EM hosts 2009 Earth Day

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class William O'Brien
  • 95th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  Team Edwards celebrated Earth Day 2009 with a day of recognition and activities at the Center of Excellence April 21.

The event has seen an increase in popularity and turnout each year. This year, it was themed "Living Sustainable Lifestyles," and had more than 2,000 participants.

"Everyday's an earth day; today is just to teach you what to do the other 364 days of the year," said Bob Wood, Environmental Management director. "The goal is to reduce the consumption of resources to a sustainable level."

Mr. Wood said sustainability is the next step in the process of environmental awareness, which Earth Day is intended to create.

"In the beginning, Earth Day was intended to stop pollution," he said. "Over the years, as pollution decreased, the next step was recycling; now pretty much every child knows that, so next is sustainability, and with climate change, the question we need to ask ourselves is what do we need to do to ensure the earth is around forever with us living on it."

Mr. Wood said part sustainability is improving the good practices already in effect.

"Recycling is good for the earth, but now we need to look at how we can prevent from even consuming so many waste materials," said Mr. Wood. "Considering the carbon footprint made by each bottle, we can buy one and reuse it until it's no longer useable and then repurpose or recycle it. That would cut back on the unnecessary production of waste materials."

To teach the children about good environmental practices, Col. Nancy Reeves-Flores, 95th Air Base Wing vice commander, planted a tree intended to thrive in desert conditions with them.

"We planted a Modesto Ash Tree and I taught them how it's good for a desert environment because it doesn't consume a lot of water, grows quickly and provides shade," said Colonel Reeves-Flores. "I explained it's a tree we would want on the base because of the importance of shade and water conservation in a desert environment."

The event had activities and information booths from more than 20 base organizations and 13 organizations from the local community. Each station entertained and informed participants about different aspects of living a sustainable life and what that does to help the environment.

"There were fun stations, such as the Safety Office's, which gave out cups with seeds, and the only way children can find out what seeds they got is by growing it," said Mr. Wood. "That helps them to get to get children excited about growing plants."

Colonel Reeves-Flores said she is pleased with the progress that's been made and hopes to see it continue into the future.

"We've come a long way in environmental protection and we need to keep that momentum going. We need to make sure what we leave behind for future generations is a great environment for them when they become our age," said Colonel Reeves-Flores.