Sure you love Google or Yahoo to search the world wide
web,
but wouldn't it be great if you could search the
internet and plant rainforests without getting bitten by
mosquitoes, or even getting your hands dirty?
Well, now there are two "green" search engines on the
web which allow you to do exactly that:
Ecoogler.com
is powered by
either "Yahoo technology"
or "Google technology" (who's
technology is not clear as both are mentioned) and helps reforesting trees and safeguarding water
resources in the Amazon region. Based in Palma de
Mallorca, Baleares, Spain, the search engine works in
association with
AQUAVERDE -- a non-profit association founded in
Geneva, Switzerland, in 2002.
The goal of AQUAVERDE is to "promote and
support all initiatives thriving to bring a new
dimension to the interaction between human society and
environment, in the perspective of sustainable
development and dignity of People. The association
concentrates its efforts in priority to the safeguard of
water resources in the Amazon region, which constitute
today one fourth of the fresh water reserves of our
planet." AQUAVERDE supports reforestation projects as an
economic alternative to deforestation.
Every time you do
a web search in Ecoogler "you contribute symbolically to
reforest one leaf". For every 10,000 searches, Ecoogler
and AQUAVERDE plant a tree in the Amazon. Exactly how
this works is not clear from the information given on
the website, but the AQUAVERDE web site offers a
link to a very cool interactive Google Earth map
of their projects in Amazonia.
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Click the
image above to do a "Green Search" on
Ecoogler |
Ecocho.com
is
a web site based in Sydney, Australia which is powered
by "Yahoo technology". Ecocho is more honest in
explaining how its program works: "For every 1000
searches users make on Ecocho we'll counter balance or
'offset' a ton of greenhouse gases."
The people behind Ecocho admit
that the company is not a charity or non-profit
organization, that it is an "environmentally-focused"
business and that they run the project as a
"carbon-neutral entity". Their stated long-term goal "is
to fund hundreds of thousands of trees and eventually
other carbon-reduction projects (e.g. renewable energy
technologies)".
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Click the
image above to do a "Green Search" on Ecocho |
Ecocho also
states that their program is audited by
KPMG who
will run quarterly and final year-end audits on the
amount of carbon credits purchased and "retired" by the
company. They are also straight-forward in
stating that their carbon credits provider is
Global Carbon Exchange, who purchases credits only
from the official, government controlled
New South Wales Greenhouse Gas Abatement Scheme.
Ecocho invites skeptics to "check
[their] carbon offset credits for
yourself"
