Ski Ride Green

I’ve always wondered how I could get my hands on one of those snowboard benches for the aging snowboarder like me who doesn’t want to sit in the snow to strap into my bindings. SkiNet.com’s article “Going Green: From Trash to Treasure” features two companies that recycle skis and snowboards and makes them into furniture, coat racks and even items for your bathroom (toilet paper holder; magazine rack; toilet seat). There’s Green Mountain Ski Furniture in Vermont and Reeski in Aspen.

Green Mountain Ski Furniture makes some seriously good-looking Adirondack chairs and Reeski makes a sweet picnic table, plus a kitschy clock and bathroom products. According to its website, Reeski recycles approximately six tons (12,000 pounds) of skis and snowboards annually and was awarded Snowsports Industries America’s Golden Eagle Award for Recycling Excellence in 1995.

If you live in Vermont, Green Mountain will pick up your used skis/snowboards or you can ship your castaways to them and chalk it up as the cost of recycling. If you’re attached to your old gear, you have have it converted into a custom piece by Green Mountain.

I’ve got a couple of old cell phones and Palm Pilots that are sitting in a drawer (with old batteries and such) waiting for their day to be donated to a good cause. They are the lingering things in our closets that if we could just get rid of them, we’d feel a happy and bright space open up in our busy and cluttered lives.

In a pioneering move that will be celebrated by neatfreaks and environmentalists alike, Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort is partnering with Waste Connections and PRIDE Industries to provide a $30 discount on the resort’s 2008-2009 Double Whammy® season pass to the first 1000 people who drop off e-waste, e.g., old VCRs, video recorders, cameras, cell phones, computers and similar items, at collection locations in Sacramento and the Bay area. To me, it would be enough just to find a convenient, environmentally sound way to get rid of my e-junk, but the resort discount is a doubly good incentive. 

This initiative says a lot about the ski resort and what it stands for – it highlights the resort’s unique and innovative effort to work with community organizations and encourages people to think twice about how they dispose of waste. To read more about the initiative and where you can drop off your e-waste, read the press release. 

Ski Press World, known for its free magazines distributed in ski towns, has launched a Green Initiative to upgrade its online magazine and allow its advertisers and readers to customize e-newsletter and web content. To enhance its viewers’ online experience, Ski Press World has also added more content links to videos and slideshows.

Ski Press World’s President, Jean-Marc Blais, wants skiers and snowboarders “to get their favorite magazine wherever and whenever they want.” 

It’s implied but not crystal clear from the press announcement that the media company’s goal for the green initiative is to reduce the number of print magazines it produces to save paper.  We’ll check back with Mr. Blais in the future to see whether readers are making the switch or if the demand continues for BOTH the print and online publications.  To subscribe to the Ski Press World e-newsletter, go to www.skipressworld.com.  And see if you can also resist the temptation to pick up the print magazine at the newstand.

I can bet that many a tradeshow-goer has dreamed of the day when he wouldn’t have to haul home reams of paper in the form of press kits, brochures and conference materials plus be stuck with yet another ugly conference bag destined for the Goodwill donation bin. Bravo to Snowsports Industries America (SIA) for putting new practices in place at the SIA.08 SnowSports Trade Show in January to show that they are an “eco-friendly association.” In their aptly titled press release “Actions Speak Louder than Words When it Comes to Being Green”, SIA lists the initiatives that they implemented during the trade show, which included:

• a new Market Segment Exhibit called ECOsource designed and built by Dept. of Energy from Seattle, WA, that showcased the products and initiatives that were recyclable, sustainable or made from recycled materials from over 70 exhibitors
• a Digital Press Room that housed exhibitors’ press kits in a digital format ONLY and made them accessible via computer terminals for attending journalists.
• water refill stations for people to refill their water bottles throughout the trade show floor
• 2,000 messenger bags that were distributed to registered buyers were made from post-consumer recycled PET plastic

And the list goes on - in partnership with GES and Mandalay Bay Services, SIA installed recycled carpet on the floors and recycled leftover paper after the show. Instead of printing out presentations for many of the seminars, SIA provided CDs instead to help save paper. In addition, for the second year in a row, SIA purchased renewable energy certificates from Renewable Choice Energy of Boulder, Colo., in the amount of 225,000kWH for 100% of the electric power used during the SIA.08 SnowSports Trade Show.

Go SIA and participating sponsors and exhibitors! This is one example of where copycats are welcome - we hope that conferences in other industries are taking notes and implementing similar changes to reduce the carbon footprint of their shows.

According to a Tahoe Mountain Resorts press release issued in January this year, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) recently recognized East West Partners for building the first large-scale, multi-building “green” resort development - the Village at Northstar — in the United States. It is somewhat surprising that Village at Northstar is the first of its kind to earn this certification but nonetheless promising — hopefully other new resort developments will follow TMR’s lead. 

Reasons for the certification include:

• The Village at Northstar’s buildings are situated so that natural daylight is present throughout the majority of the interior residential space.
• More than half of the construction waste was diverted to specialized recycling centers – which kept tons of debris from going to landfills.
• 100 percent use of underground parking
• Utilization of materials manufactured locally in 25 percent of the project
• Development of bus transit systems in the community

What about an existing resort development that wants to make green renovations — can it still be LEED Certified? Sure. LEED makes it easy and provides a rating system and guidelines on how to make improvements to existing buildings’ “performance” on its LEED Certification for Existing Buildings webpage. So there’s no excuse for existing developments not to pursue a green strategy when updating their buildings.