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June 25, 2007

Congratulations Hastings, Nebraska -- Winner of our "Be a Better Planet" Challenge

What do the birthplace of Kool-Aid and green living have in common? More than you think.

Back in April, we announced Yahoo!'s "Be a Better ____" challenge to encourage people to use Yahoo! tools to become better fanatics, advertisers, entrepreneurs, best friends, gardeners... however they want to become "better." Part of this program included Yahoo!'s "Be a Better Planet" Greenest City in America Challenge to see how communities across the country can take action against climate change and use Yahoo! tools to become better planetarians.

Today, the winner of the "Be a Better Planet" Greenest City in America Challenge was revealed and we want to give a shout out to the nation's green leader. The competition started with more than 350 cities across the country, and the winner is the home of Kool-Aid itself -- Hastings, Nebraska! In addition to their grand prize of $250,000 for city greening projects, Hastings and the top five finalist cities will receive a slew of other green prizes.

Hastings secured the top spot by rallying together a good portion of its residents to earn participation credits on Yahoo! Green through pledging to reduce carbon diets, Yahoo! Answers through answering green questions and Yahoo! oneSearch through conducting eco-friendly mobile searches. And now the city's mayor is tapping into the Answers community to solicit thoughts and advice for how to invest the $250,000 prize. If you have some great green ideas, don't hesitate to share.

Here's a bit more information on Hastings' contribution to the challenge and what they did to stand out. Congrats, Hastings.


Yahoo! Search Blog team

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Comments

Invest Green is "bankable" and I am very happy to hear that Nebraska won the Price. Armand Rousso

Posted by: armand rousso | June 26, 2007 01:41 AM

IMHO, investing $250k in the already greenest city would not help much to "be a better planet". In contrast, I think there should be a challenge for "the most polluted city" and let the mayor of the winning city to use the prize money in fighting pollution or educating people about global warming. Just a thought.

Posted by: The Dog Jacket Company | June 27, 2007 09:43 AM

It would be nice to see what they actually did to make their city "green" besides taking a pledge, going on Yahoo!Answers and using Yahoo! "Eco-Term" searches, because if that's all they did, they perhaps Yahoo! needs to look at other factors in determine what makes a city green. Making pledges and actually making changes and arriving at innovative practices that do make a difference is what makes a city "green," not using the internet

Posted by: logocat | June 28, 2007 09:15 AM

I agree with Mr. Armand Rousso, when you are looking for some funds today, everyone saying he has a business with Environment, they are listing to us...

Posted by: Jean Khan | July 7, 2007 12:38 AM

If only everyone would take more of a lead from this idea...

Posted by: sheds | July 19, 2007 04:16 AM

I'm very much in doubt if the downward spiral of global pollution can be reversed. There is so much technology, cars and other industry going on that you'll hardly avoid pollution. However, it's a first step in the right direction that the green planet issue starts beeing in the news and that prices are being given out for extra efforts. That should sharpen the awareness of everybody for our ecology.

Posted by: Michael | September 20, 2007 05:13 AM

yes at least it is a move in the right direction. If you have been watching some of the documentries on the damage that the oil industry is doing to the environment, then it is certainly something we all need to be aware off.

I dont know about you but I want a healthy planet for my kids to live on when I get older.

Posted by: Make Money Online | November 19, 2007 02:10 AM