This is not the end - it is just the beginning

Dec 29, 2009

It's hard to believe that the deadline is here.  We have accomplished so much, but there is still so much work to be done.  We will be working with our companies far into 2010, and we have many more companies that we have yet to call.  This might be the end of the 2009 Project Polar Bear - but it is just the beginning for us.

We gave a great presentation today to the public at the Falls of the Ohio State Park.  Between today and the presentation at Jefferson Memorial Forest, we raised $150 in donations to send to PBI.  We have at least 4 presentations already planned for 2010, and we hope to have more fundraisers.

Presentation at the Falls of the Ohio

We have more numbers to report to you on commitments from companies.  All Pets Veterinary Clinic has commited to 115,000 lbs.  Our team has pledged to collect and recycle 10 bags per week, which adds up to 30,000 lbs.  Maker's Mark Distillery has not gotten all of their data to us in time to meet our deadline.  However, they were able to get us the number of light bulbs they will be replacing with fluorescents, which adds up to a huge number - 1,000,000 lbs. of CO2.  They are going to make many other changes, but we weren't able to get the information to calculate the carbon emissions in time.

Our last number comes from Yum! Brands.  They, too, have not been able to get the data together in time for all of their pledge.  We were able to get some of it though, and we can announce that they are going to adjust thermostats and recycle.  Yum has 40,000 restaurants around the world.  They own 8,000 of those, which they are going to commit to putting the computers in those restaurants on sleep mode.  This makes their total pledge 4,174,000 lbs.  In addition, they are going to add our suggestion to put computers on sleep mode in their booklet that they give their restaurants on ways to be more efficient and save money.  This could reach another possible 32,000 computers, which could bring in another 6,000,000 lbs. 

In addition, UPS is going to make a pledge, but we have been unable to get the data we need to make our calculations.  Their plan is to start their new actions in the Louisville offices, and then adopt the changes throughout their offices worldwide.  This will be a huge amount of CO2! 

We also want to report our pledges from individuals at our presentations and booths, which amount to 872,883 lbs.

And last, we are still working on pledges from several large groups, including Humana Insurance and the Boy Scouts of America.

Our grand total - which does not include the possible future pledges from our companies - adds up to

                17,031,264 lbs!!!

We are very happy with our companies and their commitments to use less energy and change policy.  We will be working with them all closely in 2010 to help them make the changes and to educate their employees.

We want to take this opportunity to thank PBI for creating Project Polar Bear.  We also want to thank all of the sponsors which make the project possible, and our advisor and staff at the Louisville Zoo, who have been very helpful.  Marcelle, Debbie, Kara, and Robert - we love you guys.

Through this project, we have seen that there is hope for the bears and that people will make the changes needed to keep the bears from going extinct.  We dedicate ourselves to making sure that this does not happen, and to continue our work that we have started with this project.  There for tomorrow - that's where we want the bears to be.

Our holiday present to the world

Dec 23, 2009

As we get close to Christmas, we are thrilled to be able to offer our gift to our community, state, country and world - and the bears.  We are working hard with our companies to make the changes needed to help stop climate change.  We are so pleased to announce some of our newest pledges.

Norton Healthcare System has agreed to adjust thermostats on their 1,077,345 square feet of non-hospital offices, which include their administrative offices and dozens of system-owned physician offices.  They are also going to pledge to check tire pressure on their company vehicles and to drive 55 mph.  In addition, they are now recycling 240 thirty-gallon containers of cardboard per week, and they are in the process of replacing their 29,110 incandescent light bulbs with fluorescent bulbs.  This makes their total pledge - to date - 4,606,303 lbs. of CO2 saved per year.  I am also working with their IT supervisor on how to turn their computers off at night, and to put their computers on sleep mode when not in use during the day.  Many of their computers are used 24 hours per day, but they are going to look into making a new policy to turn off the ones that can be turned off at night. Some of their computers need to be accessed remotely, so they will be looking into whether this will work if the computers are on sleep mode.  If they are able to put the computers on sleep mode and turn off their computers at night, this pledge could be as high as 2,560,000 lbs (6400 computers X 400 lbs.)  We are not going to add this into our total because we will not know how many comuters will be pledged until after the New Year.

Our next pledge that we want to announce is for the State of Kentucky Department of Corrections.  We have been working with their Director of IT, Craig Thatcher.  He is pledging to program their 3000 computers to go on sleep mode when not in use.  3000 computers X 200 lbs. = 600,000 lbs. of CO2 saved per year.  Even more exciting is that Craig wants us to make a presentation in early 2010 to the Commonweath Technology Council, a group of the head of all Kentucky State IT offices, to consider making this a policy state-wide in all state offices.  We are not sure how many computers this will include, but the number should be huge.  This is an exciting development that is sure to save millions of pounds of CO2.

We also want to announce the pledge of a national chain of stores called Hot Topic.  They are pledging to turn off their 836 computers at night, which will save 334,000 lbs. of CO2 per year.  One caveat with Hot Topic is that they do not want to be listed on our website.  We will be listing them as "anonymous."

And last, we want to tell you about a pledge by a nationwide group called Scottrade.  They are pledging to adjust their thermostats on their 440 offices which adds up to 704,000 square feet of office space.  This wills ave 556,160 lbs. of CO2 per year.  In addition, they are pledging to turn off their 3500 computers at night, which saves 700,000 lbs., making their total pledge 1,256,160 lbs.

And so, our Christmas gift to the bears and the world is our total pledges to date of 11,694,364 lbs. of CO2 saved per year.  We are still waiting for numbers from 3 of our largest pledgers:  Yum! Brands, UPS, and Maker's Mark.

We also want to announce the two presentations that we will be giving next week.  On Sunday, Dec. 27th we will be giving a talk to the public at Bernheim Forest, and on Tuesday, Dec. 29th we will be giving a presentation to the public at the Falls of the Ohio State Park.  The one at the Falls of the Ohio will be a fundraiser for PBI.  We hope to be able to include numbers and pictures from at least one of these events in our report.

With the talks in Copenhagen in our minds, and with our hope for the bears in our hearts, we want to wish everyone a merry Christmas.  We will be giving a last update on our project, hopefully with more pledges, next week.  Happy holidays!

Lots of News

Dec 10, 2009

Our big news of the week is that after weeks of work we got a large pledge from the New Albany Floyd County School System, which is a nearby school system in Southern Indiana just across the Ohio River.  They are going to adjust their thermostats, replace 825 incandescent bulbs with fluorescent bulbs, and they have agreed to turn off their 4100 computers at night, as well as programming them to go on sleep mode when not in use.  This pledge is a whopping 4,042,518 lbs. of CO2 saved! 

We also have gotten pledges from two other small companies, including 4,760 lbs. from a cute little store called the Elephant Trunk, and 137,320 lbs. from Bernheim Forest and Arboretum. 

We also wanted to share with you that we were featured in an article in a local publication called the GreenList Louisville, which lists all companies/organizations/groups who are trying to be eco-stewards.  We have had article in several publications now, including the Kentucky Association for Environmental Educators, the Kentucky Society of Natural History, the Kentuckiana Geolocigal Society, and the Kentuckiana Air Pollution Control District newsletter.  The Louisville Zoo's quarterly publication will be out soon with an article about our project.

Article in the Greenlist Louisville magazine. 

Article in the Air Pollution Control District newsletter.

We had another meeting with the facilities manager of Norton Healthcare System, and will be having another meeting soon with their computer systems manager, Ed Wiley.  We will soon be able to unveil the total pledge for Norton.

We are excited about a meeting that we have this afternoon with Yum Brands, a Louisville-based company with more than 35,000 restaurants worldwide.  We are looking forward to seeing if they will make a pledge.

And last, we want to publically thank one of Project Polar Bear's sponsors, Lowepro, for the gifts that they gave us to help us with our project.  They generously donated a Kodak EasyShare digital camera for us to use, and three eco-friendly bags that we have been using non-stop since we got them.  Thank you to Lowepro!

We will be giving you updates often now as our big pledges roll in. 

Building our numbers

Dec 05, 2009

We have been extremely busy talking to companies and groups in our area, and are pleased to add these names with their pledges to our results:

• Boomer's Cafe and Catering - 41,272 lbs. CO2
• Dr. Shellie Branson, DMD - 22,080 lbs.
• Generation 14 - 7,459 lbs.
• Crestwood Chiropractic - 5,548 lbs.
• Coffee Affair - 4,748 lbs.
• Drs. Kall and Albers, DMD - 24,296

We thought that would also begin to share some of the news from the big companies that we are working with.  We have been following these pledges for months now, involving a great amount of meetings, e-mails, telephone calls, and generally hard work.

• UPS - we are working on calculating several actions for them.  We are also excited about a project with them that will lay the groundwork for a company-wide effort.  We will be issuing a challenge number of CO2 pounds to be met by UPS employees, somewhat like a fundraiser.  Employees will make a personal pledge to reduce CO2, and UPS will encourage these pledges by offering competitions among departments.  If this is successful, UPS will adopt this program company-wide.
• The Norton Healthcare System is going to work with us in a big way.  We are still calculating numbers for our pledge for actions that they are going to start now, but they are planning on going green in a big way, and their CO2 reductions will continue to grow in 2010.  They are going to turn off their computers at night, adjust thermostats, replace light bulbs, and do more recycling.  Emily will be giving a presentation on future plans to their staff on February 1st of next year.  In addition, they will be hosting four events next year for the community where people can drop off all unwanted electronics for free.  They are planning a conference for themselves and other Louisville healthcare groups where they talk about ways for healthcare to go green. 
• The New Albany Floyd County School System is going to make a huge pledge by turning off computers at night and adjusting thermostats.  We are in the process of calculating the numbers.
• We have an appointment with Yum! Brands next week.  We are excited about that one!
• We are in negotiations with the Hot Topic stores on options they can adopt.
• We are also talking to Cinemark about making changes nationwide.
• And one of our most exciting negotiations is with the State of Kentucky for their state offices.  This pledge might not come to fruition until after the first of the year, but it will be a big coup if we are able to get them to commit.

Other news includes a presentation that we gave to a local green group called the Louisville Sustainability Forum.  This is a group that meets monthly to discuss green issues in our area. 

Emily speaking to the Louisville Sustainability Forum.

We also wanted to tell you about a new contact we have made, with the Louisville Climate Action Network. The president of this group is Sarah Lynne Cunningham, who has a PhD in environmental science.  She was able to answer some important questions we had about climate change numbers. We also asked her if she had looked at our website and if she thought our calculations on CO2 were accurate.  She told us that they were right on track, and that she had actually used some of the information from our website on the CAN website.  That's validation!

As you can see, we have been extremely busy.  We are beginning to realize that many of thes projects we have started in companies will not be over on Dec. 31st.  They will continue on into 2010, and we hope that we will be able to make huge changes in the carbon footprint of the Louisville area. 

We will get get those bears back on solid ice!

More company pledges

Nov 22, 2009

We are all extremely busy working with companies, and we are making progress.  As of today, we have had 11 companies make pledges to reduce their energy use.  We have already listed some of them, but wanted to list the rest:

• Premium Computer Solutions -1,200 lbs.
• St. Matthews Animal Clinic - added 18,950 lbs. to their previous pledge
• Jefferson Memorial Forest - 48,300 lbs.
• Compound Care Pharmacy - 17,000 lbs.
• Kentucky Realty - 7,100 lbs.
• Atherton High School - 15,000 lbs.
• Honeybaked Ham - 32,800 lbs.
• Dr. Tolis Simon - 11,580 lbs.

We wanted to talk about the challenges that come with trying to convince companies to reduce energy use.  We knew that it was going to be hard work, but have discovered exactly how hard it is.  For every company that we call and can convince to make a pledge, we have several more that say no.  And the real challenges come with the big companies.  The first hurdle is discovering the correct person to speak with.  Then comes a long series of meetings, with many presentations and a lot of convincing. 

But we want our readers to know that success is on its way.  We have gotten commitments for pledges from some of the largest companies in Lousiville, including UPS, Maker's Mark Distillery, Brown Forman, Norton Healthcare System, and the most exciting of all - Yum Brands.  We are also working with Anthem, GE, and Humana about making a pledge.  We are all very busy, to say the least!  We will be getting the final numbers calculated soon, and are very excited about sharing them with you and the world!

We also wanted to tell you about our meeting with UPS this past week.  David Erickson, who heads the green initiative for UPS, is working with us on a new idea for a pledge that will be innovative and exciting.  We hope to be able to announce this idea soon, and we will keep you up-to-date on our progress.

Our totals for carbon emissions saved are modest so far - but we will be adding the pledges from the big companies soon, and those numbers will be very large.  It is exciting to think that we are actually changing policy in these companies, policies that will mean a huge difference in carbon emissions in the Louisville area and the world.

Stay tuned for further developments...

Seven weeks to go!

Nov 14, 2009

Waiting to start our presentation at Jefferson Memorial Forest

With only seven weeks until the end of our project, we are in high gear.  On Friday, November 6th, we gave an important presentation to the public at Jefferson Memorial Forest, a local park in the Louisville area.  The presentation was a power point by PBI, including the powerful ice loss video, and it made a huge impact on our audience.  We will be giving the same presentation to the public at Bernheim Forest on December 27th, and at a 3-day event focusing on the environment at the Falls of the Ohio State Park at a date TBA.

Emily discussing her personal experience with polar bears during her PBI Leadership Camp experience in 2007.

This is the flyer that was sent out across the city.

We also gave a presentation to the local Boy Scouts of America at their main office.  They would like us to work with them on making a commitment as a local group.

As for new pledges, we will be adding two new ones to our website soon.  They include Dr. Shellie Branson's Dental Clinic at 22,080 pounds CO2 saved, and St. Matthews Animal Clinic has added 18,950 pounds to their original pledge.  Emily has been working with them to improve their green report card.  We are also bursting at the seams to tell you about some upcoming possible pledges with very large companies, but we'll wait until everything is official before we announce their names.

On a side note, all three of us just attended a behind-the-scenes tour of our upcoming polar bear exhibit, Glacier Run, at the Louisville Zoo.  It was absolutely amazing! 

Important plans

Nov 08, 2009

Last Sunday we met at the zoo to check each other's progress and make plans for the rest of our project time.  Only 7 more weeks to go!  We have to make use of every single day.  We talked at length about each company and what we are going to do to get them to sign our pledge.  We also discussed upcoming presentations that we have planned, including the talk at Jefferson Memorial Forest, a presentation for Junior Achievement, a talk for the public at Bernheim Forest, and a big 3-day event at the Falls of the Ohio State Park.  At this event, we will be showing our Power Point presentation on their big movie screen and will be a part of their 3-day event focused on climate change.

Making plans at the zoo

We also wanted to tell you about our great first meeting with Norton Healthcare System.  Norton has 5 hospitals, 15 outpatient care facilities, and 300 doctors on staff in their hospitals and around the region in Norton practices.  You can appreciate how big they are and how much CO2 could be saved by green practices.  Emily met with Claire Rupert, who is one of their executives and is running their new "green team," a group of Norton employees who want to try to make Norton greener.  Emily spent an hour and a half with Claire on Wednesday, and they discussed how Emily is going to help them.  The next step is for Emily to meet with their Director of Facilities.  We will keep you informed!

Meeting with Claire Rupert at Norton Healthcare

An update on our progress

Oct 26, 2009

Talking to the Mayor of Louisville at our booth

Last Saturday we set up a booth at a local event called the Mayor's Healthy Hike.  It was held at a beautiful park called the Jefferson Memorial Forest.  We told people about our project, got some personal pledges, and made contacts to call at local companies.  The personal pledges we got totalled almost 59,000 lbs.!  One of the exciting happenings of the day was that we got to meet the mayor of Louisville, Jerry Abramson.  We told him about our project, and he was very excited.  Kaitlin also was able to get on the PA system and tell everyone about our project.  We were able to make a lot of good contacts.

Kaitlin telling everyone about our project.

We are making progress on getting  company pledges.  A local architectural firm called Arrasmith, Judd, Rapp & Chavan, Inc., made a pledge of 14,770 pounds of CO2 saved per year.  The Bristol Bar & Grille, which operates a large catering service, made a large pledge of 182,300 lbs.!  We are in negotiations with a dozen or more large companies in the area, including one of the largest healthcare providers in the state, which is very exciting.  We are scheduled to make a presentation to their executive staff in November.  This could potentially be a huge pledge!  We'll keep you posted.

Another bit of excitement is that a national organization of nurses who are interested in making helathcare greener are having their national conference next June in D.C.  They have asked us to be presenters.  While this will occur after our project is over, we still feel that it is part of our mission to help reduce CO2 emissions and save the bears.  This could be huge, with the possibility of reaching people nationwide.  Healthcare is one of the largest emitters of CO2 gases, and being able to reach them could be monumental.

We also gave a presentation to Atherton High School's Marine Biology Club.  They were very interested in our information and will try to get the word out about our project.

We are thrilled so far with how things are going.  Working with companies on this project isn't always easy, but we are confidant that we can reach many of them and make the difference needed. 

Energy use assessment kit

Oct 11, 2009

Now that we have our assessment kits ready to go, we are busy making appointments with businesses and organizations in our area.  We thought we would show you what the kits look like.  We used folders made from 100% post-consumer recycled materials, and eco-friendly paper made from banana peels, grass, and elephant poop.  We love it!  For the front of the folder, we printed stickers with the project name. Inside the folder we put two papers:  the first one is a letter explaining what we are doing, and the second one is the important part, the actual assessment sheet where CO2 and money saved can be calculated for each of seven options.  We love the design of our kits, complete with Arctic backgrounds and wild polar bears.

The front of the assessment kit

The inside of the kit

We have already made appointments with several companies, and are close to getting our first commitments.  We are very excited about our progress so far and how we are being received in the community.

This coming weekend we are going to have a booth set up at the Mayor's Healthy Hike event at Jefferson Memorial Forest. We hope to get a lot of individual pledges and make appointments with  companies to show them our kit. We will keep you updated on our progress.

Educating Kentucky

Sep 23, 2009

We feel that one of the most important aspects of our project is the education of our fellow Kentuckians on how climate change is affecting polar bears.  This past week we gave two big presentations.  The first one was for the staff and volunteers at Bernheim Forest, a public forest with a nationally recognized arboretum and the first LEED® Platinum certified building in the state of Kentucky (LEED is a cerification for an all-green building).  We are planning several talks for Bernheim that will be given to the general public.  Bernheim is involved with many green projects, and we are excited to be a part of their plans to educate the public.

Emily giving the presentation at Bernheim Forest

The second presentation was at the yearly conference of Kentucky Association of Environmental Educators, held at General Butler State Park in Carrollton, Kentucky.  We made a lot of contacts at this conference, including some businesses that we will be approaching.  We hope that we reached a lot of educators with our preseantation, and that they will in turn use some of what we said to help educate their students in the future.

Emily giving the presentation at the KAEE conference.

We have several more presentations scheduled for this fall and winter.  We will continue to make education an integral part of our project.

Up and running!

Sep 15, 2009

Our website is finally ready, having been re-designed to reflect our new project.  You can look at our new site at:

www.louisvillezoo.org/projectpolarbear

We have added a new page to our site for businesses or companies to see how they can help stop climate change and save the bears.  When you visit our site, click on "For Companies" and you will be able to see our Energy Assessment Kit.  Now we are able to begin calling businesses and setting up appointments.

In the meantime, this Saturday was Backyard Action Hero Day at the Louisville Zoo, where we set up a booth to tell people about energy conservation and our project.  We had handouts, all copied on 100% recycled paper, and we made a banner out of felt that was manufactured from recycled bottles.  Our booth was even featured on one of our local news stations.  We spoke to hundreds of people, and were able to get commitments for using less energy that totalled to over 156,000 lbs. of CO2 saved!  We also talked to dozens of people who are interested in having us come to their company to do an energy assessment.  This is a great start for our project.

Sam, Emily and Kaitlin at the booth. 

People signing a personal pledge to use less energy.

One of the people who stopped by our booth showed us his polar bear tattoo. I guess we're not the only ones who love polar bears!

Our next stop is Corporate America as we go into companies to make changes in policy.  Along the way we have talks to give and more booths to set up.  We will keep you updated on our progress.

Spreading the word

Aug 20, 2009

We feel that one of the most important things we can do to help the bears is to educate everyone we can on the threat of climate change, and what we can all do to help stop it.  So in conjunction with our campaign to go into companies and do energy use assessments, we will also be continuing to give talks to the public.  This week we gave a talk to the volunteers at the Jefferson Memorial Forest, which is a wonderful park in southwest Jefferson County.  Emily and Kaitlin showed a Power Point presentation on the bears and gave examples of what everyone can do at home and at work to be greener. 

After we finished our talk, we made plans with Tonya Swan at the forest for a talk to the general public on November 6th.  We will be showing the movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," and then we will have a question/answer session following the movie.  We are very excited about this event as we will be able to reach a lot of people with our message.

We also finished putting together a mock-up of our Energy Use Assessment Packet, which we will be showing to Marcelle, Debbie, and Kara, our advisors at the Louisville Zoo.  We will also be showing them our changes to our website.  After this we will make the changes to the site, and then we will be able to start making appointments with local businesses.

We feel that our project is progressing at a good pace, and we are looking forward to getting started and all of the events we have planned so far.

Making progress

Aug 13, 2009

We just had our third meeting to bring each other up to date on the status of our project.   We were happy to find that we have made a great amount of progress, and are almost ready to put our project into action.  We have formalized the changes we want to make to our website, and we have formulated most of the numbers needed to calculate total carbon dioxide emissions saved per year.  We also have the final product ready of our Energy Assessment Packet that we will be taking into companies.

These are the options we will be giving companies to save both carbon emissions and money:

1.  Shutting down computers and other office equipment at night - saves 200 lbs. of CO2 per computer/machine, and $7.00 per computer/machine.

2.  Programming computers to go on sleep mode while not in use - saves 200 lbs. of CO2 per computer, and $7.00 per computer.

3.  Checking tire pressure in company vehicles monthly, and keeping them inflated at the proper pressure - saves 300 lbs. of CO2 per year per vehicle, and 10% of the yearly fuel bill.

4.  Driving 55 mph on the highway in company vehicles - saves 1,000 lbs. CO2 per vehicle per year, and 10% of the yearly fuel bill.

5.  Adjusting thermostats up in the summer and down in the winter - saves .79 lbs. of CO2 per sq. ft. of space per year, and 2% on the yearly energy bill.

6.  Recycling - saves 3,000 lbs. of CO2 per year per for recycling 30 gallons weekly.

7.  Replacing incadescent light bulbs with fluorescent light bulbs - saves 100 lbs. of CO2 per lightbulb per year, and we are still getting the numbers together for the money saved per year.

In special circumstances, including the use of larger vehicles, separate formulas will be used to calculate the CO2 saved.  The formulas used to calculate these numbers came from the Environmental Protection Agency, the Dept. of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, and the Environmental Defense Fund.

We also had our picture taken with our mascot, Ursa and Mary the polar bears, to use on our website.  Our next step will be to make the physical changes to our website, and to put together our Energy Assessment Packets.  We also have a big talk planned this Monday at the Jefferson Memorial Forest.  We will be giving our talk on climate change and how it is affecting the bears.

We want to close this blog by saying goodbye to Tahtsa, the oldest polar bear in the U.S., who passed away at the age of 34 at the Indianapolis Zoo.  Tahtsa spent over 30 years at the Louisville Zoo, and was beloved by us all.  She was moved to Indianapolis in 2006 so that we could begin construction on our new upcoming exhibit, Glacier Run.  We will miss you, Tahtsa!

Getting started

Jul 22, 2009

We are three teenagers from Louisville, Kentucky, who are dedicated to saving the mighty polar bear.  We have been working on our project for many months now as a continuation of last year's project, Pledge for the Polar Bears.  In 2008, Pledge for the Polar Bears discovered that a huge amount of CO2 could be saved by making changes in company policies.  As we discussed the results from last year's project, we decided to focus this year's project on changing the way companies use energy, and thus reduce the amount of CO2 being emitted into the atmosphere.

We had a meeting at the Louisville Zoo on Monday to assign specific tasks to each member to get our project organized.  Kaitlin will be getting the numbers together for calculating CO2 emissions.  Sam will start working on gathering ideas for our webpage.  Emily will be designing a company audit package. We hope to have our audit packet and webpage ready to go by September, when we will begin making appointments with area companies. 

Kaitlin, Sam and Emily in front of what will soon be the Zoo's new groundbreaking polar bear exhibit, Glacier Run (modeled after the town of Churchill, Manitoba, Canada).

In the meantime, we have been busy giving talks to campers at the Louisville Zoo about polar bears and how climate change is affecting them.  We have many talks planned for this year with adult groups, where we hope to make contacts with companies who would be interested in doing an audit.

Emily giving a talk to a group of campers at the Louisville Zoo.

We will be getting our numbers for CO2 saved and money saved from formulas from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. 

We decided to change our name from last year's project to show that this is a brand new team with a different approach.  The inspiration for our name, There For Tomorrow, came from a band of the same name.  We loved the thought of this name, as we want to make sure today's polar bears are there for tomorrow.  Let's save the bears "a little faster" (the band's new single).

We will keep you updated on our project as it progresses.  We want to thank the Louisville Zoo for their support, both past and future.