Green Daily

How did Oprah accidentally started a bidding war for a Brazilian staple food? Looking for ways to promote a bike to work policy? Who will prevail in the super bowl of the hybrids: Insight vs. Prius? Today's Eco-Beat has the scoop on all the latest green news and tips.

Raiders of the Amazon? As we saw with the KFC debacle, when Oprah promotes food, hordes of hungry Americans respond. Since educating her followers on a little-know superfood called the acai berry -- rich in antioxidants but a staple food for Brazil's poor -- the wholesale price has skyrocketed.

How to Create a Bike Friendly Office Not that it isn't intuitive, but if you're thinking about encouraging employees to ride to work, maybe this awesome how-to guide will inspire you to adopt a bike-friendly plan of action.

Green Fashion Merger Luxury conglomerate LVMH just bought an almost 50% stake in Bono and wife Ali Hewson's sustainable clothing brand Edun. Does that mean the brand will water down its green mission? If you already can't afford their clothes, does it really matter?

The Prius Strikes Back Unconfirmed reports are going around that Toyota has taken 75,000 preorders for the updated 2010 model, set to go on sale in Japan on Monday. If true, that would pretty much blow away the Insight's pretty impressive sales figures.

Americans Are the Least Green Consumers Yeah, Americans were once again ranked as the least green consumers based on a number of factors like public transportation and eating local foods. Second to last place: Canada. The good news: At least we're getting better.

Green in a Flash:

• London's iconic double-decker buses are going hybrid!
• The EPA has released a summer guide to saving energy at home.
• US House may require 15% of energy to come from renewables by 2025.

Does Laurie David like rap music? Feel like donating a lot of money to work for free as an extra on a hit TV show? Can Oprah use her superpowers to save the world's oceans? Today's Eco-Beat has got the scoop on all of the latest awesome green news and tips.

How I Met Barney Stinson The cast of How I Met Your Mother is sponsoring two charity auctions to raise money for the Waterkeeper Alliance. The items up for bid are: an evening with Neil Patrick Harris, and a walk-on role in a scene of HIMYM.

Is Your Workout Killing the Planet? As you well know, not all workouts are created equal. In our quest to shed pounds and tone up, some of us are using the planet as our sweat towel. Take this quiz to see how green your workout is.

Wanna Get With Laurie David? Well, so does this guy... and he's made this totally awesome rap video to woo the very eco-conscious producer of An Inconvenient Truth, Laurie David (ex-wife of Larry David). Top that, clowns!

Oprah Takes Aim at the 'Great Pacific Garbage Patch' The word 'great' in this context obviously refers to the size, not Oprah's attitude towards the nasty floating landfill that's twice the size of Texas. Yeah, it's a huge mess, but if anyone can make a difference... it's gotta be Oprah.

Engadget Rides the Zero S Electric Motorcycle Our friends at Engadget got a chance to shred the streets of NYC on one of these emissions-free motorbikes. These bitchin green bikes are nearly silent, street-legal in all 50 states, and ready for delivery next month.

Green in a Flash:

• Feeling the inexplicable desire to plant something? It's Arbor Day, that's probably why.
• The Great Lakes might get the world's first freshwater wind farms.
• Slamming veggie juice helps with weight loss.

Julia Roberts can come across as a bit humorless, at least until she flashes that smile with enough wattage to power a small town. But you have to admit, she does her part to support green causes.

She uses flushable diapers and composts, She went on Oprah to support her green guru friend Sophie Uliano, a passionate environmentalist and yoga instructor. Sophie literally wrote the book being stylish and earth-friendly: Gorgeously Green. And do you remember, all the way back in 1998 when Julia went to Borneo to raise awareness of the plight of orangutans, which was documented in the PBS film In the Wild?

Add to all of this, now Julia is designing a T-shirt for Giorgio Armani's (RED) label. The proceeds will benefit The Global Fund to help fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

I'm not sure, but Julia might have wings. Beautiful, green, do-gooder, angel wings. No wonder she looks so cranky sometimes. I bet those things are itchy hell under a t-shirt. She should totally trade up for a cruelty-free halo like Pamela Anderson wears. It's a pain to clean, but way more comfortable.

Seriously, she might not have a reality show about her efforts, but Julia has consistently and earnestly been working for good causes for a long time. Just goes to show that she's pretty on the inside, too.

Robyn Okrant is taking on quite a challenge...To live like Oprah for a whole year. And blog about it of course.

According to a recent New York Times article, Okrant is hard at work, making a vision board and refurbishing her wardrobe. In Okrant's mission statement on her blog, Living Oprah, Okrant writes, "I wonder, will I find bliss if I commit wholeheartedly to her lifestyle suggestions?"

Okrant recently wrote about some of the contradictions in the Oprah "gospel." In a recent Living Oprah post, called "We love shoes," Okrant writes about the contradiction between an Oprah show that was all about designer shoes and the previous day's episode about putting aside our petty wants and helping those less fortunate. In another contradiction, Oprah talks about abhorring waste, and later talks about buying containers at the Container Store.

Back to Okrant's question, will she find bliss by committing to the "Oprah gospel." I doubt it, but maybe she will find a few tips that enrich her life.

Does this video of endangered baby harp seals, tigers, cheetahs and polar bears make you feel a little misty? Perhaps even teary? You're fine.

If you felt nothing then it's time for a marathon of Oprah, The View and Dr. Phil to get you back in touch with your emotions. And maybe some soy supplements. Really, that's a sweet video.

Doesn't it blow your mind that anyone can club a harp seal to death? How hungry and snow crazy do you have to be? And even though tigers and cheetahs, like all cats, yes, especially Mr. Whiskers purring on your lap, are single-minded killing machines, they are beautiful, graceful creatures. When they're alive. Yet so many collectors pay poachers top dollar for skins and other trophy parts that they will be extinct within our lifetime.

And the polar bears? We're melting their habitat with our dependence on oil.

No one can fix everything. But maybe this video will inspire you to take one small action, like walking to the corner store instead of driving, or not buying that fur-lined coat, even if it is soft and Gucci. And no more tiger penis soup! That's what Viagra's for.

Think of it as baby steps for baby animals.

What's up with celebrities and their outright rejection of the hygiene products that they once endorsed? It seems like every week we hear a superstar complaining because their co-star won't take control of the bodily odor. Now we find that even the best-smelling Hollywood divas don't wage war on their underarm sweat glands by jamming them full of phalates and aluminum. Is boycotting deodorant the next big celebrity trend?

Apparently, Julia Roberts has now disclosed that she is amongst the deodorant-hating ranks of Matthew McConaughey and Orlando Bloom. Her method of avoiding b.o. is so top secret, she can't even disclose it to Oprah -- now that's personal. These guys do know that organic alternatives exist out there, right? Is there something wrong with Tom's organic deodorant that we don't know about yet? Hollywood types always seem to get the info first, but of course the also have a tendency to be a little eccentric.

[via Ecorazzi]

Sandra Bullock pulled an Earth Day double whammy on us! First she gave a tour to Oprah's show and showed us how her Austin restaurant, Bess, is an environmentally friendly eatery. Then she announced that she's starting her own line of environmentally friendly candles.

Sandra's restaurant is green from the ground up. Coffee cups and takeaway boxes are made from sugarcane. Cutlery is made from potatoes. The furniture in the place is all recycled, including some tables made from the floorboards of a house that she renovated.

I'm head-over-heels for Oprah, and have been for as long as I can remember. 'Cause she always helps a sister out.

This month is no exception: in the February issue of O (which has been out for several weeks), actor Matt Modine and activist and Hollywood bigwig Laurie David shed some light on greenness. The article's full text is not online yet -- hopefully it will be in a few days -- but there's a bunch of green tips available, in the meantime.

The first is: git yer own coffee mug. How will this help the universe-at-large? Well, 25 billion polystyrene cups wind up in landfills each year. Let me repeat: 25 billion. Wow.

The second tip is: since it eliminates paper and plastic waste, a cone beats a cup when you're eating ice cream. (Duh!) Another humdinger: the screen saver mode on your computer uses more energy than sleep mode.

Click below for more easy tips.

Portable drinking water in a disposable plastic water bottle is an on the go convenient way to quench thirst. During a segment of Oprah's Going Green 101, first aired on Earth Day 2007, Treehugger's Simran Sethi explained that plastic bottle manufacturers use five liters of water to make the plastic bottle that holds the one liter of bottled water purchased at the store. Not very green.

But wait. Bottled water has become an integrated part of our daily routine. If it's not green to purchase water in plastic bottles made this way, is there an alternative to keeping us hydrated and easy on the planet's most valuable resource? Yes. Reusable water bottles. Sethi offers these three green alternatives to the bottled water from your local grocer.

Nalgene water bottles, SIGG water bottles and the New Wave Enviro Corn-resin bottle with a filter. The latter is a biodegradable bottle made from corn, can be safely refilled up to 90 times before being commercially composted, and the carbon based Better Water Filter removes chlorine and organic contaminants lurking in regular municipal tap water.

Want a better sex life? Clean and green your bedroom!