Monthly Archives: December 2008

Clean Coal Fans, Take Note
As reported here on TreeHugger and on Discovery News last week: “Monday night 2.6 million cubic yards (the equivalent of 525.2 million gallons, 48 times more than the Exxon Valdez spill by volume) of coal ash sludge broke through a dike of a 40-acre holding pond at TVA’s Kingston coal-fired power plant covering 400 acres up to six feet deep, damaging 12 homes and wrecking a train.” Read on for more

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Photo via Getty Images

While some studies say global warming is not to blame for an upswing in tick-borne disease occurances, a new experiment shows that warmer temperatures are indeed a problem when it comes to ticks turning towards humans for lunch.

Photo via tomsaint11

Carnegie Mellon University researchers are asking companies to do what is only absolutely reasonable in the face of a big global goal of reducing emissions – broaden the terms on which they calculate carbon emissions.

And that means factoring in the emissions of suppliers

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Here is a neat demonstration of good packaging design. You take the crappy coarse 100% recycled pulp that egg cartons are made of and you mould it around the shape of shoes so that you still have packaging to protect the shoes, but because it is the shape of the shoes rather than the shape of the box. Like an egg carton, the moulding adds strength so you can probably stack them pretty high.

And why fill the shoe with disposable tissue? Newton Running sticks a pair of socks in one and a reusable shoe bag in the other.

Don’t know anything about the shoes, but love the box.<a href=”http://www.psfk.com/2008/12/innovative-shoebox-is-

Happy new year, everyone!
A big thank you to the few thousand of you who regularly read this column, and thanks for the kind words many of you have sent my way over the past few years.  I hope these rambling writings continue to be useful for you…
Everyone probably already has a lot of resolutions already [

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Here is a way to keep busy when everyone else is having a good time and you are the designated driver: Take all of those champagne corks with their wire cages and recycle them into little models of “the chair that has seated millions“- a classic Thonet cafe chair. Learn how at Instructables.

And don’t forget, champagne corks can travel up to 50 miles per hour-remove them safely:

Photo via Brave New Films

Earlier this month we reported that ozone-friendly HFA inhalers are to be the norm as CFC-based inhalers are banned. Two chief complaints about this move are that the prices for HFA are much higher and that dose counters aren’t usually included – dose counters help users know when the inhaler is empty of medication.

Well, Wal-Mart of all companies has solved those two problems by putti

Image: Hub Pages

Arts and Literature have given us Soylent Green and The Matrix, suggesting human bodies as raw material. Usually this makes people grimace and shiver. But in the Swedish town of Halmstad, it will soon make people warm and cozy. Halmstad officials required improvements at the local crematorium after environmental monitoring indicated too much smoke was going out the chimneys. After planning for the improvements started, well

one thing just lead to another.

Credit Crunch Drives Increase in Backyard Flocks
Jeff said it before – urban chicken keeping just makes sense, even if we’ve previously referred to backyard chickens as a ‘weird ecohabit’. But if you could have a pet that not only gives you entertainment and companionship, but eggs (and great compost) too, then why the heck wouldn’t you? OK, I must admit I’m biased – I’m a chicken keeper. And despite a recent case of weasel/raccoon attacks, I can say without a doubt that ch

At a time when major U.S. companies are announcing job layoffs almost daily, the renewable energy industry is hiring new workers every day to build wind farms, install rooftop solar arrays, and build solar thermal and geothermal power plants. The output of industrial firms that manufacture the equipment for these energy facilities is expanding by well over 30 percent a year. As I note in my recent Earth Policy Institute Update “Creating New Jobs”, these investments both create jobs and help prevent climate change from spiraling out of control

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