Soy candles are a natural alternative to paraffin candles, which are made from petroleum. Because they are biodegradable, they also produce less soot when burned. Making small tweaks in our lives, like buying soy candles, is all part of the solution.

Having a local choice like A Soyful Candle Company is just icing candles on the cake. They offer 3 sizes of container candles and a set of six tealights. We sampled a “Romance” candle, and some “Rain” tealights. They both smelled amazing, and certainly lived up to the clean, slow-burning reputation of soy candles.

The details of these candles are amazing as well. They are dye-free, hand-poured, and use a lead-free cotton wick. They contain no animal products, can be cleaned up with water, and support American farmers. Seriously, I’m going to have to go with the beans on this one — soy candles rock!

In addition to a wide range of fragrances — like sun washed linen, fig, Charleston Magnolia, or Georgia peach — they have some tasty seasonal options as well. Think about greening up your festivities this year with some Harvest Spice, Hollyberry Mistletoe, Jingle Bells, or Peppermint candles. Those all sound delicious!

Be sure to check out A Soytful Candles Company’s online store — there’s lots of good stuff in stock. Buying green is one of the best ways you can contribute to the cause, as your choice is your voice when it comes to supporting green options in the marketplace.

Thanks again to Melissa for letting us test drive these great candles!

The site is located inside the Public Services Maintenance Facility at 1155 Six Mile Road in Mount Pleasant, and is open Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Check the Town of Mount Pleasant website for more information.

The site accepts up to five gallons of motor oil per visit for recycling. The oil is collected by Santee Cooper, and used as a fuel source at their power generating facility. That’s double cool!

The Mount Pleasant facility also has an area to drop off used oyster shells for reuse. The shells can be used to restore natural oyster beds, and can also be used for industrial purposes.

In addition to this amazing new resource, the actual meetups themselves have gone high tech. You can now enjoy the alternative energy goodness from the comfort of your own home, using the online service GoToMeeting. The next web event is November 19 at 6:45 p.m., and will feature a discussion on geothermal energy. Keep up the good work Ian!

We have lived in our neighborhood for 8 years, and I have never heard of any sort of accident with the school bus. Bus #206 picks up the children from this neighborhood only. It stops at the end of our street, every morning and afternoon, right on time.

Belle Hall is a mere 2.5 miles from my garage. I can’t bike myself (six months pregnant), a five year-old, and a two year-old along Long Point Road at 7 a.m. and 2 p.m. I do not want to drive to that school 4 times day. 50 miles a week— back and forth — idling with all my neighbors is totally unacceptable. I don’t want to be wasting fuel unnecessarily and releasing more toxins into our atmosphere.

However, he is also only five, it’s a long day away from home, and he has only visited his new school three times. The thought of him becoming lost around those pods is worrisome. Wait a second, he is five! He knows his address and phone number. He knows where the bus stop is. He knows how to line up in a line and follow. He knows his bus number is #206.

Chad will take him the first few days, maybe weeks, on his way to work. Eventually we will wait for the bus in the morning too. After his first day of school, he will line up and ride his bus home. I will be waiting with proud tears. I hope to be able to tell my girlfriends that he loves his bus rides, maybe influence a few to give it a try.

We’ve been waving and watching that bus for five years now – he’s ready to climb up those steps!

We would like to integrate cycling into our plan, but find it difficult due to inadequate infrastructure (unless you like riding down LongPoint Road inches away from cars going 50 mph). Charleston Moves was a big proponent of the pedestrian lane on the Ravenel Bridge, and is working hard to get a bike lane down Coleman Blvd. in Mount Pleasant. Major Joe dedicated the East Bay Bike and Pedestrian Path last month. These are all good things, but more work needs to be done.

Enter Brian Graham, a Clemson University graduate student who is creating a “Bicycle & Pedestrian Action Plan” for Charleston. As part of his work, he is documenting all the bicycle rack locations within the city – and needs your help. If you know of a bike rack, please add a marker to the interactive Google map. You can also add a marker to request a rack be placed at a certain location. At the close of the project, a more formal map will be created and submitted to the City of Charleston.

But your involvement doesn’t need to stop there. Brian is looking for your help in identifying places that need bike lane striping, sharrows, or bike paths. He has 5 questions for Charleston residents to answer regarding local bicycle and pedestrian issues. Check them out after the jump, and either leave your feedback in the comments section, or email them directly to Brian.

1. What roads seem ideal for re-striping to create bike lanes or should have sharrows? (These roads should be wider than others and have well maintained pavement).
2. Are there specific roads, that do not have sidewalks that, in your opinion, need them??  (Especially outside of downtown.)
3. Where would you suggest that bicycle and pedestrian activity be counted to document a demand for facilities (streets and intersections)?
4. What type of bicycle/pedestrian/motorist education programs would you like to see the City of Charleston support?
5. How should the city encourage and market bicycle and pedestrian activities be encouraged?

I have found that the best way I can contribute is by simply not driving. This is an excellent time of year to keep my car in the garage. The neighborhood pool, friends’ homes, the nearest grocery, and even Splash Island are rewarding destinations, especially when we bike there. Because it is summer, I am able to plan our weeks so that we don’t see the inside of my car for days in a row.

I am writing this early Monday morning, July 7th. My boys and I have not been in my car since last Thursday, July 3rd. I am lucky to be a stay at home mom, as it enables me to make these efforts. But maybe one day a week, we all should try to find alternatives to our cars, no matter our situation.

“We hope that new riders will consider trying CARTA on National Dump the Pump Day, which will highlight transit nationally,” said Howard Chapman, executive director of CARTA. “We’ll do the same locally by offering free rides—reinforcing that CARTA is a way for people to save money and also help save the environment in a small way.”

CARTA ridership is up 20% from last year, so let’s keep that trend going. Get out and ride those buses, and let CARTA know that we will use public transportation if it is there. The more we ride, the more they will try to improve the system – which will hopefully include better bus stops and more routes throughout the area.

I have not been able to find out any more info. There is a parked domain at charlestongreentaxi.com, as well as some official state paperwork. If any of you greenies have the details, please let us know in the comments.

Some thoughts…

• I averaged 43.8 and 46.8 mpg on the first two tanks. This is pretty good, but there’s room for improvement. If I had more interstate and fewer bridges between work and home, I could edge that up.

• I managed to get a huge load of lumber home from Lowe’s the other day. I’ve also had bags of mulch, pine straw, top soil, and a group of 5 people in it as well.
• I like talking to the other Prius owners as much as the Prius prospects – they’re a chatty crew.
• Cheers to my friend Ben for introducing the term “hybrid rage” to my lexicon. Having SUV’s get all up in my business when I’m rolling steady on battery makes me laugh.
• Sometimes I can’t find it in the parking lot because it is so small. See photo…

And yes, I’m still wondering how all the US auto makers failed to have Toyota’s vision. It just re-enforces that notion that as Americans, the only votes that count are the ones we make with our dollars.

Over the last few years, I’ve spoken with many Prius owners about the car, and a pattern emerged. There was very little talk about saving money on fuel, despite the seemingly unstoppable surge in gas prices we are seeing. Instead, people bought them because it was simply the right thing to do. Skeptics often say that the savings in gas will never pay for the car, but this isn’t an exercise in ROI; it’s a chance to make a good choice for the planet…and I’ll pay for that.

Yes, I’m happy about the lower emissions, but that’s certainly not the whole story. One of the most effective ways to create social change is to vote with your wallet, and buying a Prius does that in a big way. The hybrid system is so amazing, and I really don’t understand why Detroit can’t seem to figure this out. Sure, they are “trying”, but a $50,000 Chevy Tahoe Hybrid that only gets 14/20 mpg is both laughable and embarrassing. Clearly they aren’t trying hard enough.

Along with doing the right thing comes setting an example, and that was certainly part of my motivation. I agree with Mary Gatch, who was quoted in this Treehugger.com post (you go girl!) describing the satisfaction of having people ask her about Prius. I like this as well, but not as much as I like having my two boys ask me about it. Influencing them means a lot to me, and I’m already imagining them telling their college friends about all the kooky green stuff we made them do growing up. But you know what, that stuff will stick, and their generation will see things differently…and that should be reason enough for all of us all to get hybrids.

So, if you have a chance to get a Prius, jump! And if enough of us jump, mother nature will certainly notice (and maybe Detroit will too).