Lynn Hirshfield is an executive working in Hollywood on award-winning television and film productions, including An Inconvenient Truth, featuring Former Vice President Al Gore as well as Food, Inc., The Cove, The Informant, The Soloist, The Kite Runner, Fast Food Nation, Charlie Wilson’s War, Darfur Now and the PBS series Wishbone.

She runs Participant Media’s publishing division and is also the author of two children’s books, Sassafras: True Confessions of a Poodle Princess and Sassafras Goes to Hollywood. Lynn is a trustee of the Women in Film Foundation, a member of the advisory boards of Teens Turning Green and K9 Connection, and serves as a judge for the Environmental Media Awards and the Brower Youth Awards.

I used to think I was a pretty green person—I recycled, supported green groups, bought organic, checked for fair trade certification, didn’t let the water run when I brushed my teeth and always, always, always turned out lights… but I had never come across any carbon footprints, a term that kept coming up during meetings at my new job at Participant Media. In late 2005, I was hired to work on the early pre-theatrical release campaign for the film “An Inconvenient Truth.” Mystified, I went to the resident green expert on the team, Lisa Day (who is so green that even her shoes are made out of hemp!), and asked her where I could pick up a pair of these carbon footprints, which, in my mind, were some kind of super eco odor eating shoe insoles that absorbed heat and pollution. Thank god they didn’t throw me out to the curb right then and there.

With great patience, Lisa explained to me the green basics and helped me calculate my carbon footprint. In doing so, I had a good overview of the impact (numerically) I was personally making on the planet. I changed some of my habits, got a hybrid car, adjusted the thermostat, took canvas bags to the market and cut out plastic bottles, but being green was still a daunting jumble of facts and figures, and the idea of ME having the ability to curb global warming by my little behavioral changes was also still too abstract. It was too scary to think about the responsibility of saving the whole planet and much easier to feel all gloom and doom about the situation. I didn’t feel confident that my individual actions really made any difference at all.

Ironically, one of my duties was to manage outreach to teachers and students to see the film and get them involved in our social action programs. It was at the first of these high school field trips to a special screening of the film that the calculations translated into real actions. Hundreds of students streamed out of the theatre, totally psyched to take action. They bombarded me with questions and asked for resources and had so many great ideas and such enthusiasm. They wanted to DO SOMETHING, and, for the most part, do something is exactly what they did. These passionate young environmentalists became my teachers. And, they didn’t wait for adults to tell them what to do or how to do it. They were not scared or intimated by the task of saving the planet. There was work to do, all kinds of ways to help and every little bit of effort was needed and appreciated.

Over the last four years, I have had the honor and pleasure of meeting so many young people working on a vast spectrum of environmental initiatives and a majority of these young green activists are girls. Perhaps it is natural for girls, who may one day be mothers, as well as working professionals, to feel especially nurturing. Some of the young women profiled in this handbook have earned national recognition for their achievements, while others are making strides on more local levels. Some are packing up for college while others are still packing their lunches for elementary school. Each and everyone one of the girls profiled in this book is an eco hero who offers hope and direction for her generation.

I would like to thank all the Green Girls and experts who shared their stories within these pages, and Brian Gerber & Thomas Rigler for the creation of this amazing website.