Angry Birds Plush Laplander Hat – $19.95

Attention Angry Birds fans! As you are well aware it is a bird versus pig world out there. Now is the time to declare your allegiance by donning one of the above Angry Birds Laplander hats from the NeatoShop. Are you a hungry pig or an angry bird? The war against cold heads and ears is on.

These super soft Angry Birds Plush Laplander Hats are sold separately and are available in Red Bird and Green Pig.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more Angry Birds items and Headgear fun!

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While you may consider yourself a environmentalist while you are alive, have you considered being green while you are dead? People might make some great compost but one group is promoting the green way to go using a liquefying process called Resomation.

Instead of an urn or a casket, consider being buried in a bottle. In order to be properly buried, a person is generally embalmed and put in a casket. Not only does this take up wood and floor space, but embalming fluids leak back into the earth after a person has been buried, creating an environmental hazard. Cremation is just another fire putting carbon into the atmosphere (and if the person has be embalmed, it releases toxins as well). A study looking at the ecologically best way to go on to your final reward showed that resomation is the winner.

Resomation suspends the body (and sometimes the coffin) in a solution of water and alkali salts. An alkali is a basic solid known as an ‘ionic salt’. The best known one is lime, which breaks down organic solids. The process takes two to three hours. The body slowly dissolves into a powder, much the way it does during cremation. The liquid remaining is sterile, and is drained away, cleaned, and returned to the water cycle.

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Now here’s a place Homer Simpson could really worship, the Wat Pa Maha Chedi Kaew Temple in Thailand. It’s made from over 1.5 million green Heineken and brown Chang beer bottles.

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You wouldn’t think that arts and crafts required so much energy, but creating pottery and glass sculptures takes up a lot of energy. That’s why some green minded folks in North Carolina have devised a way to utilize gas from a landfill in their craft making endeavors.

Many crafters have discovered greener ways to create their wares: reused and/or upcycled materials, for instance, have become very popular among the crafty set. But if your medium is something like glass or ceramics, heavy energy use is just a part of the process: it takes a lot of heat to melt glass for blowing or to fire up a kiln. A craft incubator program in North Carolina, the EnergyXchange, has figured out a way to lower the footprint of these artistic endeavors: landfill gas.

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There’s a lot of green activity happening in this Coca-Cola billboard in the Philippines. The cola giant partnered with the World Wide Fund for Nature to create a 60×60 ft. billboard made of 3,600 Fukien tea plants, a breed excellent at absorbing air pollutants. The pots the tea plants sit in are made of recycled Coca-Cola bottles, the potting mix within is made of industrial by-products and organic fertilizers, and a drip irrigation system was installed to properly hydrate the plants.

I guess I can feel a little bit better about my caffeine habit now.

Link via AdFreak

Panasonic has announced plans to create a green community for around 1000 residents, built from the ground up in Japan. The eco-friendly Fujisawa Sustainable Smart Town should be available by 2018 and hopes to keep carbon output low.

Green building is certainly nothing new, but the thrust of Panasonic’s plan is to start from scratch rather than retrofit existing structures and communities with eco-friendly technologies. The idea is that existing technologies and town planning strategies can be brought together harmoniously from the start, for maximum effect and efficiency. And Fujisawa SST will have it all: a smart power grid; solar cells and batteries in every home; roads designed for bikes, walkers, and electric vehicles; networked public lighting, and more.

In the wake of the catastrophic earthquakes in Japan, the project has also taken on several aspects of disaster response. Fujisawa SST will boast self-sustaining power generation, as well as safety planning and mobility. And with so many devastated Japanese communities looking to rebuild, Fujisawa SST could be a blueprint to model their rebirth.

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I think that the electric vehicle (EV) will remain a novelty and sort of a green status symbol, for the most part, thanks to the limited driving range. I do think that eventually battery tech will improve to the point where the EV will go much longer distances. Right now, the best chance of making the EV more appealing is a way to quickly and cheaply swap batteries for a fresh pack. This is exactly what is happening in China with a company called Better Place that will install 2,300 battery swap stations in China by 2015. Hot swap EV batteries FTW! link

When World War II finally came to an end, Germany was in shambles. Its cities had been transformed into forests of twisted steel and broken concrete, and the German people were suffering from food shortages and rampant unemployment. Within a few years, however, things were looking up. Production of steel and coal were fueling remarkable growth in West Germany, and the country was positioning itself as the industrial powerhouse of Europe.

But this “economic miracle” was wreaking havoc on the environment. Careless mining and manufacturing turned the Rhine into what amounted to an open sewer, and soon, the international waterway contained millions of gallons of toxic waste. By the 1960s, the river was striped with red and green steaks of sludge. The water’s oxygen level had plummeted, and fish were dying en masse. Germany tolerated the pollution because food, jobs, and a sense of progress came along with it, but everyone knew that something had to change.

The catalyst for that change appeared unexpectedly on the morning of May 18, 1966, when a fisherman on the Rhine spotted a large, white creature swimming alongside his boat. Dr. Wolfgang Gewalt, director of the nearby Duisburg Zoo, was called in to identify the animal, which he recognized as a beluga whale. Intrigued, Dr. Gewalt quickly put together a team of whale hunters to trap the animal and bring it to his aquarium.

That was easier said than done. For all his expertise, Gewalt had little idea how to capture a whale without harming it. He tried trapping the animal using tennis nets, but the whale swam right through them. Several more failed attempts followed, and the whale began to garner more and more attention. Before long, the newspapers had nicknamed him Moby Dick. But as the German people continued to watch Dr. Gewalt’s attempts to capture the whale, it became impossible to ignore the unfortunate side effects of post-war progress. As Moby Dick proceeded to swim up the Rhine, journalists noticed that the whale’s skin went from soft and white to bumpy and splotchy. Concerned citizens began to fear that the river’s water would harm the animal, if not kill it outright.

After a couple of weeks, Moby Dick finally left the Duisburg area and traveled downriver. It was only a few yards from the North Sea when a strange thing happened. The whale suddenly stopped, turned around, and went back upriver. A few days later, Moby Dick appeared outside the German parliament building in Bonn -150 miles south.

This caused quite a scene. Hundreds of onlookers gathered at the river, and a group of nearby politicians even suspended their NATO news conference so they could get a glimpse of the whale. Meanwhile, the press went wild, with newspapers suggesting that Moby Dick’s plan all along had been to raise awareness of the environmental plight of the Rhine.

Although the whale eventually escaped to open water, its presence remained. For four weeks in 1966, Moby Dick captured the nation’s attention and highlighted the country’s ecological desperation. Not coincidentally, environmental politics soon became a pressing national issue. The German people began forming grass roots organizations, and in 1972, the influential Federal Association of Citizen’s Initiatives for Environmental Protection was formed. That same year, the German parliament passed the first two laws that effectively regulated waste disposal and emissions in rivers. And in 1979, Germans formed the first successful political party to focus on ecological concerns, Die Grünen Partei, literally “the Green Party.” It’s from their name that we get the term “green politics.”

Today, the Rhine is the cleanest it’s been in decades. Germany is still an industrial powerhouse, but it’s also one of the most eco-friendly countries in the world. Yet the river might still be a sewer today if it hadn’t been for one lost whale that tested the waters.

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The above article by Michael Ward is reprinted with permission from the November-December 2010 issue of mental_floss magazine.

Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ entertaining website and blog for more fun stuff!

German designer Christoph Thetard designed a versatile kitchen appliance that uses no electricity, because it’s powered by the chef’s foot! The R2B2 has three attachments: a chopper, blender, and grinder that all connect to a rotary gear powered by a flywheel contained in the cabinet. Bonus -running the machine with your foot also burns calories! Link -via Mother Nature Network

Materials used to build the structure would include reinforced concrete (for the foundation), composite slab (wood/concrete), and timber wood.  The floor will be made of a hybrid glulam (glued-laminated) beams and reinforced concrete.  The building would include photovoltaic panels on the outer facade to generate electricity along with a “green wall” (aka “vertical garden”).  The building will further protect the environment and public health through use of local resources, reduced routes of transport, use of sustainable materials, and significantly improved CO2 balance.  Highly pre-fabricated construction will further reduce air pollution as well as construction site waste.  In accordance with Passivhaus standards, construction of the LifeCylce Tower will reduce carbon emissions by 90% when compared to conventional construction.

The LifeCycle Tower will have plenty of other environment features, which you can read about at InventorSpot. Link

Got an old backyard swimming pool that’s sitting empty? Turn it into a self-sustaining garden! That’s what this Arizonan family did:

When we purchased our first home in Mesa, AZ on October of 2009, it came with a large, empty, and run-down pool. Rather than spending thousands of dollars in fixing the pool or having it filled with fill dirt we decided to design an inexpensive & self-sufficient urban greenhouse. Initially, we had anticipated self-sufficiency by 2012 but we achieved our goal by mid-2010. Our family gets about 8 fresh eggs a day, unlimited tilapia fish, organic fruit, veggies, and herbs 365 days a year.

Link – Thanks Tiffany!

Lucas Davis, an energy economist at the University of California, Berkeley, has published a study showing that after getting high-efficiency washers, consumers increased clothes washing by nearly 6 percent. Other studies show that people leave energy-efficient lights on longer. A recent study by the Shelton Group, which advocates for sustainable consumer choices, showed that of 500 people who had greened their homes, a third saw no reduction in bills.

"Subconsciously, I think this is just part of human nature," said Jason Holstine, owner of Amicus Green Building Center in the Kensington. "It’s like, ‘If I just do a little, I’m off the hook and my conscious is clear. Give me a pat on the back, and thank you very much.’ Then it goes too far."

"They think, ‘I’m being a good person, I can do more of this stuff and still come out ahead,’ " said Frank Zeman, director of the Center for Metropolitan Sustainability at New York Institute of Technology. "Although the problem is that they will never come out ahead. This goes to the heart of the sustainability challenge."

Link (Illustration: Marc Rosenthal)

The tiny structure is open to the elements (other than optional screen panels and doors) and can be assembled in a few days.

Green features, some optional and others not, include LED and CFL lighting, efficient heating and cooling systems, rainwater recapture, and construction with recyclable materials.

Link via Jetson Green

Perfect for geeky moms! More Mother’s Day Gift Ideas over at the NeatoShop.

How do you fit 24 rooms into an apartment of only 330 square feet? Architect Gary Chang, designer of the "Domestic Transformer," showcases the many, many shapes of this modern architectural marvel!

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by sal.

For the people who like a little bit of pop to that morning piece of toast. Most 8 oz jars of this southwestern concoction can have up to a pound of jalapeno peppers in them. If that doesn’t open your eyes in the morning, I dunno what will.

Jalapeno jelly isn’t exactly Irish, but hey, it’s green! Link -via YesButNoButYes

The contract has been signed for the Shepherds Flat wind farm in Oregon, which will cover 30 square miles, and is expected to generate 2 billion kilowatt hours of energy every year. That will provide 10% of the power California needs! Good to see we are finally moving forward with green technology.

Independent power producer Caithness Energy has awarded GE a $1.4 billion contract for 338 of the company’s most advanced wind turbines to build a 845-megawatt wind farm in Oregon — a size that outstrips all others currently operating worldwide.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by digimouse.

Portugal produces 1/3 of its energy from renewable sources. In having to quickly respond to a shortage of oil, coal and gas, Portugal is now an EU leader in the clean tech revolution. In less than three years, Portugal has trebled its hydropower capacity, quadrupled its wind power, and is investing in more photovoltaic plants. What is to be the world’s largest solar photovoltaic farm is taking shape near Moura, generating electricity straight from sunlight . It is expected to supply 45MW of electricity each year, enough to power 30,000 homes.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by mrmunchies.

Photo: Tom Bonaventure/Getty Images

There’s also speculation about recreating processes like limestone formation -which usually takes nature thousands of years- that eats carbon from the air.

Nanoarchitects are aiming to speed the process up to a matter of days. They believe it could be done simply by coating the walls of buildings with tiny droplets of engine grease. The grease would be laced with a common salt such as magnesium chloride. When the magnesium reacts with carbon dioxide in the air, a solid magnesium carbonate pearl begins to form.

This serves as the seed for the growth of white, wheatsheaf-shaped carbonate crystals. The large surface area of a droplet of grease maximises the interface between the magnesium and the atmospheric carbon, speeding up the rate of the reaction. Within days, the grease would be transformed into a sparkly crystalline coating similar in appearance to heavy frost or snowfall… A green city…would look like Narnia under the White Witch, crystal white and beautiful. The carbon choking our planet could become a harmless decorative feature.

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The intention of our Bike Friendly Service program is to create a consistent policy and experience for our guests in the drive thru.  To support this program, a cross-functional team, including members from Hawthorne Burgerville and community members from the Bicycle Transportation Alliance, have designed and are beginning the implementation of the first phase of the program.

Link via BikePortland

I made these plastic milk bottle lights by embedding LEDs in the caps, hanging them from a bent section of pipe and hooking them up to an Arduino microcontroller.

Not happy with an on-off switch, I thought they might look mesmerising with a rotary control knob turning them on in sequence. It works! They make great low lighting to wind down for sleep, and they’re great to hang in the hall for parties too.

There are complete build instructions on Instructables.

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Nachimir.

The futuristic new HQ of Norway’s StaoilHydro features five separate wings piled on top of one another in a seemingly haphazard manner. It saves energy by utilising renewable geothermal heat in its district heating and cooling system. Hot water (or cold depending on the depth from which it is extracted) is pumped out of a nearby disused coal mine straight into the offices’ radiators. Once the water in the radiators has cooled, it is pumped back into the mine to be naturally reheated by the Earth.

Link – via thrivecore

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Arby.

WebEcoist takes a look at the world’s worst offenders – take, for example, BP:

BP’s ad campaign with the theme ‘Beyond Petroleum’ led the public to believe the company was headed in the direction of cleaner, renewable fuels. But, it turned out the company was spending more money on advertising than on green efforts, leading Treehugger to ask, “What does BP stand for these days? Beyond Propaganda? Bye-Bye Planet? Bad Pollution?” After all those greenwashing ads, BP went and dropped $3 billion to buy into oil from the Alberta Tar Sands. Each barrel of oil out of the tar sands generates about two thirds of a ton of CO2, meaning BP’s 200,000 barrels a day will generate about 127,000 tons per day.

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Green roofs have become about more than just sustainable architecture – they have become new, long-unused canvasses for artistic expression and creative design.

This collection of green roof designs shows the possibilities of not only environmental architecture but of making something beautiful out of one of the most ubiquitous bare surfaces in the world – the roof – as we move into the future of sustainable design.

We’ve always thought we had roofs covered. They had to be barren, hostile places the rain and the wildlife slid from before they could do any damage. Nature had no place on our roofs. Except…we couldn’t have been more wrong. A green roof may required a little extra engineering behind the scenes, but it’s far better than its non-living counterparts for regulating house temperature, filtering out pollutants, scrubbing the surrounding air, controlling stormwater run-off, absorbing sound and many more factors that impact our quality of life. A green roof is a healthy roof.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by whitespace.

Could flexible organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs, be the future of lighting? Don’t worry; I don’t understand that sentence either. Keep reading for a jargon-free explanation.

On General Electric’s research campus in Niskayuna, NY, there is a machine that prints lights. This machine is so good at its job the lights it creates could make traditional lamps and lighting fixtures obsolete. In what sounds to be a relatively simple process, the semitrailer-size machine coats an 8” wide plastic film with chemicals and seals it with a layer of metal foil. When an electric current is applied to the plastic sheet, be prepared to throw on a pair of shades as it emits an ethereal blue glow.

Light from the sheet is produced using compounds known as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). OLEDs are currently used in television and cell-phone displays and have been embraced by large
manufacturers such as Siemens and Philips.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by whitespace.

Brand Image has set out to change the way we drink bottled water.  In an effort to enhance the consumer drinking experience and create a sustainable alternative to plastic bottles the designers have created the 360 Paper Bottle.

It’s the first 100% recyclable paper container and is made entirely from renewable resources. The paper packaging is food-safe and can hold a variety of liquids, making it the perfect alternative to traditional water containers.

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From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by whitespace.

Who knew that you can grow your own oil using microscopic waterlife in up-cycled plastic bottles… Pretty neat energy project.

– via blog

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by JKirchartz.

Watercone is a polycarbonate cone with the capacity to purify up to 1.5 liters of water a day with just a little solar energy.

All users have to do to create drinkable water is pour dirty or salt water into the cone’s black base, place the cone atop it in the sun. As the water evaporates upwards it condenses on the cone’s inner wall and tricles down into a seperate trough. To access the clean water simply lift the cone and pour.

Link – via treehugger

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by whitespace.

Goodwin is making a name for himself -- and his company, H-Line Conversions -- by turning gas-guzzling behemoths like Hummers, Cadillac Escalades, Jeeps and other big American cars into clean-power machines.

The first thing he does is remove the old inefficient engine -- even if it's a brand new vehicle -- and replace it with a diesel engine that can run on biodiesel.

"It's the transformation of what I call old technology to new technology," Goodwin says.

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From the Upcoming Queue, submitted by whitespace.