We’ve talked much the last two weeks about going green and electric cars, and now Bentley is getting in on the act with this tiny-yet-awesome Continental DC electric concept car. Though it’s not planned for production, the 256-pound Bentley works quite well for what it is, and can reach a top speed of 40MPH. The fact that a company like Bentley is jumping into the electric car field is exciting, and the fact that they’re doing it while making it look good is awesome. → Read More
Using excess or leftover corn as a fuel source sure sounded like a good idea, especially here in the U.S. Let’s get our farmers from, I don’t, Iowa, to set aside a certain percentage of arable land for the production of fuel corn. (The term “fuel corn” may or may not exist, but it should if it doesn’t.) This corn, rather than being used for food, would be used for the production of ethanol, an alcohol that can power combustion engines. Follow the logic: grow corn, which is fairly inexpensive to do, create ethanol, power car engines. Simple, direct and seemingly a possible solution to our reliance on foreign oil and all the bonus adventurism that comes with that. Grow corn at home, or meddle in other people’s affairs for access to oil? Onward! to our bright, biofueled future. Wait, what? There’s a word in that opening paragraph that suddenly no longer applies, apparently. What if all that corn (and other sources of biofuel) is no longer “leftover”? What if, you know, we should be using all that corn (etc.) to feed people? (Food used to feed people? Madness!) What if the price of food, for some reason, skyrocketed, and the poorer peoples of the world look longingly at all that “excess” corn being used to fuel your dumb automobile? It would seem we, Westerners, are stuck between a rock and a rock. Big rocks. With sharp edges. → Read More
When it was announced less than two years ago, many thought the Tesla Roadster was a hoax, or at best a vaporware concept that wouldn’t go anywhere. Thankfully, those skeptics have been proven wrong, with the Tesla in full production and the first lot sold out already. But what is it about the Tesla that makes it so unusual? Not only is it fully electric, making it one of the most green cars you can drive, it’s also incredibly well made. Reviews from those who’ve driven it are almost universally positive. → Read More
Anybody feeling pinched by high gas prices? You should. Expensive gas not only hits us squarely in the pocketbook when we fill our gas tanks, but it makes everything else more expensive as well; air travel, shipping packages, groceries, you name it. Aside from being expensive, gasoline is hard on the environment too. Here are a few viable alternatives (that are available now) if you decide that you’ve had enough with high gas prices and/or you’d like to go easier on the environment. → Read More
I’m a fan of geo-thermal energy. It’s almost free, available everywhere, and doesn’t pollute in any way. France likes it too, and is taking advantage of it to power a new airport. Geothermal power uses water and the Earth’s own internal heat to generate steam, which turns turbines and produces electricity. The only costs are those associated with pumping of the water and hardware. The airport, the Orly, will open its doors in about three years. → Read More
Outside of the cesspool that is New York City, regular folk drive cars to and fro’. And while New Yorkers may get a bad rap for being “mean” or “high-strung” or “fancy,” by relying on public transportation (7 train~!) and our well-muscled legs to get around, we’re doing Mother Earth a big favor. As the rest of the country pumps CO2 and other fun elements into the atmosphere, we’re doing our damnedest to keep our carbon footprints as low as possible. (Never mind that China and India throw CO2 into the atmosphere like nobody’s business… yes, I think going green is 100 percent worthless when taking other, less environmentally sensitive countries into account.) But what if y’all drove a car that, instead of producing noxious, Earth-destroying fumes as waste, you produced clean water? Magic? Wizzzzardry? Only kind of! Hydrogen-powered cars, friends. Hydrogen-powered cars. I saw a documentary on them once when I was still young and idealistic (let’s say something like 2004) and was totally blown away. By using a fuel-cell (I leave the other, combustion-type engines out of this post; the combustion engine is old hat at this point), hydrogen-powered cars mix hydrogen (of all things!) with oxygen to produce electricity (which powers the car) and water (the only exhaust). That, seemingly, would solve one of the bigger “omg we’re killing the planet with the burning of fossil fuels” problems, right? Depends on who you talk to. Figures. → Read More
Every once in a while you might see a car go by with a sticker proclaiming “Powered by soybeans” or “I run biodiesel! Ask me how!” or some such message. No doubt you’re curious, as I was. What are these mysterious frybrids, and do you want one? Your curiousity will be satisfied after the link. → Read More
I’m really digging on Lowepro’s gear lately. The Fastpack I reviewed a couple months back is still in great shape. I’ve got the Flipside, which is fantastic. I still have to do a formal review on it, but it’s phenomenal. Anyway, this being Green Week for us, I thought I’d share the Primus AW with you all. It’s Lowepro’s most eco-friendly pack and is geared towards the outdoor photog. It’s made from 51 percent post consumer recycled materials. It’s mostly made from a 100 percent post consumer recycled fabric called Cyclpet. Each of the Primus AW’s contain the equivalent of 22.6 pop bottles, which keeps .0034 cubic yards of landfill empty with each pack. With each bag being made from 51 percent recycled materials, Lowepro conserves 15,109 BTU’s of energy, .002 barrels of crude oil and .12 gallons of refined oil during the production process. It’s rigged out for pro DSLRs, 1-2 extra flashes or lenses and a seam-sealed All-Weather Cover among other things. A portion of revenue from the Primus AW goes to support Polar Bears International and their continuing effort to save those cute and cuddly bears. → Read More
I love this month’s feature package, Going Green. It’s perfect for my tree hugging lifestyle and it gets everyone else at CG on board. There seems to be a misconception that being eco-friendly is hard or that it won’t make a difference. I hear the latter argument all the time and I relate it to girls and their dieting woes. Before you go and start calling me a chauvinistic pig just hear me out. Now I’m not saying this applies to all women, but I hear it all the time from my female friends. They’ll start rambling off about how they’ve been working out and eating right for the last 3 weeks, but they haven’t lost any weight. Stop me if you’ve heard this before. Anyway, I know you know what I’m talking about so I’ll just stop there. The point is that this whole green movement isn’t going to make a difference over night. It’s going to take a long time before we see the results we want to see. Learn to have some patience. Anyway, to fulfill my green duties for the day we’re going to chat about how to print in an eco-friendly manner. That encompasses using recycled paper and/or using alternative inks. It’s pretty easy, actually. Using recycled paper seems like a no-brainer so I won’t delve into that one too much. A lot of the waste comes from ink cartridges so I’m going to focus on that for now. → Read More
http://www.ideasforlife.tv/externalPlayer.swf It’s a rather long video, but the University of Warwick’s Warwick Manufacturing Group is working with PVAXX Research & Development Ltd to make cell phones with biodegradable parts. It’s a pretty neat idea. Check it out. What are you doing with your old cell phones? → Read More
With so many portable devices in our homes, we use a lot more batteries than people think about. After many uses, though, many rechargeable batteries can suddenly fail, rendering the device useless if they’re non-swappable. If the device has a removable battery, you can of course buy a new one, but that means throwing the toxic and useless old one out. Why not trade it in to a refurb station to save money and save the precious, fragile environment? → Read More
I’d be willing to bet that there are very few people out there who don’t have an old Motorola StarTac in a kitchen drawer or a pale, yellowish 14-inch CRT monitor in the basement or a sticky, dusty keyboard under the bed. I’m just like you — probably worse. I have gadgets from the Reagan administration that are serving no good purpose other than to take up space in my already sorta-small apartment. Time for some spring cleaning, no? The focus of this post will be to spotlight various ways to get rid of three types of gadgets; broken ones, working but worthless ones, and working but valuable ones. I’ll focus on programs that are available nationwide (or mostly nationwide) and aren’t brand- or product-specific. → Read More
Geeks are a selfish lot. Our obsessions are resource intensive and damaging to the environment. Every gadget we buy, ever minute we spend charging our iPhones, every laptop we send into oblivion in the IT shop is a testament to the unbeatable juggernaut of technological advancement and resource use. But it doesn’t have to be this way. We can rethink our strategies, be more careful with energy, and generally be better tech consumers. The question is this: Are we ready? I think we are. These are grave, scary times and the rise in popularity of “green” seems a bit disingenuous at times, especially when reduced to a change in logo for a few weeks to pay lip service to “Earth Day.” But we can make a difference and all of us at CG have been researching the small things we can do to try to fix the damage we’ve caused. For the next week we’ll post a few features on the things we’ve discovered and hope we can, in some way, change our own selfish ways to reduce energy costs and consumption and move away from the endless cycle of buy, use, trash. Together we can stay geeky and green at the same time. → Read More
Now the environmentally conscious can continue their quest to clean up this dump we call Earth by requesting to be buried near Lismore Memorial Park Cemetery in the Northern Rivers region of Australia. “The deceased will be buried in biodegradable coffins between gum trees in a protected koala sanctuary,” according to the Sydney Morning Herald. Headstones must be made from natural rock and the Lismore Council of cemeteries prefer that coffins be made from “woven wicker, plantation pine, or recycled cardboard.” → Read More
