Clif Bar & Company is often graced with special guests, and this week we were lucky enough to be visited by Colin Beavan. For an entire year, Colin and his family lived as environmentally as possible, meaning no electricity, no fossil fuel based transportation, no...well, you get the picture. Definitely an extremely daunting task considering that Colin and his family live in the heart of craziness: Manhattan.

Colin documented his journey in a book and movie of the same name, ”No Impact Man.” It’s an incredibly interesting and eye-opening project that is parallel to many things that Clif Bar is trying to do on the sustainability front. So what he went though hit home for us.

Later in the day, I was able to grab Colin to give us the lowdown on the No Impact Man project and answer a few questions along the way, including small steps you can take at home to cut down on waste. After checking out the vid, do yourself a favor and hop on over to Colin’s website for a heap of great info.

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Summer is here and the 4th of July is just around the corner. That means outdoor barbecues, family getaways, camping and the like. It can also mean that your carbon footprint gets bigger, what with things like increased air and car travel, trash from all those cookouts and air conditioning. So what can you do over the holiday weekend to stay eco-friendly? Here are a few ideas:

• 1. First, Grill Smart. If you can, use a natural gas grill, or to be even greener, an infrared one. Either is better than burning charcoal. Charcoal briquettes contain coal dust and sodium nitrate, and they emit more soot than a gas grill.




• 2. If you do have to use charcoal, use Hardwood Lump Charcoal. Yes it comes from a tree, but natural hardwood charcoal burns cleaner than briquettes and you can find brands like Whole Foods 365 Brand that use wood from sustainably managed forests. Oh, and ditch all that lighter fluid—it’s just nasty, toxic stuff. Use electric charcoal starters or a chimney starter.

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The CLIF BAR 2 Mile Challenge is underway – and the competition is already heating up! Glad to see so many of you have taken the charge to heart. If you’ve yet to join in, you can read all about it here.

Speaking of heart, I’ve been remiss in getting back on the Clif Bar Blog to talk about the three key elements in keeping the 2MC extra super enjoyable for the participants throughout the summer. And of course I’m talking about the 2MC Team Leaders. I went on an exhaustive search over the past few months to find three of the most incredibly inspiring and fun-loving individuals this side of the International Date Line. Their mission: to take the 2MC Red, Blue and Gold teams to the max! And if you need more than the “required 15 pieces of flair,” you got it – we’ve got an NYC bike messenger, a former Mr. Kool-Aid Man (Ohhh yeeeah!) and the cherry on top? An international tax consultant/beer snob! I think those things are somehow related?

So without further ado, I’d like to present YOUR 2MC Team Leaders (in no particular order):

• Heather M. – RED TEAM LEADER, Brooklyn, NY
  (follow @heatherbikes and @2MCRed on Twitter)
  “I am passionate about cycling! Whether it is commuting to a desk job, touring through Europe, or messengering in the streets of New York City, I love to ride my bike and need to do it every day! A native New Yorker, I graduated from NYU in 2006 and am now part of Mess Kollective, New York’s first bike messenger co-op. I am very excited to be leading the Red Team for Trips for Kids and hope to get people all over the country out of their cars and turn them on to the joys of cycling!”

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I’m Ryan, the bloke here at Clif Bar & Company whose job it is to shepherd our environmental efforts in the world. Good to see you! I’m here with big news today as we’ve just finished up an extended period of time installing some new components (nay, a new drive train?) on one of our favorite efforts around here at Clif Bar HQ, the 2 Mile Challenge.

For those of you who have participated with us in the past, you know that it’s in our DNA at Clif to help protect those places where we love to play. The 2 Mile Challenge is a game we created to fight climate change by challenging yourself and your friends to ride your bike instead of the car for those quick trips within 2 miles from home. We’re super excited to announce that this year the 2 Mile Challenge is sinking some deeper roots into the world of bicycle advocacy and the fight against climate change. We’re pairing the 2 Mile Challenge with an effort to award $100,000 in grants to three nonprofit organizations that YOU can help us decide how to spend. Introducing the 2 Mile Challenge Red, Gold and Blue Teams!

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to register, join one of the 2MC teams and start pedaling your bike to earn points for yourself and your nonprofit organization.

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Let’s face it—we’re all busy. We here at Clif Bar & Company understand that everyone doesn’t always have the time to flip through the newest book on the food system and sustainability. But thankfully, there are some amazing films out there that do the job wonderfully, summing these interesting topics up in a visual package. To celebrate the end of earth month, here are some great, informative films out there that are a wealth of information.

The Real Food Challenge - Check out this wonderful video from a student-run grassroots organization that is changing campus food service across the nation. The real food challenge is to drive an increase of real food, with a goal of reaching 20% real food on college and university campuses by 2020.

The Meatrix - Understand factory farming and you begin to understand our broken food system. The Meatrix uses a series of animated videos to expose the problems with factory farming while making the world safe for sustainable family farms.

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