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From This Collection

The invisible man

Nov 9, 2007
Is there any way to keep marketers from tracking you down? Steve Henn sees what it takes to make his family invisible to Madison Avenue.

Why buy new when used will do?

Nov 9, 2007
Meet the Mullens, a family of four who've sworn off buying new consumer goods for a year. Tess follows the family through their experiment in scrounging.
Five-year-old Daphne Mullen with a couple of the homemade dolls she's giving out as gifts to her friends.
Terry Mullen

More tales from the trash challenge

Nov 9, 2007
In September, Tess carried all the trash she generated around for two weeks and challenged you to do the same. We bring you the stories of three listeners who heard the call.
Capt. Andrew Lane of the Army National Guard -- aka "Captain Planet" -- with just some of the recyclables he's saved from the dump at Fort Stewart in Georgia.
Capt. Andrew Lane

How much longer can we 'overshoot'?

Nov 9, 2007
Our population is consuming about 30% more trees, fish and fossil fuels than the planet can regenerate. How big a hole can we dig before we can't get out of it? Kai Ryssdal talks with Jared Diamond, a geography professor at UCLA.

A well-traveled breakfast

Nov 7, 2007
Steve Henn figures his typical family breakfast journeyed 6,000 miles to his kitchen table. It's a symptom of the ever-growing global food trade, and the fossil fuel cost required to move commodities across the planet is growing with it.