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We've been busy adding lots of new products to the range over the past month or so but one range which we're particularly keen to promote comes from the new campaign Tap.

In the past we've written about the silly practice of buying bottled water which has traveled hundreds or thousands of miles to the UK and how damaging this is to the environment.  We even made a video about it.  But now there is an alternative for bottled water lovers everywhere in the shape of Tap.

Tap is a new ethical enterprise taking on the bottled water industry.  It is a campaign and fundraising initiative committed to getting people to re-think bottled water through a range of clever little products designed to make drinking tap water fashionable, easy and safe.

Just to recap, Tap water in the UK is one of the highest quality tap waters in the world.  Testing by the Drinking Water Inspectorate in 2006 reported that 99.96% of 4.5 million samples tested passed water quality sampling.  In blind taste tests most people can't tell the difference between tap and bottled water.  Tap even carried out their own survey on London's South Bank and from a pool of 250 people 84% failed to identify tap water.

The products in the tap range have been designed to promote a sustainable lifestyle that gets people to re-use and recycle.  The Do It Yourself Water Pack includes 10 labels to encourage drinkers to re-use their water bottle 10 times before recycling which would result in saving 100 bottles of water.  The other item in the range is a sleekly designed re-usable water bottle which has been designed to last for years rather than thrown away. 
All the products carry the message that Tap water is just as good as the imported stuff and with 70% of the profits from the campaign going towards water and sanitation projects in the developing world, we're 100% behind this campaign which will hopefully do for bottled water what Anya Hyndmarch did for plastic bags.

Earlier this week London Wildlife Trust launched a new campaign entitled 'Garden for a Living London' which aims to highlight the importance of the capital's gardens to wildlife and people.  New figures show that London has over 3 million gardens covering an area of almost 38,000 hectares, a huge resource which could potentially help tackle climate change - gardens provide shade, absorb carbon, soak up flood water and help cool the city.

Urban gardens are also a great help to wildlife.  I've noticed this at home, our little roof terrace patch might be small but the birds love it and the same regular visitors pop around every day looking for grubs and insects.

As part of the campaign, London Wildlife Trust are asking gardeners in the capital to make a pledge to do one thing to help make a stronger 'Living London' - a city more resilient to climate change and better for wildlife.  I don't think you need to live in London to be part of this cool idea, any urban gardener across the country can gain inspiration from the ideas suggested.  The seven pledges are listed below and you can check out the website for some handy 'How to' guides to get started.

• Seven gardening actions:
  
  1. Plant drought resistant plants
  2. Plant a mixed hedgegrow
  3. Plant a broad leaved tree
  4. Make a pond
  5. Use mulch
  6. Add a green roof to my shed
  7. Wild up my decking

Friday night I had a domestic emergency, piles of washing up to do and not a drop of Ecover washing up liquid to be found.  Shamefully for someone who should be better prepared I have to admit I resorted to a trip to the corner shop and one of those leading detergent brands.  Lesson learned though and I quickly vowed never to let it happen again.

Not wanting to hang around with my new resolution I hopped on the bike on Saturday and headed down to Unpackaged in Islington, London with my refill bottles in tow.  The idea behind this innovative store is to remove as much packaging as possible from the whole business of buying groceries.  You bring along your own refill containers, in my case this time a couple of empty Ecover bottles and another empty bottle for olive oil which you then simply refill from a large bulk container.  The result is less waste going to landfill and it's cheaper too so everyone's a winner!

I was very impressed with the product range on offer which included lots of organic wholefoods (rice, pasta, beans etc) as well as the whole Ecover range in refillable containers.  It's also one of the nicest shops around to visit with great attention to detail and it comes as no surprise to learn when you see the place that Unpackaged was voted runner up in the Jupiter Big Idea category at this years Observer Ethical Awards. Such a good idea and full credit to Catherine the owner who has done such a great job in making it all happen.

Girls have all the fun....well last night they did when I popped along to the Eco Fashion and Design Event at the Candid Arts Centre in Islington.  To be fair, I'm not exactly clued up on fashion but having attended all the previous Eco Design Fairs I went along to support the event and maybe check out if there was anything of interest for a vintage wearing 30-something bloke.

Not surprising really, my tastes weren't exactly catered for but for a full run down of designers who exhibited and some ideas for your ethical summer wardrobe check out the Eco Design Fair website.  I stayed on for the fashion show which you know had lovely clothes on lovely models but it was the grand finale that had everyone grinning and whooping with a display of the latest range of underwear from Pants for Poverty, the fair-trade organic and sweatshop free underwear label.  Don't worry I can personally vouch they look just as good on without the six-pack stomach!

Sorry, excuse the pun but cutting a tyre in half made my arms go all wobbly and took three hours to finish! Little did I know (probably as I've never had a car) that tyres are held together with very very thick wire!
Yes, this is ECOutlet's latest quest to bring you innovative new products which help reduce our impact on landfill.

My local garage had a stack of tyres outside which were destined for the dump and kindly donated one so we've been wearing our thinking caps today and seeing how we could recycle them.  We're only at the experimental stage right now but stay tuned as we plan to keep you updated on our wheely good work!

For the adventurous and self-sufficient out there, I found this useful link on how to make sandals out of old tyres and for a wealth of other ideas, the ever useful How can I recycle this? has a list of suggestions from users on how to reuse old tyres.

If like me you watched the BBC3 series Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts and were shocked by the images of the living and working conditions of scores of people employed in the garment industry in India, you might be interested in taking a look at The Ecologist Magazines newly revamped website which now includes a section entitled Ecologist TV.

This is a new feature on the website which will see key stories featured in the magazine brought to life on film.  The first film to be available is Hell for Leather, which gives an insight into the facts behind the production of cheap leather in the Hazaribagh district of Dhaka, Bangladesh. 
The area is home to 100 tanneries and produces most of Bangladesh's leather for export abroad.  Once again it's a startling insight into how people and the environment are suffering for the sake of the West's taste for cheap fashion and it makes for eye-opening viewing.  A subscription to The Ecologist includes 10 issues sent directly to your home and can be orderd from our Ethical Magazines section.

We had some happy news last week on finding out that ECOutlet has been short-listed in our local borough of Islington's upcoming Giant Green Awards.

Looking at the range of nominees you'd be forgiven for thinking Islington covered a much bigger area (it's only 6 square miles!) with familiar names on the green scene such as the Duke of Cambridge Pub, green taxi firm Ecoigo and trailblazing wholefood shop Unpackaged all up for potential awards.

In our own category, Green Champion, we're short-listed with eight other nominees including Bere Architects who already have a mantle of trophies having won the Eco House of the Year at the 2007 Grand Designs Expo as well as Small House of the Year in the British Homes Awards 2007 for the stunning, energy efficient Focus House they designed last year.

The presentation is next Monday so we'll let you know how we get on, whatever the outcome it's nice to be short-listed amongst such good company.

June update: Well no prizes for ECOutlet at the Giant Green awards in Islington last month but we did have a very nice time indeed and after some free champagne (paid for by the sponsors) we went home with smiles on our faces!  A full list of winners is up on the Islington Council website, the winner in our category was A Chest of Drawers, a local furniture shop with the UK's first ethical and environmental label for furniture. Worthy winners we thinks!

According to the RAC road traffic produces 26% of the UK's total greenhouse gas emissions yet over half of all car trips are currently less than five miles and 23% are less than two miles, distances which are easily covered on foot or by bicycle.

The benefits of cycling include the fact it's pollution free, noise free and congestion free and as petrol prices, global warming and obesity figures continue to rise there's never been more reason for us all to think about ditching the car in favour of the healthier, cheaper and more eco friendly option on two wheels.

Yesterdays Tip of the day from Friends of the Earth highlighted this for me when it stated how a half-mile commute by bike will burn eight calories a minute or 11kg of fat a year and for every five mile cycle journey, we save 1kg of CO2 (based on a 200 g/km car).

I know I go on about cycling a lot but that's down to the fact I enjoy it so much and I believe if everyone tried it more often it could be a real solution to our transport problems. Since we started here on ECOutlet we've gradually been building up a nice little collection of cycling accessories. If you've not checked out the cycling section for a while take a peek at our newest additions just in time for summer including our first in-house product, some bicycle clips made from recycled inner tubes as well as the new Green Oil bicycle chain lubricant and two new versions of the Reelight battery-free bicycle lights.  There's a little bit of everything for the eco conscious cyclist looking to green their ride!  We're also always on the look-out for clever and useful bicycle gear both for ourselves and the shop so if you have any suggestions please feel free to drop us an email.

Anyone who checks out our eco events calendar on ECOutlet may have already noted that this week marks National Vegetarian Week 2008, an annual awareness-raising campaign promoting inspirational vegetarian food and the benefits of a meat-free diet.

Going veggie is now easier than ever with lots of meat-free alternatives in the shops for nervous newbies and most restaurants offering tasty imaginative options beyond the bog-standard veggie Lasagne or Mousaka. The NVW website has a few 'meat-free made easy' recipe ideas for anyone planning on giving the veggie option a try this week or my top tip is the BBC Food website which always comes up trumps when I'm looking for interesting meal ideas.

Abstaining from meat, even for a few days is not only good for your health but is better for the planet too. Check out my previous blog last year on the link between greenhouse gases and global meat production or have a look at this award winning video on youtube which highlights the problem! 

We were lucky enough to receive a couple of tickets to the Radio 1 Big Weekend down in Maidstone last Saturday.  The sun was shining, the beer was flowing and everyone there was in high spirits, a really good day out.

Given the very high temperatures we had to partake of a few beers ourselves and it was nice to see some effort was being made to reduce the amount of waste our thirsty appetites produced on the day.  Next to the main beer tent there was a recycling centre where 10p was given back for every paper cup which was returned.  Just like when I was a young lad and used to return my neighbours lemonade bottles to the shop to buy sweets there was a double whammy of satisfaction knowing my paper cup was going to be recycled and I was getting my next beer for that little bit less.  I actually took my recycling duties very seriously on the day and managed to collect between 10 and 20 paper cups off the grass every time I returned to the beer area.

As the day went by, everyone started catching on to the idea and come the late afternoon there were lines of people queuing up at the recycling bank to hand in the pint sized cups they had collected from all around the site.  Such a good win-win idea.  I've not been to any other festivals for a long time but it would be nice to think the same practise is in operation at other events this summer and I dont see any reason why it should'nt be extended to cans or bottles too.  Perhaps for some on Saturday, the idea of cheap beer made recycling an attractive option but whatever the reason it was evident that given a little incentive lots of people are more than happy to get involved and do their bit.