Green Design

ROI reality check on corporations saving the planet

From Business Week:

On the surface, it appears that Big Business is getting serious about climate change. Almost every major company is launching a green strategy, designed to cast it as being part of the solution on global warming. But how much are businesses actually doing to lower their emissions of carbon dioxide? And what happens when protecting the environment collides with the drive to maximize profits? BusinessWeek found that green claims range widely; most tend to be heavy on hype, light on substance.

The cover story, is a good reality check about how the greening of business is not always going to be fun or easy or even profitable. In reality, as the subject of their article points out, "This is hard work. It's messy. It's not always profitable."

They go on with some examples. One article follows the struggles of a "corporate sustainability advocate working for an Aspen resort:

Thwarted on guest rooms, Schendler switched to Little Nell's underground garage. Guests never saw it because valets park all cars. For $20,000, Schendler said he could replace energy-gobbling 175-watt incandescent light fixtures with fluorescent bulbs and save $10,000 a year. Unimpressed, Calderon again balked. If he had $20,000 extra, he would rather spend it on items guests would notice: fine Corinthian leather furniture or shiny new bathroom fixtures.

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Posted by Andrew at 12:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Instructables competition for green DIY design projects

Treehugger, Popular Science Magazine and Instructables.com website have come together to make a competition for "how to" tutorials about green inventions and designs made from found items, used items, or just stuff that's eco-friendly. The competition rules include helpful links to get you started making a tutorial with photos, illustrations or video.

I love reading sites like instructables.com, makezine.com, and lifehacker.com where people discuss ways to get more from technology that's already available. It's a very common sense approach to creation and design, but its still exciting!

Let us know if you submit any project ideas to the instructables.com "GO GREEN" competition (comment below, or email). And good luck!

Posted by Eoin Dubsky at 4:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Dell vs Apple: Eco-Rumble in the Electronic Jungle

Get the popcorn folks, it's the computer industry's heavyweight championship fight of the century.

Michael Dell led with an uppercut to the chin when he announced Dell's free worldwide recycling policy and challenged the industry to match it. Steve jobs staggered back to the ropes, dazed, then came back with a surprise left when he declared a phase-out of the worst toxic chemicals in the Apple product line (and a deadline to do so sooner than Dell's), along with a new commitment to eco-transparency. Yesterday, Dell shook it off and sucker-punched Jobs when he laid down his plans to become the greenest computer company in the world.

This is the kind of prize fight we love.

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Posted by brianfit at 10:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Australians produce energy from beer

...and not the kind that gets stored in beer guts! Homer Simpson was right: beer really is the solution to, and cause of, all life's problems. I was amused to read this morning that Australians have found yet another use for the country's most famous beer (which only homesick Australians actually drink) - scientists from Australia's University of Queensland and brewing giant Fosters have combined to research a project which will produce clean energy from brewery water waste.

It is expected the fuel cell will be running by September and Fosters has said the technology will be used to power all of the breweries and wineries owned by the company in due course.

More here: http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7007226620

Now they just need to come up with a way to produce energy from the huge amounts of beer the Australian cricket team consumes....

Posted by Adele at 1:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Branson on Biofuels: Grist chats with everyone's favourite billionaire

[Pic of Branson © Grist. Sorry Grist, just borrowed it for your own good!]

Posted by Adele at 9:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The Appeal of the Commons

I came across an intriguing article today, in the September/October issue of Peter Barnes, co-founder and president of Working Assets.

I couldn't find a copy of it on Adbusters, but I found variations of the articles - see the links below. I also found a video on YouTube of Barne's discussing the very basics of the idea of Capitalism 3.0 - the idea that we we need introduce a whole new dimension to capitalism, if we're to have any chance in protecting our environment and the future of life on the planet.

I've only read the basic articles, but I think I'll be checking out all 216 pages his book, Capitalism 3.0 over the next week or so. It can be downloaded for free!

Barnes writes:

"I'm a businessman. I believe society should reward successful initiative with profit. At the same time, I know that profit-seeking activities have unhealthy side effects. They cause pollution, waste, inequality, anxiety, and no small amount of confusion about the purpose of life."

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Posted by Dave at 6:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ireland's Vanishing Eco-Houses and building a new Elasticity

© MacGabhann Architects

Ever thought about grazing sheep on top of your house?

The Venice Biennale is on at the moment in... well, Venice. I've been reading about the Irish entries to the exhibition - and it's all very interesting. At first glance, the architects seem to be creating a kind of construction haute couture - but when I looked deeper, they seem to be both practical and imaginative in addressing the burning issues of day. Ireland's population is growing rapidly, and the infrastructure and housing market are only barely keeping up. And while there's demand for housing, a certain well-off strata of society maintain countless holidays homes on the beautiful west coast that remain empty much of the year, adding to the hellish 'Bungalow Blitz' that has quite a few people upset.

Indeed, while I sit here in a house in on Ireland's west coast right now, I'm surrounded by empty houses that have lain dormant since the end of August.

Now, however, two County Donegal architects, Antoin and Tarla MacGabhann, have come up with a novel way of 'hiding' houses - using hydraulic systems to hide holiday homes when not in use...

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Posted by Dave at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The shapes of green things to come?

Here's a glimpse of some strange green futures that have flickered across the low-energy flat-panel LCD screens over at the Greenpeace Secret Mountain Zeitgeist Laboratories.

The Dutch advisory for the landscape asked designers to come up with new generation wind mills. 100 MW mountains, a cooperation between One Architecture, Ton Matton and NL architect, suggested that grouping up to 10 turbines into a kind of flower bouquet would add a nice touch to the landscape.

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Posted by brianfit at 9:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)