Archive for organic waste
Welcome back for another edition of weekly green news featuring some articles from the past week focusing on the green movement. This week: 5 Amazing Structures built from recycled plastic bottles; top 10 green chefs to follow; coffee-powered car sets Guinness World Record; Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner airplane is more energy efficient; and health and climate, 7 ways you are being harmed. Click on the link to read the full article.
EcoARK built from 1.5 million plastic bottles
5 Amazing Structures Made from Plastic Bottles. We’ve previously reported on Plastiki’s sailboat from plastic bottles and they’re included on this list which also includes a recycled bottle school from Hug it Forward and the amazing nine-story EcoARK. EcoARK is located in Taipei, and it’s built out of 1.5 million recycled plastic bottles. EcoARK is truly a recycling wonder of the world.
Our friends at ecorazzi.com have compiled a list of the top 10 green chefs you should follow online. Each chef provides delicious wholesome food whether it be vegetarian, vegan and/or sustainable. Top green chef and best selling cookbook author Isa Chandra Moskowitz and her Post Punk Kitchen has been featured a number of times in our Meatless Monday recipe series. Isa also started Apron Activists to help save animals and promote animal rights as well as fundraising for Haiti earthquake relief efforts by persuading fellow vegans to conduct bakes sales. Iron Chef Michael Symon also makes the list for his efforts in sustainable food culture. Jamie Oliver, Emeril Lagasse, lots of popular and very familiar faces make the cut. It’s really amazing what some of these green chefs are doing to support the green movement. Find out who else made the list over at ecorazzi.
Coffee-powered car buzzes past speed record. In Durham, England, engineer Martin Bacon and volunteers from Teesdale Conservation have transformed coffee grounds into gas to power a car and this month broke the Guinness World Record “for vehicles run on gas from organic waste,” according to the BBC. Maxing out at 77.5 miles per hour with average speeds of 66.5 miles per hours as a result of several modifications to a Rover SD1 including eliminating more than 550 pounds of surplus weight from inside the vehicle. This story made me think of the movie Back to the Future. The time-travelling Delorean was running on garbage by the end of the movie after travelling to the future. Imagine if we could turn organic waste into fuel for cars?
Boeing 787 Will Be More Fuel Efficient with their first 787 Dreamliner airplane. Boeing declares Dreamliner uses 20 percent less fuel and produces 20 percent fewer emissions than similarly sized planes. “This airplane begins a new chapter in aviation history,” said Jim Albaugh, president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes. The company attributes advances in the engine technology provided from General Electric and Rolls Royce as the most significant contributing factors in improving fuel efficiency.
Health and Climate Change: 7 Ways You Are Being Harmed. From asthma to heatwaves to drought to infectious disease, global warming and varying weather patterns are already resulting in public health issues. Asthma sufferers doubled in the US since the 1980’s and “mosquito-borne diseases are appearing higher in the mountains of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, precisely where glaciers are retreating and plant communities are migrating upward.”
Comment below if you have any other interesting green news from this past week that you’d like to share. Stay tuned for the next edition of green news weekly.
September 28, 2011
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Robots Bring Recycling And Garbage To Waste Management Site.
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Recently, I read up on the Dustbot project which is “a project aimed at designing, developing, testing and demonstrating a system for improving the management of urban hygiene based on a network of autonomous and cooperating robots.” More simply, the Dustbot is a robot that collects trash, classifies it into organic, recyclable or waste and then whisks it away to a waste management site. Now how cool is that? If only some men could be trained this effectively.
In fact, although still in prototype stages, the robot will bring recycling and garbage to a waste management site by maneuvering itself along the streets and through narrow pathways, utilizing a laser scanner and ultrasound sensors for obstacle avoidance. Reportedly, it also has the ability to measure atmospheric pollutants like sulphur oxide, benzene, ozone, and nitrogen oxide with its on-board sensors. Also, if a registered user wishes to have the robot bring recycling and garbage to a waste management site, the Dustbot can be called by a cell phone. Perhaps it could walk the dog and collect his waste too?
Now as astonishing as all this sounds, I have to say that I am not personally ready to witness Robots roaming the streets without human guidance, even if it does bring recycling and garbage to waste management sites for you. If we can program robots to be green we must be capable of living in a more eco-friendly way ourselves, are you doing your part? Planet Forward aims to take us all a step or a short circuit nearer.
