World

Nuclear reactors aren't generally accident-prone, though when something does goes awry, it's devastating. By Derin Richardson, LuxEco Editorial Assistant If you’ve been following the tsunami disaster in Japan lately, you’re probably somewhat confused about the dynamics of the situation. While we’re no experts on nuclear physics here at LuxEco Living, here’s a basic, tentative guide on the radiation involved and current events.

By Elaine Durr, Sustainability Coordinator of Elon University and LuxEco Advocate Elon University’s mission statement says, in part, that “We integrate learning across the disciplines and put knowledge into practice, thus preparing students to be global citizens and informed leaders motivated by concern for the common good.” Elon believes that one of the most pressing issues facing students, indeed all citizens, today is global environmental change. In order to be true to that mission statement, it is imperative that Elon teach its students about environmental change, human interactions with the earth and how they can be good stewards of this planet so that the mission of producing “global citizens and informed leaders motivated by the common good” is accomplished.

Journey with us to South Africa the home and heritage of Nelson Mandela. The Saxon Villa and Spa is one of the most beautiful hotels in the world.

By Nancy Chuda, Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief LuxEco Living and Co-Founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Last night, CNN reported that engineers are at higher risk of extreme levels of radiation due to a potential meltdown. In Japan's tsunami-crippled Fukushima No. 1 (Daiichi) power plant, nuclear authorities have reported that spikes of radiation have escaped from the facility at levels that can be dangerous to human health. But what does this mean for Americans, especially those who live on the western coastline where the fallout may occur.

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Cows have a voice too! If you can stomach, actually bare...

By: Nancy Chuda, co-founder of LuxEcoLiving.com and Healthy Child Healthy World "One need not be in California long before he feels his soul beginning to stir. The air is magnetized...the consciousness awakens ...the soul must speak." Ganna Walska, the flamboyant opera singer who wrote those words in her memoir, had not merely tired of New York. After a six-week stay in the Hollywood Hills in 1940, the 53-year-old Mrs. Walska truly believed that her destiny lay in this "sunny land" where "people are decidedly more interested in your being than in your pocket."

In a rare look at the Deepwater Horizon rig, Kerry Sanders from The Today Show flew over the oil-soaked Gulf of Mexico.  As far...

By Nancy and James Chuda founders of LuxEcoLiving and co-founders of Healthy Child Healthy World Las Vegas Nevada, City Center, Vdara/ Travels with Journey Our...

"It will awaken your senses not only to the beauty of nature but to the plight of South Africa's wildlife, many of which are teetering on a thin line for survival.

Just last month marks the fifth year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the catastrophic natural disaster that claimed more than 1,800 lives in the Gulf coast region with damages totaling $80 billion. After the devastation of the hurricane and consequent flooding, it seemed to its residents and many around the world that New Orleans, specifically, was making a painstakingly slow recovery. Frustrated by the sluggish progress, actor Brad Pitt founded the Make It Right Foundation in 2007 to help rebuild the hardest hit region of New Orleans, the Lower 9th ward.

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World. It...

"The Milestone Hotel in London was just voted the #2 city hotel in Europe and the # 1 World's Best Hotel by Travel + Leisure"

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Two architectural visionaries, James Chuda and David Noble...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World "Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books,...

By Janelle Sorensen, Chief Communications Officer, Healthy Child Healthy World Expert Opinion courtesy of Healthy Child Healthy World When my husband and I toured schools to...

LOHAS Second Annual Los Angeles Networking Event & Reception - Provides Forum for Green Business Leaders. LOHAS, the producers of the annual LOHAS Forum is...

By Hannah Canvasser LuxEco Editorial Assistant With Prince William and Kate Middleton’s wedding rapidly approaching, and the highlight to this week in Tivo, many are curious to know if Prince William will carry out green standards throughout his celebration. With the Royal Family’s interest in reducing energy and their environmentally friendly practices in and around the Palace, it is expected that the Prince and his bride will hold the same in their celebration. Although the ever so famous rhyme still holds true to weddings of every nation, it is rumored that Kate Middleton’s “something blue” may actually be tinted a little green this Friday.

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World and contributing author Philip J. Landrigan, MD, MSc Dean...

Due to the constraints of money and commitments at work and home, many of us don’t have the flexibility to zip down to Louisiana...

Morgan Stanley announced that Bloom Energy will install a fuel cell system at the Firm's global headquarters in New York City's Times Square neighborhood

On April 21, 2010, the oil rig Deepwater Horizon had a dire malfunction. Both its manual and emergency blowout preventers failed to deploy when the worst-case scenario became a reality. An oil rig blowout has the potential to occur when some combination of mud, oil, natural gas, and water erupt from the well, surge up the drill pipe, and ignite at the surface, exploding into an inferno.

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Skeptics would say that Darryl Carpenter and Otis Goodman of C.W. Roberts in Florida did not thoroughly think their...

By Merry Elkins, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Best known for being a star-maker, Ken Kragen, who is also an author, teacher, and film and television producer, has charted the career course of some our most celebrated entertainers including Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, Tricia Yearwood, Olivia Newton John, The Bee Gees, The Smothers Brothers, Harry Chapin and more; but nothing he has accomplished in his illustrious career has ever achieved the significance or the scope of his philanthropic work. For breathing life into Hands Across America in the 1980s where young and old alike joined hands across the country to call attention to hunger and homelessness here in the US; for setting in motion and organizing the recording We Are the World, that brought together 45 prominent recording artists including Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie and Bruce Springsteen to raise $64 million to feed people in Africa and for founding USA for Africa to distribute the money, he received the United Nations Peace Medal, something few civilians receive and an honor for which he is most proud.

By Bethany Colson, Managing Editor of LuxEcoLiving.com We are in a hairy situation indeed!!! Tens of millions of gallons of oil have gushed into the Gulf...

By Nancy Chuda founder and editor-in-chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World The Worlds Greatest Cheese and Cheesemongers Before Adam Moskowitz found his...

I was hoping to wear a white dress and walk into town to share my heartfelt joy with my friends. I wanted to roar like a white lion with pride and share the passion of OUR WIN TOGETHER.

By: Bethany Colson, Managing Editor of LuxEco Living. In Part I of my interview with Lisa Gautier, Founder of  Matter of Trust, she helped us...

Forrest Gump may have been on to something when he compared life to chocolates. You really never know what you’re gonna get in a box of chocolates, do you? The truth behind chocolate is more bitter than sweet. The Ivory Coast produces 40% of the world's chocolate, and it just so happens to also be notorious for this little thing called child slavery. Children, both local and from other third world countries, are sold to farms in this area where they are physically abused while working in risky and inhumane conditions. Some children are sold into the trade by parents who are tricked into believing their children will have better lives at the farm. Others are trafficked, stolen from their families, lured by the promise of…chocolate. In these farms they are forced to work 60 hour weeks with little or no food (depending on their performance on the field). These children lose their fundamental human rights when they enter these farms and “modern” society turns a blind eye to the atrocities. Every time we buy a box of chocolate that is not fair trade stamped, we (often unknowingly) endorse child slavery.

By James and Nancy Chuda founders of LuxEcoLiving and Healthy Child Healthy World Santa Barbara California Earl Warren Showgrounds   "The most dangerous 8 seconds in sports."...

"There is no one among us who will light the world. You may use all of your days igniting the empty flares huddled and peopling the darkness

By Lush Huxley, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant Move over Al Gore and make room for the ladies. The Western world isn’t the only hemisphere freaking out...

Empathy and Compassion in the Wake of Japan's Tsunami Crisis By: Marc Ian Barasch, author of The Compassionate Life and Founder/Director, Green World Campaign The aerial shots...

by Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEco Editorial Assistant and author of the Resplendent Repurposing series As if those of us who are concerned about toxic chemicals in our environment didn’t have enough things to worry about, we must now add methamphetamine lab sites, either currently operating or long closed down, to the list. The inconvenient truth is that you could be living in one right now. Or parked next to one. -- Mary Elizabeth Williams-Villano, LuxEcoLiving Editorial Assistant

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World I've been fascinated by the long lasting power of orchids....

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant For the majority of the time that the BP oil spill has been happening, company officials as well as...