New Bike Share System, Copenhagen Competition

Check out this highly designed bike share system proposed for Copenhagen. The end goal is to increase the number of commuters traveling by bicycle from 37% to 50% by 2015, but in order to do so the design calls for a high-tech, all knowing, (somewhat frightening) bicycle.


Via RAFAA Architecture and Design.


- Anna

The View From Spain's Solar Power Tower

Hundreds of enormous mirrors that turn "themselves towards the sun like a field of giant metal sunflowers" allow Spain's Solar Power Tower to produce 11 megawatts of energy, enough to power a town of 6,000 homes. Valerio Fernandez, the director of operation, isn't satisfied with that accomplishment and continues to refine the tower in order to produce more energy. Check out the article online at CNN.


- Anna

How to Declutter on the Go

Per Anna's last post, there's yet another way to discard your unwanted stuff, which may be particularly convenient for you cool kids with your iPhones. It's an app called Yoink that you can download for free from the iTunes store, and it allows you to either list your goodies or see who in your area has stuff that they want to get rid of. Be the first to click on what you want and it's yours. You're put in contact with the...not seller...downsizer?, arrange to pick up the items, et voilà! You have a new couch. Or some dude has your old toaster. You get the picture. If you don't have an iPhone (excuse me, but some of us are quite attached to our Droids), there's also a web-based version of Yoink, though that somewhat decreases its appeal, e.g., its portability.


So far it looks fairly sparse, but is getting great reviews on iTunes. Hopefully more items will be posted as increasing numbers of people download the app. Start (continue?) decluttering, people!


-Kaitlen

A Different Kind of Treehouse

This is amazing. Architect/forester Roald Gundersen builds houses using entire trees, not pieces of lumber. The resulting structures are gorgeous, and the process is so much gentler on the environment than traditional logging (or building with steel supports). Here are some of the highlights:


"According to research by the Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, run by the USDA, a whole, unmilled tree can support 50 percent more weight than the largest piece of lumber milled from the same tree. So Mr. Gundersen uses small-diameter trees as rafters and framing in his airy structures, and big trees felled by wind, disease or insects as powerful columns and curving beams.

Taking small trees from a crowded stand in the forest is much like thinning carrots in a row: the remaining plants get more light, air and nutrients. Carrots grow longer and straighter; trees get bigger and healthier.

And when the trees are left whole, they sequester carbon. “For every ton of wood, a ton and a half of carbon dioxide is locked up,” he said, whereas producing a ton of steel releases two to five tons of carbon. So the more whole wood is used in place of steel, the less carbon is pumped into the air.

These passive solar structures also need very little or no supplemental heat."

Now go check out the slide show. (Nice work noticing this one, Anna!)

-Kaitlen

Sixteen and Super-Green

So here's some good news: Daniel Burd, a 16-year-old high schooler in Canada, figured out a way to make a plastic bag decompose in only three months. Yeah, as opposed to thousands of years. He isolated the bacteria that breaks down plastic. Burd (quite deservedly) won the top prize at the Canada-Wide Science Fair in Ottawa, and snagged a $10,000 prize, a $20,000 scholarship, and a slew of other awards.

And I thought I was an overachiever in high school. Psht.

-Kaitlen

Make It Green

Yahoo and the Everyday Edisons TV show are sponsoring Make It Green, a contest where the goal is to submit an idea for an eco-friendly product that both improves consumers' lives and helps the planet. If your product is chosen for production, you win $2,500 and a percentage of the sales. Not too shabby. (Well, I guess that depends on just what percentage of the sales you get....)

-Kaitlen

Green and Clean

So it's a little late for spring cleaning, but whatever. Here's a super-helpful roundup of editors' and readers' picks for green cleaning products and tactics. I can personally recommend Method's Le Scrub (which smells so fabulous I actually enjoy cleaning the tub!), newspaper on sink handles and other metal, and plain ol' vinegar and water on glass and mirrors. (Via Re-Nest.)

-Kaitlen