Outside of my hotel and throughout the streets I came across these great solar parking meters. Now, I don’t like to pay for parking, and didn’t because I didn’t rent a car. But if you have to pay, what a clever and innovating way to showcase green practices. Anywhere that had access to sunlight in the downtown used these parking pay locations in place of plug-in types. It was amazing to see the many locations that could use the solar panels even within the tall high-rises.

Often, we try to prove ways that we can’t incorporate green instead of finding a few ways we can. In Houston, not every location used these meters but they were found about 50% of the time.

A few other observations.

According to the EPA, the City of Houston in the top purchasers of renewable energy. This is the Oil Capital of the US, where you can’t walk one block downtown without seeing an energy company and they have made a huge committed to renewables. If they can do it, we can as well.

Finally, my hotel, the DoubleTree downtown,  had these cute waste baskets that were half regular trash and half recyclables. I was so excited to have a place to put my empty beer bottles!