At this year’s West Coast Green conference in San Francisco, Bill McDonough gave a rousing call–to-action keynote speech in which he proclaimed that we do not have an energy problem, but what we do have is a materials problem. He went on to say that the carbon in the environment is in the wrong place. Instead of leaving it in the ground, we have mined
Using fallen leaves and discarded plastic bottles, two designers have created a recycled material that could turn buildings into automatic rainwater collection systems.
Thousands of gallons of free water fall on roofs, parking lots, and sidewalks every day only to flow directly down the drain. Rainwater collection systems are often bulky and (in some regions) illegal. But with the
Electronics are everywhere around us, and life in the 21st century is unimaginable without them. Computers, mobile phones, televisions, etc. are ubiquitous and have transformed the way the world works. However, like any technology, there are problems that need to be addressed, and electronic waste is one of the major one for the environment.
Electronic waste or e-waste grows at an exponential rate because the industry churns out new products at an ever faster rate. This renders old products useless.
Colleges across the country compete to see who can reduce, reuse, and recycle the most waste.
As part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2010 Game Day Challenge, any college or university in the U.S. with a football team (which excludes my alma mater which dropped its football
Is food waste-to-energy technology sustainable? There was a lot of publicity last year about ethanol requiring more energy to produce than you can get from the fuel. Is biogas from food waste a better deal for the environment? The answer is yes. It turns out that a tonne of food waste produces enough biogas to not only fuel the collection vehicle that picks it up, but
Burning fuel releases a lot of carbon dioxide. For more is emitted than any other air emission. What can we do with it all? A basic reuse of carbon dioxide or CO2 is to have plants and trees use it to make new plants and trees. Recently, the U.S. government has been funding more than $100 million to six research projects that will turn carbon dioxide into fuel, plastics,
A few months ago, when someone said “eco-friendly mobile phone”, the thought that crossed my mind was, “Good-bye advanced features!”. However of-late, the new enviro-friendly handsets that have been stepping into the market, have blown me off my feet. They’ve managed to hit two birds with one stone by not only being green, but also packing in those advanced features
“What I think is really special about the US is the way the US encourages business and then is not shy of failure. Probably the latter being more important than the former.” – Tom Szaky, Founder and CEO, TerraCycle
KissMyCountry had the opportunity to talk with Tom Szaky, Founder and CEO of TerraCycle, which manufactures products from non-recyclable waste. It’s a fascinating and exciting company that reflects the energy, creativity and commitment of Tom Szaky.
We’ve all heard the “recycle, reduce, reuse” mantra. However, to really combat the current problem of overconsumption and reduce unnecessary waste, this saying should be flipped on its head: “reduce, reuse, recycle.” Recycling is reactive, and society needs to combine it with a proactive solution, because recycling alone will not “fix” our current consumption problem. The first step should be reducing
“Plastics are bad but it’s impossible to avoid them completely”. This is my conclusion after 30 days of staying away from plastics. I was almost rebellious when I was refusing to use plastic materials for the past month. However, I have to admit I have violated my rules more than once.
Within the past month, I was served plastic straws two times with my drinks, used four plastic garbage bags for throwing away my ‘wet’ garbage, purchased shaving
I was recently asked by a friend whether I was able to create an impact through my anti-plastic propaganda. I told him how easily I was able to reduce my plastic consumption in a couple days and how supportive the people that I spoke to are. He kept asking me whether my individual environmental care would result in a dramatic reduction of global plastic usage. Good question.
For one month, I have talked to managers of stores and restaurants who sell plastic forks, knives, bags and
Trade fairs – even those presenting green technology – are not exactly known to be environmentally friendly. Every trade fair causes a variety of emissions starting with the production of trade fair stands, transport and other logistics and a lot of waste during and after the fair when a large quantity of material, including the major part of a fair stand are simply thrown away. Photovoltaic manufacturer, Yingli Green Energy was looking for a way to ‘green’ its event and trade fair material
(Reuters) – Taiwan aims to transform several of its outlying islands into models of green energy production as part of a 10-year effort to cut its overall greenhouse gas emissions, the government said on Monday.
Industrialized Taiwan, a major semiconductor, chemicals and steelmaker, will invest heavily in wind power on the Penghu islands in the Taiwan Strait. The aim is to raise renewable energy production to half total consumption of the 90,000 population, officials said.
On the Kinmen islets, also known as Quemoy, T$3 billion ($90 million) will be spent to develop solar power, recycle water and push eco-friendly architecture for the 70,000 people who live there, the Environmental Protection Administration said.
The agency said it was hoped the investments could deliver a rapid transformation of the energy supply on the islands and help drive efforts on the more industrialized main island, with a population of 23 million.
I wasn’t thinking about my plastic diet, when I walked into the store and bought a chocolate bar yesterday. Obviously eating chocolate is not the healthiest thing to do for your body, but today I learned that the packaging material of chocolate bars is also not the best for the environment. It’s tricky because it is difficult to determine what materials were used in the production of the chocolate and candy wrappers.
Similar to milk and juice cartons or potato chip bags, the candy wrappers are generally laminated foils which are prepared by coating a paper base with wax, bonding a thin metal foil layer with an adhesive and dampening with a plastic solution.