The latest from Saudi Arabia's first youth-driven eco-friendly initiative: Green Jeddah جدة الخضراء
King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) invites Green Jeddah’s Co-Founders to its “Sustainable Living & Solutions” Lectures
(from left to right) Menal Nour Hussen, Rana Jan, Alaa Al-Mizyen, Lulwa BinMahfooz
Desalination plants and solutions for sustainable living within Saudi Arabia were just highlights of the KAUST presentations headed by Professor Alice Agogino today. Green Jeddah’s co-founders had the chance to meet with several of the mechanical engineers and environmental scientists behind the conceptualizations.
Ms. Lina Jamjoom, Dr. Shamim Khan, and Ms. Maimuna Sultana, of Dar Al-Hekma College, also gave some insight on the black cloud project and its results as per the study executed at the Dar Al-Hekma campus.
For more information on the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology check out: http://www.kaust.edu.sa/
On your marks. Get set. Sort your recyclables – Let’s go go go!
Nursery and Kindergarten students between the ages of 3 and 6 joined Green Jeddah in an action-packed morning of eco-friendliness. Between learning about endangered species and planting flowers, the Ambassadors Schools’ toddlers really proved themselves to be our planet’s heroes. Giggles and squeals of delight filled the air while, one by one, our new friends helped us beat the odds during Green Jeddah’s 1st Recycling Rally! We all practiced separating our recyclables: cans with cans, plastic with plastics, and paper with paper.
The Ambassadors Schools - Jeddah, KSA
The students learned how to identify the reduce, reuse, recycle sign (yes, the three arrows), how to help save their favorite endangered species, and what they can do to make mother earth smile:
- Turn off the tap water while brushing our teeth
- Turn off the lights when we’re not using them to see
- Don’t waste paper – use both sides to draw and write.
Saudi Arabia’s young are now officially part of the green movement.
If you’d like Green Jeddah to organize awareness events, campaigns, or lectures at your institution feel free to contact us on
greenjeddah@gmail.com
...and so the Green Jeddah recycling rally commences
the kids are in line with their teams for the rally
All the recyclables are sorted - mission accomplished!
Yep, ladies and gentlemen set your alarms to 8:30 PM on March 27th because that will mark Saudi Arabia’s first ever Earth Hour! Organized and kicked off by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in 2007, Earth Hour has become an annual event, celebrated on the last Saturday of March, globally, with approximately 92 countries participating a week from today.
What is Earth Hour exactly? It’s an hour dedicated to our planet. No community clean-ups. No recycling rallies. Just an hour of darkness. All you have to do is turn off your lights from 8:30-9:30 PM on the evening of March 27th. Get together with some friends and family and celebrate Earth Hour together – do your part in raising awareness on environmental preservation, after all, this is your home.
What’s a mere hour of darkness going to do for the planet? Records have shown that power consumption during Earth Hour in cities such as Dubai and Bangkok have gone down by 2-13%. But its about a whole lot more than stats, Earth Hour celebrates your voice along with millions of others around the globe, in support of our planet. How big is it? Let’s just say that places such as the Sydney Opera House, Burj Khalifa in Dubai, the Pyramids in Cairo, and the Empire State Building in New York are among the buildings participating in Earth Hour this year. Several governmental buildings and private companies are going dark in Jeddah, Riyadh, and Dammam. Earth Hour 2010 – take part in the world’s biggest climate awareness campaign ever!
For more information: www.earthhour.org/
Our initial reaction after our first ever Green Jeddah presentation at Babson College...which was our same reaction once Green Jeddah was announced the 1st place winner at the US-Saudi Women's Forum on Social Entrepreneurship at Dar Al-Hekma College held under the patronage of HH Princess Sit Bin Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud
After an entire year of hard work, the 30 female students from Jeddah participating in the US-Saudi Women’s Forum on Social Entrepreneurship joined together today for the awards ceremony. Stress, anxiety, and excitement filled the air of Dar Al-Hekma College’s auditorium, where the event was held under the patronage of HH Princess Sita bint Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud.
Six social enterprises, co-founded by students across Jeddah, were being assessed by a tough panel of judges made up of established businesswomen. And allow us to say that we were really put on the hot seat when the judges arrived at our booth. Silent inner freak-outs and palpitating hearts? Yes. However we managed to dodge a couple of tough questions and really get our message across…which was made clear to us while we held our breath as the forum’s organizers began announcing the 3 winners. Green Jeddah ended up winning first place and it was your support that led us there.
Your kind words of support, e-mails, and nods of approval have meant so much to us and we promise to continue our initiative, working hand in hand with all of you towards a green Jeddah.
We’d also like to give a special thank you to all of the forum’s organizers: Dar Al-Hekma College, Babson College, Wellesley Centers for Women, MEPI, and ICF International.
*on a side note, we’ll be updating the blog with photograph and news articles covering the event as they are published so keep coming back for more. In the meantime, feel free to check out the following article on Green Jeddah published by Arab News last week in addition to the US-Saudi Women’s Forum on Social Entrepreneurship blog.
On January 4th 2010, Green Jeddah kicked off the new year with its first of many eco-awareness seminars to be held at colleges/universities/schools throughout Jeddah. The GJ team had the pleasure of conducting an all-out green campaign at Dar Al-Hekma College accompanied by an educational lecture to the student body.
Guest speakers Dr. Mohamed Masoud, visiting lecturer and researcher at Harvard University, and Mr. Mohammed Angawi, environmental manager at Tetra Pak, spoke to the students about Saudi Arabia’s current environmental situation, the benefits of being environmentally conscious, and how they teamed up to establish Jeddah-based recycling company: Trewind.
Students had the opportunity to think out loud, ask questions, voice their concerns and quite a few offered to pitch in a helping hand.
The next step? Green Jeddah could very well be paying a visit to your educational institution! We’ve got a city-wide eco-tour set up and if you happen to have a keen interest in the environment do let us know through:
greenjeddah@gmail.com
If you haven’t copped the latest issue of Oasis Magazine then you should do so now! The Green Jeddah team were interviewed and featured in the up-to-date local English lifestyle magazine with international standards that is focused on highlighting the best of what Saudi Arabia has to offer to the world. This issue really hits the spot by drawing attention to the Middle East’s “Bubble Generation” aka the youth. Grab your copy ASAP.
Oasis Magazine can be found all over Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Lebanon, Jordan, Amsterdam, Paris and more.
Visit their website & blog at:
Who says Saudi Arabia doesn’t take recycling seriously? We found recycled napkins (manufactured in Saudi Arabia) sitting at our local Starbucks hut. Not only that, but have you ever wondered what’s up with gas stations around here giving away free tissue boxes with every 10SAR of gasoline purchased? Those tissue boxes are actually made out of recycled material!
Take notice of green stuff around you; you’d be surprised at how many corporations and schools in the Kingdom are leaning towards eco-friendly solutions for waste management and reduction. The 3-arrowed symbol should be your key sign; the arrows stand for reduce, reuse, and recycle, and when placed on packaging of any sort means that that very item can be reused and recycled. Keep a look-out!
On the occasion of attending a consortium hosted by the Emirates Environmental Group, Dar Al-Hekma student, Mona Othman alongside colleagues Faiza Rizvi and Muna Abdul Kadir with the aid of Dr. Sawsan Al-Majalli addressed the topic of reducing the water-energy footprint of the Gulf region in a comprehensive research paper. Challenges and opportunities of the topic at hand were debated and we would like to share a sneak peek of their paper with you. Feel free to direct your questions and comments to the researchers by posting comments at the bottom of the post:
Water scarcity is the major highlight as one of the biggest threats that will affect the presence of the human kind in our planet. Reducing the tremendous amounts of energy that have been used for collection, treatment and distribution of clean water throughout the Middle East region is a major issue that governments, organizations and communities should put efforts to solve.
Solutions exist to cut both water and energy use through water efficiency measures to reduce power consumption and water demand, to conserve energy and water, and to minimize negative impacts on the environment such as global warming and pollution.
In Saudi Arabia, although there is availability of energy resources including petroleum, natural gas and electricity, which have helped in solving the challenge of satisfying rapid and substantial increases in water demand for drinking , industrial and agricultural uses.
The current daily supply from destination plants has a production capacity of about 3 million cubic meters of potable water per day, which make Saudi Arabia the world’s biggest producer of desalinated water. Therefore the Ministry of Water has implemented water reuse in line with international best practices and manipulates the water cycle to treat alternative water resources, and at the same time, is a low-energy source of water supply. It means that water is conserved, re used whenever possible, and when discharged upgraded to the highest standards. In many cases, water recycling is both economically attractive and environment friendly (Abdul Kadir, Al-Majalli, Othman, Rizvi).
