Your Dog Did His Duty, Are You Doing Yours?
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on March 17, 2009 by admin in Editorial & Opinion
Tuesday, March 17th, 2009The Straight Scoop On Plastic Bags And Poop
It struck me yesterday as I was walking the dog and picked up his “business” with a plastic bag that the same Liberal Elitists who who got the whole poop-scooping movement rolling probably never considered the unintended consequences. I was curious. How many dogs are there in America, and how much plastic goes un-recycled because of this practice? Doing some rough math, based on the idea that I can squish a plastic bag down to about a one-inch cube, I determined that we waste enough plastic this way to fill the first 26 floors of the Sears Tower. Which, as you can see, forced me to create one of the worst info-graphics ever. The fact remains that in spite of tremendous improvements in America’s recycling behaviour, we still only recycle an estimated 2 percent of the plastic bags we use daily. San Francisco was one of the first communities to tackle this problem head-on, but real action remains feeble nationwide. Interested in keeping your consumer behaviour green in general? Another big offender is cell phones; consider selling your discarded phones to GreenPhone.com. They claim that for every phone they buy, they plant a tree. You can also make smarter choices in the first place; EnergyStar.gov has been around for ages, and has plenty of great resources for consumers. And for businesses looking for greener computer hardware, there are resources like EPEAT.
Norwegian Bus Fuel Going To Waste
[ Comments Off ]Posted on January 31, 2009 by admin in Clean & Green, Technology
Saturday, January 31st, 2009Finally Citizens Are Giving A Doo-doo
We’ve touched on the environmental impact of cow farts and human waist as fuel before, but this time we’re going to talk about a new (ahem) movement in clean & green energy: biomethane as vehicle fuel. This is apparently a booming industry, but in Norway, where there’s such a firm commitment to clean and green policy that carmakers aren’t allowed to call their cars either, they’re taking this to a new level of efficiency by powering buses with biomethane produced from human waste. Presumably major energy producers will get in on the action; perhaps with BP making a big shift from investing in Europe to investing in the US, Exxon could step in and expand on last year’s record profits. The new division would also require only a subtle logo alteration (see image).
Taking Some Wind From The Sails Of Peak Oil Doomsayers
[ Comments Off ]Posted on November 13, 2008 by admin in Clean & Green, Technology
Thursday, November 13th, 2008Or is that taking some sales from the wind
It’s nice to know that while the big three beg for bailouts and utility executives try to raise alarm about the dangers of switching from coal, innovative thinking and a desire to make money are showing some tangible results in the clean tech movement. Apparently electric car innovator Fisker Automotive (Warning: melodramatic string music) is setting up shop – although only a couple hundred actual jobs – in Michigan. On the energy production front, even Texas is ramping it up; with its current growth in windpower generation, the state could be able to generate all of its energy from wind in the near future, with a surplus to put back into the grid. Maybe some of these survival-product pushers masked as loony prophets of oil doom will be put out of business.
Better Living Through Blender Defenders?
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on October 20, 2008 by admin in Technology
Monday, October 20th, 2008Confession: I just wanted to post the funny cat video.
I was just saying to a friend the other day that if all the technologically creative minds in the world focused specifically on ideas that really mattered – like cleantech or election monitoring* – we could probably wipe out some of the world’s biggest basic problems. Sure, we might suffer slightly in personal ways if we had to go without radio-controlled golf balls
* Ironically, that International Election monitoring link excludes North America
Seeking Solar Where The Sun Don’t Shine
[ Comments Off ]Posted on September 29, 2008 by admin in Technology
Monday, September 29th, 2008Can we just talk for a minute about the solar-powered bra?
There are plenty of clean & green concept vehicles around, like the frankly rather absurd solar bicycle, pictured left. Much cooler, in my opinion, is when people just dig in and do it. Want to start your own solar project? Although you could always steal the solar panels you need, there’s a more ethical way to get going cheaply. Mike Davis is a tinkerer from Arizona who builds inexpensive home-made solar panels from parts he buys on eBay. Total cost per panel? $104.85, not including labor and eBay page-load waits. Mike has a few other projects on his vintage, 1999-style web site, which appears to have also been home-made. Rock on Mike. Maybe you should give 12-Year-Old William Yuan a call. William just won $25,000 for his science project , which may lead to a 500-fold increase in energy captured, compared to a traditional solar cell. Pretty impressive. When I was twelve, my idea of a science project was trying to reverse-engineer my girlfriend Jeanne’s bra. And on that note, yes, there is indeed such a thing as a solar-powered bra.