Battery recycling and some cool websites

I learned today that Staples (office supply store) accepts pretty much any kind of electronics that can be recycled, and both rechargeable and single-use batteries. Why are thrown-out batteries bad for the environment? http://newyork.earth911.org/master.asp?s=lib&a=electronics/bat_env.asp
Unfortunately there aren't any Staples in Clifton Park, but there are locations in Latham, Albany, Schenectady, Saratoga, etc. Radio Shack (there's one in the CP mall that is no longer a mall) accepts rechargeable batteries (lithium, Ni-Cd, etc) but not single use ones (alkaline).

The site I posted about 100 ways to save the earth seemed to suddenly disappear- I swear, it was a real website a couple days ago! It appears to be back up again, and hopefully this time will stay: http://www.seql.org/100ways.cfm. Thanks to Liz for posting it! http://www.earth911.org/ is also pretty cool and has a lot of information on recycling household products.

I thought this was an amusing advertisement for Energy Star: http://www.getenergysmart.org/Files/Videos/pony60.mov

NYSERDA (NY State Energy Research and Development Authority) put out this list of how you can save energy: http://www.getenergysmart.org/WhereYouLive/EnergySmartWinter/EnergySmartWinter.asp#TipsVideo
It's not winter anymore, but there will probably be one again soon, and there are some non-winter related tips there too.

The Clifton Park - Halfmoon Public Library is pretty green- they used a lot of recycled materials, used the architectural design to use reduce the amount of artificial light needed, and 20% of all masonry was sourced regionally. http://www.cphlibrary.org/documents/about/environmental-flyer.pdf
I hope to see everyone at the climate change panel this Sunday there!
-Shona