their recipes all the time. I've been putting up recipes for years and now I always go there. I'll go to Care2 and put in the ingredients that I have and there's always something good there. That's probably the one I use the most.

Annie B. Bond will speak at Green Fest Sunday at 1 p.m. on "Green Chi: Finding and Following the Green Flow." You can also find her "Ask Annie" page here.