I've never been able to figure out the popularity feature of my journal. Nevertheless, after a year of writing, the popularity meter clearly identifies some of my posts as being more popular than others. Hoping to take a semi-holiday until New Year's Day, I thought I'd spend the next week recycling the posts readers have somehow identified as being the most popular.

Here's the top "thoughts" post of 2007, posted on June 26th:

green tour buses

As I was riding my bicycle into Grand Teton National Park yesterday, I couldn't help but notice the three tour buses parked at the first turnout. While scores of tourists lined-up to have their picture taken in front of the welcome sign–with the Tetons in the background–I wondered what the impact would be if all the tour buses that come through Jackson Hole in the summer ran on biodiesel.

With no train access to Jackson Hole, tour buses are our best hope for fuel efficient mass transit. But they could be so much "cleaner" than they currently are.

As I often do when I wonder about something, I turned to google to see what I could find out about "green tour buses." Voila: a story out of Ithaca, New York about a dozen student activists promoting sustainability issues on a 54-day, 8,600-mile tour across the country in a biodiesel-fueled bus. Their journey is called the Udall Legacy Bus Tour and their goal is to honor former Arizona Congressman Morris Udall.

Their bus is fueled by a blend of 20 percent biodiesel and 80 percent ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel and equipped with emissions-monitoring hardware.

Hoping to learn more about their bus, I googled the Udall Legacy Bus Tour and found a website chock full of information about this Celebration of Public Service and the "certified green" bus these students are riding:

When the Udall Legacy bus rolled into Burlington, Vermont, on June 21, representatives from the University of Vermont certified our motor coach as the country’s first ever “Green Coach.”

UVM’s Green Coach Certification Program is an exciting environmental initiative to encourage the motor coach industry to become cleaner and greener. Our food can be certified as organic by USDA; appliances are given the EPA’s Energy Star certification. How do you know if the transportation you use is clean and green?

Working much like the USDA’s Organic Certification program, UVM’s Green Coach Certification Program provides incentives for the motor coach industry to use new engines meeting the most stringent EPA standards, participate in carbon-offsetting programs, and use biodiesel blends, hydrogen, hybrid technologies, and other alternative fuels. Nationwide, certified operators will be able to participate in value-added incentive programs, including technical assistance, marketing support and recognized levels of Green Coach Certification.

So there you have it: the beginnings of a green tour bus initiative that I hope will wend its way west, sooner than later.

As for the students on the Udall Legacy Bus Tour–they'll be in Grand Teton National Park on Monday, July 16th, doing good work. Rest assured, if I happen to see their green bus stopped at a turnout, I'll stop by to check it out.

As a bonus, if you're looking for more Christmas reading, here are the other top-five posts in the thoughts category over the past year:

    2. The first R stands for reduce.

    3. there ought to be a law against idling vehicles

    4. before you buy carbon offsets, spend $4.95 on this

    5. Of course it will be inconvenient.

Happy reading and Merry Christmas!

Carbon Neutral Journal's thoughts are brought to you by Hawtin Jorgensen Architects.

Popularity: 15%