Photo: Wikipedia , Public domain. If You Insist on Car-Commuting, At Least Fill it Up With People! Thanks to modern social networking technologies and mobile computing, finding people to carpool with has never been easier. But sadly, that doesn’t seem to be enough. The popularity of carpooling is in sharp decline in the US, down about 50% since 1980s, and corporate efforts to encourage the practice among coworkers is losing steam. … Read the full story on TreeHugger
Continue reading …Shell Quits Last Algae Biofuel Commitment – Still Backing Ethanol & Cellulosic Biofuels
January 31, 2011 No Comment
photo: Eric E Castro / Creative Commons A quick update on some technological shake out in biofuels: Renewable Energy World reports that Shell has quit its last agreement in
Continue reading …Message for Policymakers: Ocean Iron Fertilization Chances of Success Low
January 31, 2011 No Comment
photo: Marina Kuperman / Creative Commons Another summary of the potential risks and benefits of ocean iron fertilization –the geoengineering method which proposes seeding oceans with iron so as to stimulate microscopic plants that absorb carbon from the atmosphere and sequester it–comes down against it. The
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Tired of seeing similar reviews of the Chevrolet Volt ? Here’s one for you by Gene Weingarten, a man who’s definitely not a automotive journalist and who probably couldn’t write a typical review even if he tried to. Some of you might remember Mr. Weingarten’s best-known work : “his chronicling of a world-class violinist (Joshua Bell) who, as an experimen… Read the full story on TreeHugger
Continue reading …Top 10 Nations With Clean Power – Hydropower, Nuclear or Small Populations Figure Heavily
January 31, 2011 No Comment
Apropos of President Obama’s intent to have 80% of US electricity come from clean power sources by 2035, GE has just released a graphic detailing to the top ten countries with the cleanest energy sources–a small version is above, click here for full-sized version . Since it’s a bit small, here’s how the rankings (as calculated based on World Bank and IEA data) fall out:… Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Photo: Kelly Rossiter There was a bit of eye rolling from my husband when I said I was making a chickpea casserole. That’s probably because he remembers casseroles from his childhood, as do I. They were usually gloppy affairs with one of the main ingredients a canned cream soup. Cream of celery soup was the usual choice for my mother, who then added canned tuna and cooked macaroni. It remains one of her favourite meals to this day, and some forty years on, the thought of it still makes me gag. This casserole, I’m happy to say, bore no resemblance at all to the concoctions my mother made, and my husband actually … Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Image: World Ocean Observatory England has been hit by unusually cold winters for the last two years — the cold seasons of both 2009 and 2010 were more frigid than usual. And then there were those hacked climate emails — which were actually leaked from a famous research center right there in England — that breathless skeptics were eager to claim revealed that the whole global warming thing was a hoax. But wouldn’t you know it; those two favorite skeptic talking points haven’t gained much traction. The people of England still believe climate change poses … Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Photo: Michael Graham Richard The Future We Want Is Already Here, It’s Just Unevenly Distributed There’s little doubt in my mind that compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) will turn out to be just a transitory technology. While they are a significant improvement on incandescent bulbs (which are better at producing heat than light), they remain a bit too fragile and hard to dispose of to be the lighting’s ‘holy grail’. Light emitting diode (LED) lights, on the other hand, could very well be the answer we’ve been looking for: They’re very efficient, turn on instantly, last a long time (deca… Read the full story on TreeHugger
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A plant that is endangered in one place can be an invasive scourge in another. Photo credit: taberandrew / Creative Commons An estimated 10 percent of the 753 plants on the United States Endangered Species List are sold or advertised online. Most of the buyers, a new study in Nature reports , are hobby horticulturalists looking to add something exotic to their home gardens. However, an increasing number of buyers, some evidence suggests, are… Read the full story on TreeHugger
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There are few designers who I admire more than Patty Johnson; she travels the world to quietly work with local artisans, producing “goods that fuse quality with creativity beyond just low cost.” She very modestly has created “an unprecedented collaboration, weaving together elements of craft production, community development and modern design.” Her latest exhibition shows work produced in Guyana…. Read the full story on TreeHugger
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