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White Roofs vs. Green Roofs: Which Keeps Your City Cooler?

Here is why cool roofs are better than green roofs when it comes to reducing outdoor temperature.

Reusable water bottles have more bacteria than a toilet seat. Here's why you shouldn't fret

You really should wash your reusable bottle more.

Farmers should grow flowers alongside other crops. Here's why

Scientists are using this technique in India to boost the production of moringa, a superfood that can end hunger globally.

Want to make your pet more sustainable? Try dry food

A dry diet can turn your pet into an energetic and environment friendly companion.

How the humble Sphagnum moss can become our protector against floods

Bio-engineering at its finest.

A lot of people would go vegan if it wasn't for the money, taste, and convenience

Despite the perception that going vegetarian or vegan is 'hard', it's never been easier than ever to cut meat out from your diet.

Five environmental consequences of Australia’s fires

Australia’s road to recovery may be long: Here’s a developing list of how the fires are affecting glaciers, wildlife, water supplies, and global carbon emissions.

Microplastics found in the guts of all sea turtles across the oceans

More than 100 turtles were tested -- all had synthetic fibers in their guts.

Germany rolls out the first hydrogen-powered trains in the world

These bright blue trains are the greenest around.

Renewable material made from crab shells and trees could replace plastic film packaging

The new packaging is compostable and keeps food fresher longer than plastic wrapping.

How Buildings of the Future Will Conserve Water

As things evolve, so will the future of water conservation.

Eco-designer turns landfill waste into 'plasma rock' -- a sustainable, all-purpose material

Landfill waste is given a second life by blasting it with plasma hotter than the sun. Now that's a project we love!

Give ugly veggies and fruits a second chance - they're just as tasty

According to the United Nations, 20 to 40 percent of fresh food is thrown away by farmers because they don't look as appetizing as they should to sell. Besides looking a bit crooked, twisted or shrugged, these fruits and vegetables are perfectly edible and taste no different than the perfectly shaped ones you're always on the lookout for in the supermarket.

The App that could fight food waste

According to the EPA, Americans waste some 30-40 percent of all the food they use. Even not considering the poorest areas such as Africa or SE Asia where food is almost a luxury, there are 50 million Americans who don’t have daily access to adequate food; reducing food waste could improve and save countless lives. Food […]

Giant 500 km wide ocean whirlpools affect climate

Giant whirlpools or mesoscale eddies, as described in scientific literature, can grow between 100 km and 500 km in diameter, forming around islands where ocean currents become disrupted. These whirlpools carry immense amounts of water and heat, but up until now they’ve been largely ignored in climate models. A novel research, however, found that energy dispersed […]

Silly Putty ingredient helps improve batteries

When you think about Silly Putty toys, the last thing that comes to mind is high-tech. A group of researchers, however, used a novel trick to incorporate  an ingredient in Silly Putty to improve lithium-ion battery life between charges by three times the industry standard. For what’s it worth, Silly Putty is actually one of the […]

West Antarctic Ice Sheet collapse is irreversible; to cause 10 feet sea level rise

The  West Antarctic Ice Sheet , a massive system of glaciers, is collapsing as a result of glacier melting (global warming). The process is most likely irreversible and cause a global sea lever rise of at least 10 feet, a pair of independent studies conclude. A warmer planet gives way to rising oceans Previously, the two-mile-thick […]

3D printer used to build 10 homes in one day in China

Say what you will, but the Chinese are clearly the fastest builders in the world, though sometimes quick haste makes to waste. A while ago, I wrote about how a Chinese company wants to build the tallest skyscraper in the world in just 90 days. Really crazy stuff, but now another Chinese company, with many […]

Condensing towers could make water from thin air in the driest places on Earth

The Namib desert is one of the vastest and driest deserts in the world. There is little water to be found here, so the few critters calling the desert home had to learn to adapt in order to survive. One particular beetle species stands out through the ingenuity with which it manages to quench its […]

Toyota confirms confirms fuel cell launch for 2015; zero local emissions and 500-mile range

Toyota has officially announced that it will launch a hydrogen fuel cell-powered car in 2015, but said sales volumes would be limited. The company announced they will use a high-density fuel stack which will have the potential to cover 500 miles on a single fuel tank. The technology will take a while to be implemented and accepted […]

This sealed bottle garden hasn't been opened since 1972 - still doing just fine

It’s 1960, a nice Sunday, Easter day. David Latimer decides to do something special to mark this day, and he starts a bottle garden in his ten gallon carboy. He poured in some compost, a quarter pint of water and then, carefully added some spiderwort seedling (Tradescantia) using a piece of water. He then placed the […]

Middle school student shows the US government could save $400 million by switching fonts

How important are details, when it comes to saving money? Any accountant will tell you: really important. A middle school student in Pittsburg thought the same thing – he discovered that the government could save $400 million dollars just by change the typeface it uses. Inspired by a school project on saving ink, he calculated […]

Solar powered toilet locks greenhouse gases and increases crop yields

One of the 16 teams involved in a collaborative project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that aims to help some of the 2.5 billion people around the world lacking safe and sustainable sanitation recently unveiled their innovative design: a solar-powered toilet that treats solid waste by effectively carbonizing it. The concentrated solar […]

Growing the World's Tallest Vertical Garden in Sydney

Patrick Blanc is a French botanist, typically wrongly credited as the inventor of the vertical garden (aka. Green Wall, Botanical Brick), a title which belongs to Professor Stanley Hart White at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (1938). Still, Patrick Blanc is certainly modern innovator of the green wall – a wall, either free-standing or part […]

Seattle plans for a city park with edible plants - free for anyone and everyone

Forget meadows. Forget grass. Forget sterile, monotone parks with no plant diversity. Seattle’s vision of an urban oasis is becoming more and more a reality: a seven-acre plot of land will be covered with hundreds of different kinds of edible plants: walnut and chestnut trees, blueberry and raspberry shrubs, apples, pears, yuzu citrus, guava, persimmons, […]

First fully 3-D printed house looks incredible

Possibly the most exciting technological innovation of the decade, in terms of the impact it’s projected to have, 3-D printing never seems ceasing to amaze us with its unrivaled potential. We’ve seen 3-D printed titanium jaw bones for implants, nanoscale F-1 cars, an ear or live tissue by 3-D printing of stem cells. A number of […]

A word on plastic and reusable bags

A while ago, I was telling you about the big garbage island in the middle of the Pacific ocean, and why you should use and reuse canvas bags instead of going for the plastic bags. But here are some quick facts about reusing bags. An average reusable bag requires the same amount of energy as […]

Biochar stoves could save millions of lives, improve soil and air quality

Open-fire stoves represent the biggest domestic environmental threat today, killing 3.5 million people a year—more deaths than caused by malaria and HIV/AIDS combined. But now, cookstoves that produce biochar could provide a viable alternative, saving millions of lives and giving a boost to local agriculture. Cookstoves are common in many parts of the world, from […]

Small changes in your bathroom bring big benefits to the environment - and why Cameron diaz advocates urinating outside or in the shower

Usually, whenever celebrities advocate some cooky thing that supposedly does a whole lot of good, it’s just a trend or a cooky idea — but Cameron Diaz is really on to something here: she wants you to stop flushing every time after you pee. Every flush takes somewhere between 4 and 10 liters of water […]