Fresh green links

4 degrees of change – a map of what 4 degrees of increased temperature would do to our world, created by the UK government. Click on the labels at the bottom to show or hide the sections you’re interested in, then click on the circles with plus signs to show information about that area.

Timor Sea oil spill, in pictures – I don’t understand why this isn’t getting more coverage: oil is valuable (even if it causes pollution and climate change); it’s killing dolphins and whales and probably smaller, more vulnerable wildlife too; and it’s reached the coast of Indonesia and East Timor. Bloggers there are covering it, as you would if a giant oil slick showed up on your nice clean beach. They’re up to the 4th attempt to plug the leak (which has cost $4.3 million so far), when they should have had preventative measures in place before anything even happened. And yet the government is going to give them a licence to drill for more oil in other places. I don’t think this company is very good at the drilling part, why would we want them to have another go?

OpenAustralia.org – if you’re curious about who said what in Parliament, check out this website. It’s like Hansard, only it’s online and you can search it. I’ve linked to Wednesday’s speeches, which include the second reading of the CPRS bill. It’s still pretty dry stuff, but at least you can find what you want quickly and skip through the boring bits.

Reel mower guide – we’ve got a push mower like these, but I usually leave it to Dave to mow our tiny patch of lawn. This little guide makes it seem easy enough that I could give it a go and get some more exercise this spring.

Shoe repair tips – an interview at Craft with Vince Pacheo, a shoe repair guy from California. Below the interview he gives his advice on what to do about common shoe problems. So next time your favourite pair loses a strap or heel, check this out to see if you can fix them instead of having to buy a new pair.

Google Powermeter – this is available in the USA and the UK, with Canada and India next, but I want to know when we’ll get it here in Australia because I’d absolutely use it. It’s a way to monitor your household electricity usage, to make it easier for you to help the environment. According to an article in Worldchanging, not only are people are saving lots of money with it, and one lady even stopped her house from burning down because she was able to detect a burning toaster while she was at work. It’s one of Google’s philanthropic projects, with the goal of using technology to help fix global problems. It’s free, you don’t even see any Google ads when you use it. I’ve asked them to email me when they go into beta testing in Australia – you never know!