Cancerman72 said:
"Didn't know there was such a thing but here it is. Ticking timebomb. What happens if there was a massive tidal wave..." [read]
Cancerman72 said:
"That is a good idea and at least they won't be killed. How long does it take to grow back the horn?..." [read]
Cancerman72 said:
"at least she is committed not like other fake celebs saying they are green too!..." [read]
James said:
"Limited edition = you're paying too much.
Also; it needs fenders. ..." [read]
MrSteve007 said:
"I'm a huge fan of solar power - but I'm a little sad to see development at this site. I spent my childhood riding horses through this land - it is ..." [read]
Cancerman72 said:
"On hold for another 1-2 years. This will never get done...." [read]
Positive TV Highlights Solutions Not Problems
Back when I lived in the UK, I used to occasionally pick up issues of Positive News at festivals or activist gatherings. While the concept of a newspaper dedicated to covering upbeat, optimistic stories was appealing - ultimately the print format meant that stories were not covered in great enough depth to give the details of what was going on (a critique that could equally be applied to blogs I suppose...). That's why I'm delighted to discover Positive TV - an online video channel which, much like Peak Moment TV, is dedicated to reporting "what’s breaking through rather than what’s breaking down." Click below the fold to see their coverage of the London to Brighton Revolve Ecorally.
It might be efficient to unlock the energy in old tires, which are, after all, derived from petroleum. It might be relatively non-polluting to recover heat from burning tire bits if adequate emission controls are deployed. But, who would propose a law defining something made from petroleum as "renewable?" Some Ohio State legislators did, apparently.
Comet trialling free EV charging
Every time we talk about electric vehicles (EVs), nay sayers always bring up the question of range - after all, how can a car with a range of 100 or 150 miles hope to compete with the internal combustion engine? Of course, advocates for EVs argue that the vast majority of journeys are short trips to work or to the store that can be achieved on one charge, and with a little investment in charging infrastructure that range can be extended further. The UK has already seen utilities installing EV charging points and a map of London's electric car charging points looks a little like my face did in highschool. Now UK retailer Comet - the British equivalent of Best Buy - has installed a prototype charging station at one of its stores. Click below the fold to see the system in action.
Sakarya University students with their hydrogen-powered car. Photo via SAİTEM.
Gas prices in Turkey are among the highest -- if not the highest -- in the world, a fact I was rudely awakened to last summer when some friends and I rented a car to drive from Istanbul to Edirne, a round-trip of around 500 kilometers, to watch the oil-wrestling championships. (A story in and of itself.) We paid about $100 for the gas alone, some 38 liters of it. If we'd been driving the SAHİMO, a car invented by Turkish university students, we could have gone all the way across the country -- more than three times farther -- on just three liters of fuel.
Car designer Harsha Vardhan suggests that this two-wheeler concept is the car of the future.
His Transporter TW (Twin Wheel) is a single-seater electric vehicle that uses magnetic fields for driving the car. The two gianormous wheels, suspended over a superconducting fluid, are propelled by those shifting magnetic fields. Thus the power generation, and motion of the car, is a nice noiseless and smooth ride.
Most of us agree that cycling is one of the most eco-friendly and healthy ways of transportation, although it can also be dangerous, even if you use bike lanes. Motorbikes swishing past, doors opening, parked cars that need driving around into the car lanes, are but a few nasty surprises you can come across even if you stay on the bike path. Most people agree that bike lanes should be separated from traffic. To make sure traffic also respects those bike lanes, Spanish designer Curro Claret (whose Hat Light was one of the very early posts on TreeHugger) designed the ZEBRA bicycle lane divider, made from recycled plastic.
Dale Vince's Wind-Powered Car Driven for First Time
In my last post about Dale Vince's prototype electric sports car, the term "wind-powered" clearly raised some hackles who felt this was a deceptive marketing ploy. I continue to think that a man who has struck rich building wind turbines, and who will be charging his car on renewable energy, has every right to use the term. But really, semantics aside - the big question is how does the car perform? Now, finally, (in episode 10 of 6!) we get to find out as Dale and friends take the "Nemesis" onto the track - the results, despite some hiccups, are pretty astounding!
Tom Dixon is a TreeHugger fave for his work making compact fluorescents elegant; now he does the same for electric cars, converting a 1949 Mk VI Bentley to electric power. He likes it because the body can be easily separated from the chassis.
...
RTP Re-Tread Products is in the testing phase of a series of recycled rubber tire products designed to one day take the place of some of the applications where pressure treated lumber has traditionally been used. The benefit of such a trade-off would be less chemicals to leach into the ground (from the treated lumber), improved flexibility, and increased overall durability.
The tire logs are believed to be a very appropriate substitute for such applications as heavy equipment platforms, logging roadways, boat ramps, hurricane-prone building construction, highway separation, and flood-control barriers....
Diesel trucks on the road. Image credit:EHS News
It's a 40-year tradition for USEPA to propose a new industry performance standard, and for laggard industry lobbyists to declare that jobs will be lost, companies destroyed, stockholders screwed, and the American Way Of Life threatened. Visit the federal docket a decade later, read what lobbyists and Think Tanks alledged would happen, versus what actually happened, and time after time, you'd see that things turned out as good or better than expected by USEPA in the cost-benefits analysis. No surprise then to read this news : Environmental Health News reports that New diesel trucks and buses cut soot and smog more than 90%. ...
Image credit: ElectricAidTH!NK Electric Car Company Receives Huge Cash Injection
TH!NK may have been considering a leap into the US electric vehicle market, but the Norwegian electric car company's well-publicized financial struggles have had commentators on tenter hooks to see if this promising little enterprise can survive. Now campaigners who have been pushing for government support of EVs have reason to celebrate - TH!NK just announced a massive cash injection from anonymous investors that should put the company on a path to profitability.
...
We’ve heard much about the Tata Nano, India’s $2,000 car that has over 200,000 Indians lining up to own one. We’ve also well aware that General Motors USA has filed for bankruptcy, although many of its international subsidiaries, like in China, are hanging tough, particularly those offering small cars. Well just the other day GM Chevrolet India unveiled their Spark LPG vehicle.
Not to infer that LPG represents any long term solution to resource depletion. LPG is still a finite fossil fuel that will also reach its peak. But LPG does offer some significant short term benefits....
Image via: Getty Images
We're not sure if this is legal, or if it's the first of its kind, but thanks to Tipster Jason for the scoop on this latest in carbon offsets. Seems where there is a need, there is a market and one man has decided to test this theory out and make a few bucks on ebay in the meantime....
Our pals over at the excellent Wend Magazine thought our readers might be intrigued by a new company they found. I reckon they’re right. For they’ve unearthed the delightfully named Lorax Motor Works, a start-up who are providing purpose built electric vehicles, and customized conversions of existing internal combustion vehicles. One of their early incarnations is The Hauler: an all-terrain, mountain-bike style recumbent tricycle, which sports its own solar panel powering an onboard motor that provides electric assist riding....
NationmasterRyan Avent shows us an interesting table, showing that the USA has way more cars per person than anyone else in the world. It makes some sense, it is a big country without good public transport or rail system. But Canada is even bigger, and the rail and transit isn't much better. What could account for such a spread?
Felix Salmon at Reuters suspects that the American rate will fall significantly, which does not bode well for the auto industry but might overall be a good thing....
Video production: Tim Walter Associates LimitedDale Vince's Sports Car Project Delayed, But Continuing
UK wind entrepreneur Dale Vince may have made the Sunday Times Rich List, but that doesn't mean he get's everything he wants, when he wants it. In fact, his wind-powered sports car project has been in the 'final stages' for some time now. Maybe Dale is regretting his comments that the car would "not be another Tesla". No matter though, because progress is being made. And best of all, the team continues to document their progress in these illuminating videos - clearly hoping to inspire others to follow their lead. Read on for details of where the project is at. ...
Photo from PHOTO/ REUTERS
With the auto giant General Motors filing for bankruptcy today, they are now promising to change into a lean, green automobile-making machine. But if you look at the facts, they already are green. Is GM the poster child for what is to come if established companies don’t innovate, or is it the scapegoat for America's manufacturing debacle?...
Photo from Casual Mafia
Green isn’t always serious business. The newest video out by Casual Mafia called In My Prius makes fun of the Prius which is, well, really funny! With the looming GM bankruptcy, a few laughs, were cars are involved, is welcomed! ...
According to the Plugs and Cars blog, a small parade of around 50 electric cars tooling through the streets of Oslo this week underlined Norwegians' frustration that their government hasn't made much effort to support TH!NK as it struggles to be solvent and fulfill the multiple orders it has from municipalities around Europe to assemble its popular TH!NK City car. At the same time, Norwegians got a chance to drive and experience electric cars when the city's first car share program Move About added electric City cars to its roster....
Function over form - Greenstreet bikes are abandoned bikes repurposed.
Here's what Paris did right in setting up a city bike share program: versatile, sexy bikes and enough of them (1 for every 200 residents). The Vélib bike-share program is about to hit its 2-year anniversary and it is going strong, with more than 20,000 bikes (used for an estimated 26 million trips each year) and almost 1,500 stations. The program has even been extended into the Parisian suburbs. Compare that to Gothenburg's GreenStreet bike share system, with less than 60 bikes scattered across the city, a program which no one seems to know about, much less use. But wait - as with many things, there's an upside and a downside to Vélib's success as well as Greenstreet's slow start....
The new EV IE from Electric Car Corporation - the real deal.
The EVs (electric vehicles) are coming! But not exactly to U.S. drivers. On any day in the streets of London, you might spot an electric Daimler Smartcar, a G-Whiz, or one of the Electric Car Company's cool new EV IEs. Not all these EVs are highway ready, and their drivers are dealing with that curious new concept called 'range anxiety' - e.g. you turn on the air conditioning, battery power plummets, and miles away from your destination, you really start to sweat! But as more and more of the next crop of EVs come out, prices may also surprise you. And the fact that European drivers are getting the bulk of the affordable EV goodies may infuriate you.
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Image: DaimlerSolid Buys Sexy
Yesterday, Daimler AG acquired about ten percent of Tesla Motors, Inc. The purchase had been in the works for 18 months, and follows the establishment of a Daimler-Tesla partnership for cooperating on battery technology. Further acquisition is not being ruled out.
German engineering meets American pioneering spirit. "Solid Buys Sexy," the German newspaper Die Zeit headlined the news. But is this a match made in heaven, or the beginning of a slow death for independent e-car startups?...
Photo courtesy of: EcoFriend
The Robo Taxi -- which hopefully behaves nothing like RoboCop -- is a robotic taxi designed for large metropolitan cities.
Conceived by designer Kubik Petr, the vehicle holds only two passengers with a minimal amount of luggage. It's driven by two electric motors connected to the vehicle's back wheels. The car would be built from the lightest of materials and can operate for up to 20 hours.
...
Photo via: Mr. Bill
“Using taxpayer money to subsidize U.S. job losses,” is how the United Auto Workers (UAW) describes GM's move to tighten their belts, slash production costs, and make the most of their $15.4 borrowed billion by outsourcing to China. GM has already plucked the suckling Pontiac and Saturn from their proverbial tit and are prepared to slash a few more sucklers' in the form of U.S. Laborers......
Vintage Car Window-Mounted Evaporative Air Cooler. Image credit:ClassicAire, via 62-77ChevyTrucks.com
Refrigerant gases are back in the news - "HFC's" especially - now, because of their extended climate forcing potential. Remember the Montreal Protocol, that successful, 1989 global treaty to protect the earth's ozone layer? The Protocol still has an important role to play, in encouraging development of refrigerant gases that have reduced impacts on both the ozone layer and climate. TreeHugger interviewed Mack McFarland, Environmental Fellow with DuPont, Inc., and an active participant in both the Protocol and IPCC, to get his insights into what the refrigerant choices of the future will be, and how we'll get them. Stay cool, read on....
We'll be working on better category archives soon. In the meantime, take a look at the weekly archive if you really want to dig around, or use the search box at the top of the page.
on 07. 9.09
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Photo by 
Tom Dixon is a TreeHugger fave for his work 
Photo via: 
Image credit: 
We’ve heard much about the 
Image via: Getty Images
We're not sure if this is legal, or if it's the first of its kind, but thanks to 
Our pals over at the excellent 
Photo from PHOTO/ REUTERS
With the auto giant General Motors filing for bankruptcy today, they are now promising to change into a lean, green automobile-making machine. But if you look at the facts, they already are green. Is GM the poster child for what is to come if established companies don’t innovate, or is it the scapegoat for America's manufacturing debacle?...
Photo from Casual Mafia
Green isn’t always serious business. The newest video out by 
Function over form - Greenstreet bikes are abandoned bikes repurposed.
Here's what Paris did right in setting up a city bike share program: versatile, sexy bikes and enough of them (1 for every 200 residents). The 
The new EV IE from 
Image: 
Photo courtesy of: 
Photo via: 
Vintage Car Window-Mounted Evaporative Air Cooler. Image credit:
Image credit: 
