Hombre se crea su propio miniparaiso flotante con 250.000 botellas de plástico [ENG]…

Después de tres años este tipejo se ha construido su propia isla flotante con botellas recicladas. Está hecho con una base de bambú, es algo más grande que una pista de tenis y lo mejor es que crecen plantas y arboles. Añádele además la casita …

[...] page, or find out more about me. I also have a RSS feed and full archives. Thanks for dropping by.Man (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles » ecoble Here’s one way of putting all those bloody plastic bottles to good use.Jonathan Coulton Sings [...]

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where did he get all the bottles …
and why did he have to make an artificial one when there r like thousands of natural ones …
environmentalist … ???

He turned rubbish into usable land – seems like a fairly environmentally sound solution.

I agree with ecoble here, where else would you stick 250,000+ bottles?

Wow dude now thats devotion.

haha
he said rubbish.

subcorpus he tolds that in the future he will travel trough the ocean with his island, he can’t do that with a traditional islan

Great idea! Although I also have to ask how environmental it was when 250,000 plastic bottles were washed out to sea after a hurricane destroyed the island?!?

Yeah, it’s environmentally sound until you consider that the sand was stolen from the beach and that after being destroyed by a hurricane all those bottles, instead of being recycled, ended up disbursing into the ocean. Also the plants on the island are not nearly enough to make it self sustainable.

[...] More delicious pictures and information are available here at ecoble.  Here’s another YouTube link. [...]

He created the island as part of his dream; he may have not had enough money to buy his own land -let alone island paradise- and he made it his own. However, I don’t think it’s as ecological as it seems, he may have ‘created’ land, but that’s only one person. For it to be a solution to the earth’s eco-problems, everyone would have to do the same, but most people, selfish as they be, are the vast majority, don’t want to give up their luxuries.
Not that this is relevant, I’m fifteen. I can’t find many people that express themselves properly on the Internet nowadays. It’s a shame.

I liked the part where they said he was taking sand from the beach. Very sound environmental practice indeed. At least he didn’t dredge it up like the islands of Dubai.

[...] Visto en Ecoble [...]

Canada is under represented on this map. refer to this wikipedia article on the alberta oilsands, an area with approx. 175 billion barrels currently in bitumen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athabasca_Oil_Sands

my bet is still not with hydrogen powered vehicles. there is a loss of energy on the conversion to hydrogen from an electric grid, which in most cases is still majority fueled by non-renewable sources such as coal. I think the straight electric as it uses the same source but there is not as much lost on conversions to the storage(ie battery vs hydrogen cell) is still the better option. more infrastructure is already in place or easier to adapt than implementing a nationwide grid of fueling stations for hydrogen.

General Discussion – Week 13…

Post your posts and comments below as usual… Green colleges Maddy The Sierra Club’s magazine released an article…

Vote Green and we will start seeing action.

Let’s make the politicians come to the party.

[...] LINK http://ecoble.com/2007/12/02/five-of-the-worlds-weirdest-alternative-fuel-sources/ [...]

No chance big oil will ever let these innovations see the light of day.

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If we used the all the money from the war and invested it in green energy we would have it by now. Also invest some into spaceships i want to see a hotel on the moon before i die.

I think green energy is cool and in now.

[...] Of Course the other sources of renewable sources like bio energy solar energy etc. Check out Five of the World’s Weirdest Alternative Fuel Sources. really [...]

[...] The five weirdest sources of alternative fuel. [...]

[...] are dirty islands of non-biodegradable plastic floating in our oceans? Well a former carpenter made his own tropical island buoyed by empty plastic bottles, and it looks like paradise. Spiral Island currently lives off the [...]

fsgh

I would kill for a Mr Fusion and a deLoreon. I think it is fascinating how with our energy reserves running low, we will turn to anything for fuel.
<a href=”http://www.ecobeater.com/” title=”ecobeater” Ecobeater

when and where can I buy some?

when and where can I buy some? Please send me info.

There are too many applications for this, where to start?

sounds expensive

Make a cool Tron costume.

Would be very nice for emergency vehicals, also.

Why yes, I would love a jacket that glows in the dark because it is full of radioactive gas. That sounds great… And they thought that lead was bad in paint. Soon China will be returning toys to the US because we painted them with glow in the dark radiation…

didn’t watch the video but from what i see its very innovative. definitely an environmentalist and an engineer. this is a great way to look outside the box and find immediate solutions to current problems the world is facing. just think how much further one could take this idea…

((( daniel says:
December 29th, 2007 at 1:59 am

Why yes, I would love a jacket that glows in the dark because it is full of radioactive gas. That sounds great… And they thought that lead was bad in paint. Soon China will be returning toys to the US because we painted them with glow in the dark radiation…)))

Just so you know, that monitor your using to type stuff like that is beaming radiation in to your head along with countless other household items.

Yes the jacket is 5,000 pound crush resistant….but your body isnt

Hehe, these work because they’re radioactive

Wait till a rapper gets his hands on this. Glowing grillz, slimer 26’s on the glowing escalade. oh my!

Hhmmm

Well in 2005 the bottles ended up everywhere and no- he does not sustain himself on the island. Ripleys put a very positive spin – on a seemingly very good idea that has a whole other side to it.

this is the coolest thing i ever seen. Its a shame to us Americans, that we can’t build this kind of buidings in America.

Cool!!! But, my question, does it generate more power than it consumes (what with being a building for environmental friendliness and all)?

Great pictures! I am also wondering about the amount of power it consumes compared to the amount it generates. Either way, nice find.

Sako, we have the coolest military gear though! Imagine what we couldv’e built for a trillion $$$ instead of war? Ron Paul for president!

This looks like you could ride your scatboard on it,preety cool

Of course it generates more power than it consumes. Even if it consumes more, who cares, solar energy is free for life because James Bond has shutdown the one and only solar blocking satellite built by the crazy villains.

Generates 500,000 kWh? I think you mean 500,000 kW (kilo-watt-hours is an amount, kilo-watts is a rate). It’s like saying Arnold Schwarzenegger is so strong he can lift 60 inches!

500,000 kWh isn’t a lot of energy. But 500,000 kW produced cleanly and sustainably is a lot of power.

[...] has over 5,000 active solar panels generating over 500,000 KWh of environmentally friendly energy.read more | digg [...]

RON PAUL for president!!! (forgot to add that to my previous post) =)

what makes it so hard for other countries to construct this????????
especially the netherlands

Why are we not doing this too. How long are we going to be known as the idiots in america?

hristopher Sachs says: January 9th, 2008 at 5:43 am Generates 500,000 kWh? I think you mean 500,000 kW (kilo-watt-hours is an amount, kilo-watts is a rate). It’s like saying Arnold Schwarzenegger is so strong he can lift 60 inches! 500,000 kWh isn’t a lot of energy. But 500,000 kW produced cleanly and sustainably is a lot of power.
==============================

Huh? Why do KWh go over the heads of so many people. A kilowatt-hour is a kilowatt generated for an hour. For instance, leaving a 1kw microwave on for an hour. That is 1kw/hr of electricity. 10c if you’re using fossil fuels.

The key to this is… how long does it take to produce the 500,000kw/hrs? Obviously it’s not producing a half million KW every hour or even every day, that’d be an insane amount of energy.

Is it per month? Per year?

Justraw wrote : “This looks like you could ride your scatboard on it,preety cool”

Wouldn’t that make a pretty foul mess though?

You think Ron Paul, ultra fundie Xtian racist who thinks Alabama and Mississippi had the right to decide that blacks shouldn’t integrate and abortion is murder, is gonna build that?

Put the bong down hippies….

How durable is this building? It’s awfully complicated, with a lot of moving parts, which is cause for concern due to the increased likelihood of problems arising. I think this may get very expensive to maintain.

That aside, this is one cool building!

Oh, and does the government of the country that produced this town have anything to do with constitutional libertarianism? Ron Paul?

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[...] Fuente | MetaEfficient vía EcoBle [...]

Soylent Green is PEOPLE!!!

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Americans could easily build it.
But not without making the last couple dozen years absolutely meaningless.

Delete my last comment and just tell chris sachs that he needs to take a physics course. It’s much more suitable to the topic here.

We can so build stuff like this. Look at the Googleplex with a total capacity of 1.6 megawatts!!!

That is so awesome when will these sustainability tech come down in price

[...] Some of these supposed answers to core climate questions are truly as bizarre as these weird alternative fuel sources and outlandish as this incredible man-made recycled island. Whatever your opinions on climate [...]

[...] questions are truly as bizarre as these weird alternative fuel sources and outlandish as this incredible man-made recycled island. Whatever your opinions on climate change these are, at the very least, entertaining and extremely [...]

5 of the Strangest Climate Change | Deliggit.com…

ecoble.com

Wait so is it global warming, cooling or climate change? Good, bad or ugly? The questi…

[...] eruptions to glacier-wrapping and space mirrors, here are five of the strangest such ideas on Earth!read more | digg [...]

Thats it! I’m going home to paint my roof white tonight!!

Great article, bit worried about the shiny trees tho.

Neat idea .. actually kinda novel in as much as it is not sustainable over the long term … too many contingent areas of vulnerability such as: the navigating of oceans with salt water and their effects on the plants ( other than Mangroves ) he has planted and/or corrosive factors; the nets containing thousands of plastic bottles can be compromised ( broken corroded or nawed upon to the point of sinking the entire island; fresh water requirements may not be adequate to sustain himself and plants; the eventual deterioration of the plastic bottles when crustaceans such as barnacles and the like begin to take their toll; lack of emergency medical treatment if too far at sea etc, etc.

It seems an ok concept if he remains close to shores and out of salt water but sailing around th world ? I don’t think so … but he is to be congratulated and admired for his efforts

After watching the U Tube video a second time hearing of the Mexican government claiming it and wanting to use it as a tourist attraction ( any opportunity to capitalize and make a buck ) well, there goes the peaceful tranquility of your “private, island sanctuary … and lastly, what of the sanitation factor … disposing or recycling all that human and animal waste so as not to contaminate the waters it floats in ? Logistics, logistics, logistics.

[...] Via Ecoble via Metaefficient via PHOTON [...]

[...] came across a post on Ecoble.com, titled the World’s Coolest Solar Collecting Building, so I had to take a peak. Unbelievable, [...]

Impossible.
The most optimistic number that I can find for solar energy density is 1.4 kW/m^2. So for 500 000 kWh
(That’s 500 Mega Watts) you would need an area of 357142.9 square meters.
Follow the more info link and we find that the panel is 315 meters long that leaves the height at > 1133 meters!
Maybe it’s just the camera angle but it doesn’t look that tall to me.

[...] Via Ecoble [...]

[...] abridged. To read the full list and full descriptions, view the original post at it’s source: 5 Strange Stop-Gap “Solutions” to Climate Problems [...]

We can get the Earth back to its temperature 100 years ago! Wonderful!

Ok, everyone: go out and get all that white paint (filled with toxins), paint your roof and fill the air with fumes. Then, dump the rest of the paint in your backyard, which will eventually find its way to your local water supply. Don’t forget about how much waste material will be created by the factories producing all that paint. And what are we going to do with all those used paint buckets?

Here’s the kicker… you’re doing ALL THAT in order to get back to where we were temperature-wise 100 years ago. Which is ONE DEGREE COOLER.

*smacks forehead* people are stupid.

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In the 70s, for those of us old to remember, the fear was Global Cooling. One plan discussed involved spraying the arctic and antarctic with black soot or some such material.

Of course, unlike today’s scientists, scientists in the 70s didn’t know what they were talking about. Heh.

Of course there is climate change. There always has been. Come visit me in Ohio. I will show you where glaciers many years ago dug up the terrain. What a great scam. Convince people that climate change is something new. Genius

[...] 5 Strange Stop-Gap “Solutions” to Climate Problems » ecoble – ecological design, green innovati… [...]

The atmospheric content of carbon dioxide has increased by 35% since the onset of the industrial revolution. You don’t suppose there is any chance that radical of a shift in our air could possibly be altering the environment, do you?

[...] Now Global Warming has stopped 5 Strange Stop-Gap “Solutions” to Climate Problems

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Just like the unit’s name implies, KiloWattHours are made by multiplying a value in KiloWatts by a certain number of hours. If you want to know the rate of energy being produced, you need to divide it by time, just like metres per second (m/s) KiloWattHours when divided by time gives us KiloWatts which is a rate of energy production. A value expressed in kWh has a different meaning without the number of hours involved.

Imagine I said that my car can travel 10,000km. This doesn’t tell us anything about the speed of the car until we know the time frame. 10,000km per year is fairly normal, 10,000km per day is quite fast. 500,000kWh per year is pretty good, 500,000kWh per century is not so good.

kWh are a unit that most people find rather confusing unit, much like Nm (Newton Metres) which are found my multiplying Newtons (a measure of force) by metres. I suspect this is because we are more used to measuring rates expressed as one unit divided by another, not just a bare unit or a unit multiplied by another. I hope I have cleared things up a little.

What all this means is that the panel doesn’t have to be 1133 metres tall, it only needs to be 10 metres tall as long as it’s out in the sun for 113 hours. Of course, in reality, it actually extracts less energy than the theoretical maximum and runs for more than 113 hours per year.

There are many more details at http://www.solar-ark.com/english/about/spec.html but to clarify some of the details mentioned in this blog, the outputs are 630kW and 530,000kWh per year. The actual usable power is 2x 300kW at 440V AC.

Although this is pretty cool, some of the best improvements to buildings can actually be made without solar panels at all. The building behind the solar array looks like it has been designed with passive solar collection in mind. Large glass windows to let in light and avoid needing artificial light, insulating glass to avoid needing costly heating and cooling and passive air-flows through the building to reduce the need for fans to move the air. It’s amazing that for about 10% extra building cost, you can reduce the running costs of a building by 50% and save enormous amounts of energy at the same time.

Also, their Free Winds ship is filled with asbestos: http://www.holysmoke.org/cos/freewinds-cancer.htm

Same ship is litteraly destroying the Bonaire environment with hazardous waste: http://sxmprivateeye.com/node/11952

Not to mention the hypocrisy with Scientology’s “shining star” Tom Cruise showing up to a awards show with a Bugatti Veyron…which from what I remember only get a few miles to a gallon of gas and wasn’t exactly environment-friendly to produce either.

Hey… As I was reading and looking at the pictures of the E-Meter, it occurred to me; Has anyone taken one of those things apart to see just what they have inside the mystical gizmo?

Someone needs to post an E-Meter dissection page online or something

Nice article. I wasn’t aware that the cult pretended to be in favor of environmental causes.

However, you lose me when you say “inaction of President Bush”. This makes no sense. President Bush started a war to fight terrorism instigated by the events of September 11th.

President Clinton was the one who took no action the first time the World Trade Center was bombed on his watch in Feb 1993 and he also nixed a plan to assassinate Osama bin Laden.

Maybe you’re not in favor of the current war in Iraq, but in no way can you classify that as inaction.

Otherwise, the article was nicely informative.

lol pretty soon you can use this shizzle to underglow ur car. im lookin forward to it, if u can let me know when and where it will be available.

In defense of Tom Cruise, he had the Bugatti’s engine modified to run on explosions of craziness rather than gasoline explosions seen in most other internal combustion engines. It’s the most sustainable fuel source known to man.

awesome, but where can you get one?

why would you want to get one?

I almost peed my pants laughing when I caught glimpse of the “Hubbard Electrometer”. It looks like a whacky device right out of Bioshock. LULZ

What’s wrong with a bit of darkness?

Yeah, this is going to take off like a lead baloon.

[...] A 15-Year Light Source that requires no recharges sounds great – at first anyway. It seems that this GloPaint innovation will last a long time as promised but leftover materials are of questionable toxicity so there is still waste to be considered – just fifteen years later. This may help replace emergency lighting in the short term but still isn’t a long term solution. Spread the Green These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]

very good writing! these techno. in great innovation but we should consider! Thanks for the information!

It’s only a matter of time before someone somewhere will have that “eureeka” moment and come up with a viable alternative to fossil fuels.

Until then we need to reduce carbon emissions by utilising proven energy saving products and methodology that are in abundance on a worldwide scale.

Governments around the world should agree a standard for innovative energy saving products in order to substantiate the saving they are claiming to make. Once the product is approved it should be added to a category that attracts a 0% import duty in order to make it attractive to promote and market all over the world.

R.O.I. (return on investment) is the driving force in the decision making process of most organisations when considering energy saving products. This mindset needs to be changed to one of reducing carbon emissions by whatever means possible in every area of operation including the residential sector.

I see a ton of FUD in this column. Stop and think about how many tons of ethanol producing crops we dump to rot every year that still recieve all those chemicals. I would rather seem them converted into something useful than just seeing them wasted.

Fusion – It will get there eventually, why are you getting your panties in a bunch. Is it a bad thing because you can’t have it right now? Reminds me of a George Carlin skit.

The floating islands is a novel idea, and with Dubai spending BILLIONS on creating artificial islands already when they have a whole desert to expand into, it baffles me that they haven’t built a couple of these already.

Hybrid cars – True batteries still have a long ways to go, and the biggest problem I see is their recycling lifespan. However, your column imparts an idea that they will never improve, which is ridiculous. Car manufacturing companies are now dumping millions into new battery research to overcome these limitations. If they wouldn’t see a profit from these cars taking off, do you think they would have bothered with it previously?

Zero Pollution Cars – Give me a break, you’re going to the gas station anyways, dump your collected emissions there. They can give you price break on your gas and sell it back to whatever collection firm is in the area. Jobs are created, environment is cleaner, and you save money, yeah it’s a bad idea.

Gravity Powered Devices – You are a lazy SOB aren’t you. Too lazy to spend fifteen seconds of your time moving a weight up a chain to gain hours of light that is independant of the grid? Remind me never to shelter at your house in a storm. You know, years ago people would spend that same amount of time ON A CLOCK.

15 year light source – This is probably the only thing I agree on, since the power driving that light is a radioactive source that would be extremely harmful if you came in actual contact with it.

Martin – Return on Investment is king, otherwise there is no reason to persue anything. Everybody needs to get something out of the effort that they are putting into developing/manufacturing. Stop and think about it like this. I sell you a house for $20,000, that cost $20,000 worth of materials to produce. I hope you enjoy said house, because now I am unable to pay my own rent. Why, because I made no profit on the sale of the house, and thus others down the line from me will suffer from my inability to make said profit. The profit is my return on the $20,000 I invested in building your house. That is why R.O.I. is the driving force behind all decisions. This is Micro Econ 101 stuff, not rocket science.

Articles like this are the problem with the internet, free knowledge is good and all, but it has become so easy to use even the idiots can make a blog and post their rants, thus driving down the overall quality of that free knowledge.

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I think biofuels will eventually become viable as we do more research on clippings and switch grass. NOT ALL biofuel has to come from a food source. Switch grass is one source that is already MUCH more efficient than corn based biofuel.

Alternative Eco friendly renewable energy is definitely the way to go. There are so many options today with so many new discoveries happening each day. I read of solar power becoming more and more efficient with printed panels that are 2+ times better efficiency at 1/4 the cost to make! Lots of new cool high efficiency wind turbines you name it.

The government needs need to make some serious long term $$ commitments to get the momentum going. Just image if they used 1/2 the money for the Iraq war. With existing technologies we in theory could be free from oil. It’s pretty sad what lengths the government will go to protect oil interests. There is such a deep good old boy network involved. Greed is the motive here. We need to shift from that greed and do what needs to be done.

We all need to do our part and get ourselves out of this energy and economic crisis!

All this article does is highlight that “sustainable” is a myth in any universe that has entropy in it.

[...] out-of-the-box thinking but lack feasibility. In some cases, they might do more harm than good.read more | digg [...]

Regarding biofuels – this country is capable of growing so much more than it currently is. I know here in North Carolina there is so much farmland that is no longer farmed and is fallow. Many farmers in the area are getting out of farming – I think it would be a way of keeping family farming alive, growing fuel crops.

I think if we all use a little conservation in the energy we use, it could be alot better, the problem is getting everyone to do it, and we slowly but surely are getting bigger corporations on the wagon for conservation of energy, we see ads like that send a good message I believe, and its easy to do these little things, and it truely does all add up, but its easy to get caught up in good ideas and miss the problems that come with it… i liked this article for exposing that other side. All sides need to be explored.

The mentioned gravity lamp is not working.
It is just a concept that was never build.

Generally speaking, I think we need less technology, not more. But I still want a gravity powered lamp…

i’m not convinced at all

Twenty years from now, absolutley no one will be talking about global warming. Their main condcern will be how to heat their homes and how unaffordable food will be since we will be faced with chronic shortages of oil and oil based products. Our primary focus should be finding some alternative economical source of energy regardless of the carbon levels they have.

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Coin purses make great media but they have no application to real-world environmental concerns. Yuppie lip service. Let’s get real.

[...] Recycling doesn’t have to be limited to helping the environment: it can also be a challenge and opportunity to ingenious designers who work with materials most people would consider waste to create amazing things. – Ecoble [...]

i am all for saving the environment, but let’s face it. being “active” is a huge trend right now amoungst impressionable youth. for instance, i see 15 year olds with “vote for change” shirts and “barack and roll” shirts all around town.

the way these things are designed they seem to be pretty stylish AND help the environment. however, 10 ball point black ink pens being sold at £10, this very well could just be one of the best marketing schemes ever.

This is just neat!

Great list. Are there any practical ideas that everyday people can use to reuse their waste?

excellent post!

I guess there are some thing you could do in this list. I mean, the CD case greenhouse is one such example, and I will be doing something similar this summer (provided it’s sunny, not flooding this year!) This said, I am going to modify the design from a black roof to a transparent roof…

The newspaper insulation in the house wouldn’t work very well anywhere there were cockroaches, as “wild” cockroaches live in between tree bark, so they love cardboard and newspaper. Your house would become a cockroach house. And God forbid there was a fire. I don’t even want to think about it.

Found this story on Digg. The cardboard bridge is amazing.

are the bottles half empty or half full?

This is a great site. Thanks for all the wonderful things you are doing plus, at the S.C.R.A.P. Gallery (Student Creative Recycle Art Program)we have thousands of cd containers and one more idea of how to reuse them always helps! Look out for a new crop of green!

how dose the sand not all get washed off with the water/waves!
how dose he keep it on the island?

Excellent point on the Ethanol bit.

Some people also seem to have forgotten that most of our beef and poultry are fed corn, which means higher priced meats as the price of corn rises due to demand.

A solution: stop feeding the cattle and poultry corn. it’s bad for them and makes them less nutritous. Feed them grass! Grass-fed beef is much higher in Omega-3 fatty acids tastes better, and is lower cholesterol than it’s corn-fed counterparts.

If you like this – look into “fibercrete”. It’s an old idea that works. Paper recycled into cement.

Fabulous creative ideas that may not work for everyone but every little bit helps…anything to create awareness. Check out “reuse centers” in your area, a growing trend of centers which collect reusable business discards and donate the items back to kids, educators, and artists, look for one in your area.

[...] hasn’t imagined living on their very own floating paradise? For those aboard ResidenSea, a permanent ocean-going residence, this dream is at least a partial [...]

[...] with our green theme, I saw this on Ecoble the other day, a rug made out of recycled clothing. Even though this kind of looks like my bedroom [...]

In addition to concurring with the two other comments, was this photo taken in the summer?

May the climate Nazis have their knavish tricks obfuscated.

Hi there,

I run a design and branding company that focuses only on environmental companies.

I am wondering the prices for a banner ad on your site for 1 week or 1 month or 3 months or 1 year

Thank you.

What a wonderful idea!

[...] that most urban cores are already densely built, one designer has proposed an auxiliary series of structures to be attached to existing structures in downtown [...]

It’s “per se” not “per say” — in itself, as such . . .

that is just so freaking cool!!!! spread the green!!!!

i totally agree with betty
=D

Without the help of Betty I would have chosen the most stupid idea of all to reduce Global Warming. Now I’m not sure what option to pick for my school assignment, but thatnks anyway Betty!!

Very interesting, but I will prefer to have a car moved by air, compressed air. It’s a reality already, I don’t know why it’s not being sold here in USA yet. In one year it will be running in the streets of India. Check on Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztFDqcu8oJ4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSwlTqaM1oA

That’s really amazing!
Japan is really playing with creative ideas (to be precise:a big international corporation).
I’m sure the USA is going to see loads of similar new renewable miracles, after the election, though.

I doubt if this guy will make it very far out to sea. It’s obvious his engineering skills won’t hold up to what Mother Nature on the high seas will dish out to him. But hey, somebody has to feed the fishies!

I doubt if this guy will make it very far out to sea. It’s obvious his engineering skills won’t hold up to what Mother Nature on the high seas will dish out to him. But hey, somebody has to feed the fishies!

why doesn’t he go use all the plastic already floating in the middle of the pacific?

Interesting idea. Until you get to the part where he wants to float out and tour the world. I wonder how many invasive species he’ll transplant and cause ecological issues with?

[...] toilet and multiple beaches. Don’t worry though: this guy is already building a new one!read more | digg story addthis_url = [...]

[...] Man (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating … … Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles … The manmade island floating atop plastic bottles : Rapidsea ~ Escape from Paradise … More delicious pictures … ecoble.com [...]

Everybody should sen their plastic bottles to him; I would.

I am very impressed… I like to see people doing things like this. Kudos to him

Regardless thats TOO sick. Its my dream, like I’m sure millions of others – but this guy did it.

Kudos.

Its beautiful.

To the critics i ask: since when is moving land from one point to another some enviromental risk?

And considering that the bottles would probably have ended up there anyway, at least he’s trying to make something constructive from the trash we’ve added to the planet. Whens the last time you did something constructive with your McDonalds wrappers? But thats cool, sit back, surf the web, watch TV, eat your McDonalds and criticize… when the food runs out someone has to die and frankly i’d feel better if it were you and not me.

What is all this talk about him not being an environmentalist because he took sand off a beach? Do you guys have any idea how much of the world is sand? You may as well be bothered that he had a few bottles of water to drink and that the water came from a river.

there is actually a long back story they are not mentioning, he was robbed several times from mexican nationals and was considered a thief due to the worth of the recyclables he was collecting. He wouldn’t last a month in open sea with that thing without a weather monitoring system

About 4 years ago I built a soda bottle pontoon boat. Here is an instructables link that shows it and how it was built.

I think we finally found a future solution to Pirate Bay’s server location problem.

Terrific find! I like the fact that it’s a catamaran-style for additional stability.

I can’t help but think that if the seating area was lowered, it could be used as an aquarium (ie, encased in a plexiglass design to allow seeing underwater).

btw, the current ad on this page (”create you pirate and play’) overlaps the [Leave a Reply] form in Opera.

That’s really an amazingly simple, yet very attractive design. It could really replace/support the fleet of rent-a-boats, which don’t look so tempting as this one.
Dry, sealed batteries as energy storage will probably support a real model.

p.s.
It really looks so ‘nicely posh’ for a rent-a-boat, though.

We, as humans, are just a bunch of amazingly successful rubbish producers.
Is there going to come a moment, when we are going to think and use our brain, before we ‘vomit’ even more waste?
Poor animals and plants surrounding us…God bless them.

Why do people leave such ignorant comments on articles like this? I think everybody has something to say, and nobody will listen to you. Get off your video games and myspace and read a book. FOX News obviously won’t educate you with their FAUX stories.

[...] Independent living…there’s one use for all those plastic bottles in the ocean. Man (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles – “The original Spiral Island was (as its successor will be) built upon a floating collection [...]

I like these new ‘renewable energy gadgets’, especially because they are first, but successful facts, that solar power,wind power, hydrogen really work in every day life.
Focus is really important, not to be lost in to many products, which simply couldn’t get enough scientific, technical, financial, marketing, etc. ‘attention’, because of the (small) size of this new renewable energy industry in comparison with other well known industries. So much more could have been done in this ‘brand new’ technological topics, if only efforts have been more focused, centralized, leveraged by sharing the knowledge and resources, worldwide.
Efficiency rates of new ‘green technologies’ are going to rise every year, the cost of final products is going to get lower and lower.

I think, that simplicity of the term ‘global warming’ is just perfect. Every body could understand it, not only a very narrow class of scientific society.
‘Global understanding’ of this very fact of ‘global warming’ and its regular comprehension in an average human mind are two conditions, which should be achieved as naturally as possible, if we wanted to address these real threats and real global changes, which are happening every day around the globe.

[...] caution and at least consider it a risk on a short-term basis. Otherwise, go do more research into whether or not climate change is fact or fiction and then reserve judgment and make up your mind after knowing the stats, facts, history and [...]

The most effective thing you can do to fight climate change is not to buy efficient-energy appliances, convert to green energy, or walk to the shops, etc. Though don’t let me dissuade you. Nor is glaring at that poor 17 year old checkout chick for offering you non biodegradable plastic bags, angry as they make you.

Nah, the best thing you can do to expedite the revolution, and bring on the carbon economy is to go and take on a AGW denial propagandist, on their own turf.

It’s these people that have been at the forefront of the well-documented, fossil-fuel industry campaign to create doubt in the publics mind about the link between co2 emissions. And they have been successful, the extent to which they have can be shown by the late ratification of Kyoto by Australia,and the non-ratification by the US. And more recently, by the 0.5% increase in carbon dioxide levels between 2006 to 2007 over the 30 year trend of 1.65 ppm.

I visited the original and its a lot more amazing outside of pictures I was fortunate to be friends with Barbara his X

What kind of critters got caught in the nets? Dolphins? hmm..
I admire his efforts to set a good example. At least he’s trying, which is more than I can say for most of our population.
If we all try to inspire others to take better care of the planet (that we could not exist without) we might be able to turn things around in time to save it. But people are so willing to criticize and poke fun at others’ valiant efforts that I am afraid that it’s going to be too late, that we won’t realize what we are doing until our earth is totally polluted and we have to try to find a new place to live. Who do you think they are going to pick to take with them? What do you have to offer if such a terrible (and unthinkable) thing came to be? Would they take YOU?
At least make an effort and spread the word. Support organic farmers, buy ecofriendly products, use renewable energy sources, don’t litter, protest the use of styrofoam, cut down on plastic, and THINK what we can accomplish.

I see this events just as a ‘political spin’ or ‘marketing spin’ of how to buy more time for not acting and not taking any responsibility, at all.
Sadly, very many people are going to die and suffer a lot, before there are going to be greater changes about this topic, if ever.
Every single week new coal power plants are opening all over the planet, millions of new cars are sold, thousands and thousands of new factories are opening in developing countries, huge forests are cut, etc. President George W.Bush is not supporting, President Vladimir Putin is not supporting China and India are not supporting, Gordon Brown is not supporting, etc.
Very sad, but true.

That is truly amazing practical solution of so many ‘night problems’. This company is going to make a fantastic profit, if they are really going to bring this product to the market.

Kon Tiki made it across the Pacific (well sort of). It was made of balsa, a lot less durable than PET bottles. Then again, Kon Tiki was not saddled with 60 tons of sand either.

Sailboats seem to have dealt with most of the problems he will face, so it is theoretically possible.

It does sound like he will have a lot of maintenance to do on the island. I guess it doesn’t matter as he’ll have lot’s of free time in the middle of the Atlantic.

Hopefully he’ll have all emergency devices (EPIRB, lifeboat, lifevest, etc).

Should be interesting if it happens.

Goat

I adore the creativity of these designers – scientists – engineers, how do they manage to combine all state of the art knowledge about ultra light materials, solar cells, computer control, sensors, into one working plane!
So many thousands of informations in working order, and it uses solar power, not patrol.

Saltwater Burned into Hydrogen and Oxygen…
Sorry boys but you can’t violate the laws of physics. It has to take more energy to separate the H20, than the energy produced. Otherwise you would not get heat. If it is above 100% efficient it would be a perpetual motion machine. Ain’t gonna happen.

That’s why ethanol is a scam to payoff the red state farmers and Republican supporter Archer Daniels Midland.

I would like to add slight correction about Britain and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

a quote: ‘a public consultation about new nuclear power plants on the issue which recently finished’

There were just a political spin. Government officials haven’t listened to absolutely any opposition towards nuclear power plants. Britain still haven’t paid $150 billion for clearing up old nuclear material from old nuclear power plants – decomposition of old nuclear power plants, yet the government wants to spend another tens of $billions for new nuclear plants.
Luckily, such hostile attitude towards renewable energy sources of British Labour government has achieved total defeat on national local elections and mayoral elections in London, last week. Gordon Brown has completely lost his authority and public support.
I hope, now, is going to come right time time for brighter future of renewable energy in UK, finally.

wondering how he is doing with the island now.. it been one years.. is he still staying there?

[...] is slated to open to the public within the next few months in Laguna Makax near Isla Mujeres. The new island has drawn in donations, volunteers and visitors from all parts of the world and walks of life – [...]

Hi,

Another green transportation innovation is the elliptigo, which enables a more ergonomic means for urban human powered transportation. Check out the video and blog at http://www.elliptigo.com.

[...] From Ecoble [...]

Well I am not sure if I would want to live their but he seems happy. What can I say I like my A/C and for me it’s just way too hot to be without it down there.

UPDATE: New Crazy Floating Man-Made Island Completed [PICS] | Deliggit.com…

\r\nThe original Spiral Island was the talk of the world: a man-made floating island const…

Why not build your own little piece of paradise? I love it when people dream big and make it happen. How cool.

[...] has more info on the island and looks into some controversy around the island (if it gets destroyed all the plastic bottles [...]

Is there a catch? Maybe non-toxic to use, but what about to produce? Seems too good to be true, but then again … *could* it be all good? If so, will big coal and oil buy this technology and then bury it (or whatnot)? We sure need technologies similar to this to start taking wing. ‘Course I also worry about application and durability. Disposability is what our businesses thrive on. All the petrol-plastic ever made still exists in our environment, and this surely will be used with plastic, as it can be mixed in. Ugh, glowing trash… What we really need is to stop acquiring things (which we typically abandon using within 6 months) and instead go plant a garden. Ok, off my soap box…

Sounds like they’re using tritium, which is totally safe. The beta particles released are low energy and can’t penetrate anything for the most part, including your skin. Also, tritium is a gas, so any breakage would result in tritium being released and dissipated in the air, which is harmless. Why do I know? Because I searched high and low for a tritium watch and read all about the stuff. It’s pretty uber.

Yeah Maxxy, you could almost replicate Automan’s car.

Radio active nano-particles. Just what the world needs.

I am skeptical. With the displayed level of brightness, maintained over 15 years, represents a large amount of energy. What kind of “radioactive gas” would release that much power?

Who ever said that it is powered by radium?

I’m quite interested in how it works but we shouldn’t assume that science has lept back to 1950’s America where watch hands were painted with the stuff. Also LCD screens don’t emit radiation.

Sounds like this is nothing more than tritium in microbeads. which is not really what you want possibly floating into your watersource.

Ik wil, ik wil….(I want, I want..)

Nueva fuente de luz que dura 15 años…

¿Qué le parece una fuente de luz brillante que dura 15 años, en lugar de los típicos 15 minutos?…

Where the hell have you lot got “radioactive” from? It clearly says on their homepage “non-radioactive”. Learn to read and stop scare mongering.

it lasts for 15 years…what happens when you want to “turn it off”?

hear hear !!

Can this be added to the paint used in the “yellow lines” on highways??

Maybe paint a few guard-rails too.
Make the highway systems look like Tron!

All joking aside. This technology has the possibility of saving many lives. Buy your stock in this company early.

[...] | incoming hURRLs | getting started | FAQ | blog Voila, the hURRL you reqested …1 hURRLs – New Light Source Lasts 15 Years Without a Recharge | ecoble [...] (first hURRLed by MrCoool @ 12 seconds ago /// permalink) MrCoool says:”Amazing! I want [...]

[...] Keeping with the theme of travelling and flights, here is a curious and practical suggestion to program for another destination, on Earth this time, the airplane carts. Bordbar is the collection created but the German designer Stephan Boltz to give us a new and super customisable cupboard on wheels. Adaptable to any kind of use, it is usable anywhere one may need to put things away with order and a touch of style [via Ecoble]. [...]

If this is made of Tritium which I bet it is (half life of Tritium ~ 12.3 years). I thought the US banned the importation and commercial use of this stuff. They do use it in nuclear weapons. They never let us have any fun.

Kids:

What’s really “amazing” is a skill called “critical thinking.” Think. Read.

Too bad they can’t use a gas with a longer half life, that would be awesome. But they are all probably too radioactive to be used, depending on exactly how resistant to electron penetration the glass and polymer walls are. If they are actually 100% resistant, or very close to it, then i dont see why they couldn’t use a different, longer half life gas. You might be able to make these things last for decades or even a century or more.

Tritium?

Homeland Stupidity already limits TRitum into the Country for fear of contamination \ dirty bombs etc.. how is this different?

What is the active ingredient?

Anyone?

LOL ok nevermind…
I just read the patent app…
2. A self-luminous microsphere as set forth in claim 1, wherein the gas is tritium.

Good luck selling it in the states or buying it. I’ll bet consumers never see the stuff.

Won’t you take me too… FUNKY TOWN!

You gan buy it here:
http://www.glopaint.com/24orders.htm

How about tattoo ink?

Traffic signs, road paint, emergency exit lights, communications towers, bikes, sporting goods, golf balls, dog collars, and more! If the paintable stuff does work well, then we just saved millions in energy, but also lives. When the street lights go out, the signs will glow and the lines on the road will be visible at any time, day or night!

According to their website “Our products are LEAD FREE and Non-Radioactive!”

Finally: this is the thing to coat a hockey puck with so we can see it on TV.

A light source that lasts for 15 years on it’s on, and yet, battery technology remains the same as long as it keeps making companies rich. When is someone going to convert something like this into usable amps to power our devices for 15 years?

Summary:

Tiny glass balls filled with a stuff that glows when hit by electrons, and gas that spews out electrons.

The electrons cannot penetrate the gas balls, so it’s safe.

The glass balls are so small that if damaged, the escaping gas is negligable.

And yes it is using radiation – beta – which is not considered dangerous (how this paint works is conceptually the same as how a CRT monitor works).

How about a glowing jumpsuit for when i am riding my motorcycle at night. Wait’s for the next Driver to say (s)he didn’t see him.

lcd screens do emit radiation, it’s called light…

Y’all, we can’t use these for road markings, the microshpere’s crush at 5000lbs of pressure. If I load up my single axle, two wheel trailer to 11000 GVW, then every time I change lanes, I’ll be releasing tritium into the atmosphere, and blacking out the road lines.

The company is playing fast and loose w/ the “non-radioactive” claim. Maybe they mean no radioactivity is released from the product, but considering that they use tritium (3H), it definitely contains radioactive material. The comparison #7 made to monitors isn’t really valid, 3H emits ionizing radiation, a monitor (or flashlight) emits non-ionizing radiation, BIG difference. Still, a couple of nanocuries of 3H shouldn’t be a big deal. 3H is used in Luminox watches right now, so it’s not really novel, probably just miniaturized so that it can be used in paints, etc.

Looks like this is indeed Tritium and IS INDEED radioactive, just another way to put more deadly particles of radioactive waste into our environment. Sure they claim none of the Tritium can escape, please remember scientists make mistakes, and salesmen will willingly sell anything to make a profit, even if it kills the whole planet after they make the sale.

Ok… you people do realize that this is vaporware and basically amounts to a meaningless publicity stunt…?

There is nothing whatsoever on the website that details anything about how this magical material actually functions or from where it obtains its absurdly abundant energy.

The “award” they got from NASA was basically for having the coolest-sounding idea… they are not required to explain how it works or actually demonstrate that they have created anything.

Believe it when there’s something in the store you can pay money for. Right now it’s just snake-oil, and you’re a sucker for buying into it.

I like The Tron Idea, all roads and guardrails…Cooool

Analog Science Fact & Fiction ran a story once about windows that captured the past and let it out again years later. A man who had lost his family had the windows in his house, showing the family scenes from years ago. Readers wrote in explaining that such a window would contain so much energy it would be hazardous, to put it mildly. So how is this new invention supposed to contain so much energy to provide all that endless illumination locked inside it, without being dangerous to health and safety?

I wanna glow while i sleep,i hope it’s gonna be available soon.

from Wikipedia:

“The low-energy beta radiation from tritium cannot penetrate human skin, so tritium is only dangerous if inhaled or ingested.”

Sounds as safe as lead paint.

I do believe I need a tat…..

New Light Source Lasts 15 Years Without a Recharge…

How about a glowing light source that lasts for 15 years instead of the typical 15 minutes of a glowstick? GlowPaint’s newest product does just that and is also non-toxic and inexpensive and doesn’t require a recharge via solar or electrical source…

Just be sure not to let Doc Ock find out where you store all the Tritium.

Ha! Tattoo Ink is a cool thought. William Gibson didn’t even think of that in Neuromancer. I’d like a glowing dragon for sure, especially with multiple colours.

This product is not dangerous.
The tritium used is encased in small glass beads so that both the gas and the beta radiation cannot leak, and is stored in these beads to minimize spillage if they rupture.
Even if it leaks, the low-energy beta radiation from tritium cannot penetrate human skin, so tritium is only dangerous if inhaled or ingested.

@Lenny: This is not yet for sale, all of the products on that page only glow for a few hours, and must be “charged” in another light source.

It says “non-toxic” – Tritium is not toxic, it’s a beta emitter version of Hydrogen. Beta particles are just accelerated electrons like old style CRTs & TVs. They won’t even penetrate your skin, let alone the borosilicate glass Tritium is commonly packaged in.

It’s banned from export, not import.

Radioluminescent tech got a bad rep because early versions used Radium which is a very strongly chemically reactive alpha & gamma emitter that decays into an Radon gas which is also an alpha emitter that you can inhale. Alpha particles can cause nuclear transmutation, which is very strong carcinogen.

What most people don’t realize is that both coal and oil contain radioactive elements that are released in significant amounts when they are burned in volume. By contrast, beta radioluminescent tech produces less radiation and of a much safer type. Don’t be scared by the word ‘radiation’ – even visible light is a type of radiation.

Great.
Glowing plastic trash. Maybe we’ll finally see the Pacific Gyre from space!
Would be nice to know how these will decompose and how long until it is in the food chain.
Can’t wait to glow in the dark too.

Been here, done this. Search around for some older exit signs and you’ll find that they’re “powered” by glass vials of tritium. The only new thing is that they’re packing it in microbeads. It takes a very tiny amount of shielding to protect us from the particles this gives off, as they are relatively low energy. Other materials with longer lives typically are of higher energy. Besides, who wants to deal with nuclear waste from a raincoat that was shredded 40 years ago?

I don’t see LITROENERGY for sale ANYWHERE.

Odd link to glowpaint because “glow paint” requires light, THEN glows a while. Read this about LITROENERGY:
“without any exposure to light”

Whereas GLOWPAINT says:
“Each time the item you have painted is exposed to light for 15 minutes the item will glow in the dark.”

“Litrospheres (non-toxic) emit light continuously for 12 plus years (half-life point) without any exposure to a light or other energy (not effected by cold or heat).”

http://www.createthefuturecontest.com/pages/view/entriesdetail.html?entryID=567

[...] – Ecoble Filed under Eco-product, Energy, Technology [...]

Wow can you imagine how this could change third world countries with no power? Imagine lighting your house for free !

One supposes the tritium gas is “non toxic” as long as it is contained within the 5Klb crush resistant “micro-spheres”?

Well, certainly, they could advertise it is 100% natural too. Wonder what the inventors def of “non toxic” is??

What do we really need this stuff for? I could see a glowing string bikini on an exotic dancer under black light doing her thing, maybe. When was the last time anyone really used a “glow stick” rather than a flashligt to illuminate something? Don’t reflectors work well enough in presence of car headlights?

Wow, soon we will not have any dark left and be constantly bombarded by glowing everything so we are “safer” during the evil night. This sounds a lot like that gyroscopic unicycle thing that was supposed to revolutionize the world. Ride a bike, get a flashlight. I’ve got an LED one with a crank. I’m sure it is good for 25 years or so since the actual time it’s ever been utilized is so limited. I’ve got 25 year old flashlights that still work too! Probably better to invent a better battery for those old flashlights that still work.

Are they going to make glow-in-the-dark stars with this stuff?

I’d LOVE to put some of those on the walls of my room!

[...] Fun in Life …. Fun can be hidden in small words …. « Job Application New Light Source Lasts 15 Years Without a Recharge May 23, 2008 check this out. [...]

Cool Stuff!

Awesome list!

[...] Brio 54 introduces a new set of prefab residential prototypes built with shipping containers.read more | digg [...]

kudos to this man, he should be awarded for this endeavor.

I would like to wear this wardrobe for my 1st marriage anniversary:), it looks cool.

When the fuel prices are going up, I believe the only resources would be to go forward with the alternative fuel.

Wow ! Just how many of you eco people are using sea shells instead of tolet paper? LOL!
This guy had a dream and he made it come true. How many of you have made your dreams come true no matter how stupid others think it is. Lets build an ARK next! but this time don’t use wood!

i don’t like global warming as much as the next guy, but i think that it is a natural thing that will eventually happen anyways. as for people say that global warming needs to be stopped… i belive that they are wrong. The earth has already gone into, and out of ice ages before industries and greenhouse gasses were a problem. Yes, i understand that they are speeing up the process, but, how far were we from it in the first place? i am all for reducing emissions, and saving the ozone, but when people are flipping out about how they need to be stopped right now….just chill….nature will take its course, and that will be that, wether we impact it or not, the glaciers will melt, the climate will change, and the world will still keep spinning. i bet by the time we get in trouble with climate change, we will have already polluted our land with so much garbage, and chemicals, that it will become impossible to grow crops, food proces will rise, people will starve, and life will be a struggle. and if we do not pollute our land to the point of infertility, we will over populate the earth and still end up with people strving, prices rising duie to high demand, and life will again be a struggle.

Marcus Aklybok — age 9 ( my mom made me put this so that you will all think i am smart, but i don’t want to brag)

Heaven Hi to you all*

It,s Rishi here or Rieshie, actually on my passport Richart Sowa (I like to play with names),
Most of what is said above is true. I like it, but the part about the disaster and the island littering the area I thought was rather unclear. So I would like to add that it was hurracane Emily which destroyed Spiral Island and that the debri was localized within a few hundred feet on a beach where construction of condos was about to begin. In fact that was the very reason why Spiral Island was moored in such a vunerable position at the end of a rock pier and only one week away from sailing to a more natural location and It took only one week to clean it up with the help of Puerto aventuras,s clean up team. I was tying to get it back in the water, the mangroves were sprouting again after only a few days.
Yes there are many natural Island so why build an artificial one?
Have you ever thought that if the oceans do rise how much land we will lose?
Have you ever thought about how we will sustain ourselves as a human species as the population increases and recources are used up?
And think how exiting and how much fun it would be to travel around the globe on an Island, even go to wher the flotsom and jettsom trash is gathering and use that to enlarge and as it grows it becomes stronger with the outer salt resistent plants protecting the inner more vunerable ones and Islands like that could even provide a way to survive like arks through times of global trouble!

The net fruit sacks and nets which hold the bottles beacame interwoven with salt resistent mangrove roots, they had grown to over 7 meters tall in only 5 years, which is higher than the mangroves on shore where they were taken from. I transplanted the young mangroves in the dry season when most young mangroves wither from lack of water.There was always water for the roots on the Island as it rose and dropped with the changing levels, so they grew much faster and stronger on the Island. The mangrove roots actualy provided a very good organic buffer stopping bottles rubbing together and wearing thin with the movement of the waves. This and the fact that they were in the cool water away from destructive solar rays ensured their long life. In fact after 6 years some of the first bottles to be put in the Island were checked and found to be fine. Sea weed quickly grows on the nets and bags making sure that fish do not get trapped by filling in the gaps and adding a slippy covering, then shell fish and corals start to grow in turn providing a habitat for many other types of marine life.
My dry compost tiolet was built on a platform over a waterproof tarp above the mangrove roots. There was no leakage into the ocean and with a light covering of leaves also no unpleasant odor, this made usable compost for plants such as bananas, melons, tomatoes etc.
The sand I took from the beach actually helped the passage of boats into the marina because the prevaling winds almost constantly blew sand into the marina,s entrance. I would take some from the edge where there was too much. Yes sand can be washed off easily and with the new Island the beaches will hinge back and fit together like a puzzle for travelling in open waters.
The new spiral Island Jouxsqey will be opening in August 2008,,,please come and explore this amazing possibility of making selfsustainable land on the ocean, from TRASH to TREASURE* ISLAND!

If there are any other questions please post them to the website spiralislanders.com

Love peace and Joyfulfun,,,Richart Sowa

[...] found in faux-historical interior furnishings. There are some more great green furniture items and unusually cool recycling projects at Inhabitat and Ecoble as well as some neat recycled art over at CultCase. under: Urban [...]

Whether Richie Sowa succeeds in making a long sea-going voyage or not, in my eyes this man has succeeded in doing something not that many people have dreamed of, but something that virtually no one dreamed of. Hats off to you, Sowa!

found your site on del.icio.us today and really liked it.. i bookmarked it and will be back to check it out some more later ..

Haha, reminds me of Neil Stephenson’s Snow Crash. Seems like the hero was living in a shipping container or maybe it was a storage unit. Those homes look pretty sweet though. I’d take them over a trailer any day

You might want to checkout this article about hydrogen

http://ezinearticles.com/index.php?The-Truth-Behind-Hydrogen-Gas-Saver-Devices&id=1235858

[...] Pee as a product? In 1986, the folks at Lexington Outdoors, an outdoor supply store in Lincoln, Maine, began selling urine from predators such as wolves, foxes and mountain lions to hunters. The product, known as Predator Pee, unexpectedly became a hit with gardeners eager to keep pesky varmints such as mice and deer away from their plants. “It was a safe bet to follow the market,” said Ken Johnson, a co-founder of Lexington Outdoors, in an interview. Business is good, growing at 10 percent to 20 percent a year. The product retails for $22.99 for a 12 ounce bottle. (A 32-ounce jug of insecticide sells for $19.97 at Lowe’s.) When asked how he collected his product, he quipped that “It’s not bad once you get them to hit the bottles.” Actually, the urine is collected from animals in captivity via floor collection drains, he said.Recycled wonders. Terracyle has taken recycling to a new height, figuring ways to convert trash like juice drink pouches into tote bags and worm poop into fertilizer. Other one-of-a-kind products from reused stuff include baskets made of chopsticks and home furniture from recycled wood and other items. [...]

It’s sad how all of these breakthroughs are being made by the mom n’ pop producers and not being picked up by larger corporations with the money to produce this stuff in mass.
I’m 16 years old and for the longest time I thought that souring gas prices wouldn’t affect me by the time I was able to drive because I would be using a cheaper alternative fuel source, but now that I’m well on my way to getting my license, I know that isn’t even close to the case.

[...] bit to get it going. Still, you get to toss out the pricey gas costs associated with most water cruihttp://ecoble.com/2008/04/15/awesome-solar-powered-bicycle-boat-design/CruiserBike.ca – Cruiser Bike, Low Rider, Beach Cruiser, Vancouver …What I got was an overwhelming [...]

Chicago is a great city. The Olympics would be great here.

This is why Chicago is the greatest city in the USA (in my humble opinion). Taking majestic steps into the cutting edge of design and technology with a Mayor who wants the best of the best. Kudos to the initiative for invention while solving problems concurrently.
Is it for the press and potential Olympics in 2016? Maybe. But who cares. It’s a winner either way.

[...] Based on the article from ecoble. [...]

Okay …. sooo… this is not kid friendly but IS a good idea…. Road lines… maybe not but guard rails, signs, towers, car paint… all totally acceptable and since is a gas and not a solid its Unlike Lead paint… if you were to paint a room with it and they were to all break at the same time it would not be harmful unless the room was sealed… and the person stayed in there for a excessive amount of time… I would love to see sumwun steal a glowing car…. lol no wun would notice that…. and this does have 10000 of uses if i had sum money to invest freely believe me i would put Some.. Not All my money into this company… Beta particles are harmless to humans…. so dont go on about radiation dangers… Learn to read up before you mindlessly post a comment about a possibly fantastic idea…

some one said something abouthim trasfering invasive species, I belive ther is really no so thing. It’s just evolution in progress, how do you think species get where they are to begin with?

The horse ridden carriages soon went out of business, and eventually an alternative fuel source is what consumers will buy and use. It is inevitable. Only a matter of time, and enough people to say enough is enough. They are already tinkering with 4 day work weeks for crying out loud.

it’s scary what’s happening with our natural areas.

The Arctic is so bad now that there have actually been waves lapping along the traditional Arctic shipping routes (the NW Passage over Canada and the North Sea Route over Russia).

The fact that these traditional iced areas are experiencing waves, as well as the fact that more ice is drifting away from the Arctic as well as melting, and it makes for a scary scenario that there may be no ice left in the region before long.

The impact of that on the wildlife and the planet as a whole is just too frightening to imagine.

Dick Cheney Thinks Threats to Public Health Are None of Our Business…

Cheney’s people specifically asked for the removal of data in congressional testimony which proves the negative health consequences for human beings as a result of climate change. At stake is pan-industry regulation by the EPA under the ……

More Nukes, Less Kooks!
Sounds like a great idea to me!
I wish them luck marketing it to the same clowns who hold up grocery store lines making the clerks manually enter every item because they don’t want their purchases ‘contaminated by laser radiation.’

Bush & Dick agenda OIL OIL more oil
may GOD bless this country and its people.

LOL Cheney is a MORON in every sense of the word!

JT
Ultimate Anonymity

Looking forward to Jan 09!! Thought readers that liked this post might like this site:
http://www.bushslastday.com/

[...] read more | digg story [...]

Well what else would you expect? This is Dick Cheney. Mr.Warmth.

He does not believe in anything that might benefit someone else. He would find a way to make a buck from disease if he could. He probably has. He along with Bush will go down in history as some of the most unprincipled SOB’s ever. And Cheney has a daughter that is a chip off the old block.

This man holds so much of mankind in contempt. Well he can’t live forever. Perhaps in some wild irony, he will die of a new disease.

[...] read more | digg story [...]

[...] read more | digg story [...]

Republicans are just too entwined with the oil and car companies and their lobbyists to ever offer policies that might be viewed as forward thinking and progressive. This new story is another example of that:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/14/AR2008071401049.html

Rick says:
on May 7th, 2008 at 11:15 am Buzzkil said:
” Sorry boys but you can’t violate the laws of physics.” It appears to have been already been done! Look at the experiments with liguid helium and magnetics. If the laws of physics can be manipulated (not broken) think of the possibilities!! I really believe that we can find an alternative fuel source that is right under our noses if we’d think outside the box and keep trying. Yes, there are scams out there and we need to be aware of, and avoid them. One day however, I do believe we’ll discover a source of fuel that is both environmentally and economically compatible .

I am writing from India.Saw this man’s island on Ripley’s Believe-it-or-Not two days ago.I was spellbound after seeing his island.I wonder how he thought about this.This is innovation.He has done something that no one of us might have even thought about.I think he is an inspiration to the humanity and is truely on a next level of human thoughtfullness. I am completely taken over by him and would like to meet him and congratulate him on his success.
Richart has shown that a human heart can make you attain anything that you dream.What’s required is the belief in oneself.He is ‘The Environmentalist’ in the true sense of the word.I remember lot of faces who have touched humanity from all across the world.Some of them are leaders, some artists and some are very common people.Now I would remember one more:Richart Sowa.I support you Richart and wish you all the very best.May lord always be with you. ~Pranav from India

That is really interesting. I would love a pedal-powered generator! Save money and burn calories all at once. The nightclub that uses human power sounds like an exciting experience as well.

I wish I had $5,000 to name a new species. They should really advertise this opportunity and get celebrity endorsements. I bet it would catch on and the donations would pour in. Some people spend thousands of dollars on clothing they wear once or twice – surely it wouldn’t take much to stand up for this cause.

Travel more than 300 miles for just $3 – amazing! I know it sounds restrictive, but I think stricter rules regarding individual and household recycling should be enforced so we can make use of our waste and save other resources. It’s amazing how much we take for granted on a daily basis and when I think of all the people in the world and the daily drain on the planet – it makes my head spin.

Mr. Sowa is a true frontier blazer in an age when we need to look further down the road for new and inovative solutions to ecological issues. Maybe as he moves forward in his endevour he will inspire even more people to think outside the box, or at the risk of sounding cliche, “Realize that there is no box”! I find that Mr Zowa’s accomplishmet has seemingly opened somewhat of a pro and con discussion. Also some questions regarding his procurment of something as abundant as sand. You have got to be kidding! I think that there is a part in most of us that would love to see him succeed and that we should embrace his attempt to look past what we see as normal and forge new ideas. Richart, you are a true inspiration to me and I wish you the best of luck.

Good to see that George W is doing all he can to get the dems back in power.

Yeh, it’s kind of cool the technologies that people are coming up within the eco/green markets. Technology will most likely lead the way towards general acceptance of green living.

[...] stark industry of the former Soviet Union clashes with your environmental sensibilities, you might make your own island out of recyclables like Richie Sowa did in 1998. A new Spiral Island has been built and is set to open to visitors [...]

This is so cool!
I wish I had one of those.
However, I am not sure how practical this designs are, I mean – is the solar power is ebough to run the boat? is it now taking too much space? and what about sailing at night?
I hope that there is a good answer to all of these questions.

This has quite clearly been designed by somebody who knows next to nothing about boats or about photovoltaic solar power.

It’s got paddles instead of screw propellors, which haven’t been used seriously since screw propellors were developed because they’re so inefficient, and with the tiny amount of power that solar panels put out you’d want your propulsion system to be as efficient as possible so you didn’t waste any.

Speaking of which, today you would coat as many of the upper surfaces of the boat as possible with flexible solar panels and not just have a couple on top of the mushroom to maximise the possible energy generation:
http://www.newscientist.com/blog/technology/uploaded_images/SolarBoat1-750683.jpg

If you want a clean powered boat wind is a novel idea… if you don’t want sails, you can use things like this:
http://i.treehugger.com/images/2007-2-21/Windmill-Sailboat.jpg

What a buffoon! I wish he’d just keep it zipped.

[...] the same time there are hundreds of new marine species discovered each day, many of them beneath what was once arctic ice.  While these new species may or may not [...]

Unless the laws have been changed these will not be available in at least the U.S. and Germany, if you want to see something that’s already in production and has been for years using an almost identical system google Trasers.

[...] repellents:hello, my name is mosquito magnet. – suggestions from ideal bitenatural bug repellentsnatural mosquito repellents (marigolds, mint, cayenne pepper) — from ecoble (browse that website for even more green [...]

Sorry to disappoint you folks but the story behind the Sanyo`s solar power is much different than you imagine, I know that (without going into details) because I worked there. The truth is …. A Sanyo salesman made an error on an production order for one of his customer (let`s say the customer order 1000 solar panels and the sales guy add 1 more zero), after that and almost at the same time the president was going to a trip by shinkansen which passes in front of the old factory (where today is located the solar panel) and thought that something need to be done in order to “hide” the old factory looking … therefore, he used the mistaken order (taking out from the “9000″ solar panels left) to cover up the factory from shinkansen view. I know, sometimes the reality hurts and destroy dreams but that is what happen.

[...] read more | digg story Posted by matwau67 Filed in Uncategorized [...]

When I saw the news this morning about McCain it was an absolute “Here’s your sign” moment. UGH!I can’t say I’m sold on Obama, but it’s a no brainer over McCain. I liked Edwards, but I can’t help but feel disappointment right now. This isn’t a Clinton moment, the wife has cancer, that’s a low blow.
Oh well… just my 2 cents…
Jen

BTW – only thing about your post… look at the ads Google picked up on your page! LOL

Scientology, what a brilliant idea. You write a crappy science fiction book then a team of mindless drolls say it’s for-reals then they form a powerful lobby of ruthless, criminal activity. The head of the shabang is an actor who can’t really act, but then again you need an actor and/or a sociopath to run the show because that’s how cults are driven. If it wasn’t so disturbing it might even be funny.

[...] today, there is a powerful entry in a blog: “Without positive, permanent action taken RIGHT NOW, the latest estimates say we have 8 years and 4 months before climate change has reached an [...]

[...] read more | digg story Posted by hannah62 Filed in Uncategorized [...]

[...] Months OneHundredMonths – 100 Months for Climate Change | ecoble – ecological design, green innovation and … ADQ __________________ She had rings on her fingers and bells on her shoes. And I knew without [...]

In the IIWW Uk found so may ways to survive in a very dificult situation. They did it and achieved better health marks than befora and did it by using their gardeb«ns as food source, tehir clothes to exchange, their knowledge to be sahred, but also by simplifying their lifes.

And I so much wich we could downgrade our lifes: it is simple and works so well

The trouble isn’t generating and storing wind power. It’s transferring it from the wind power collection site to other cities. http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/26/business/grid.php

Buen post, las ideas son muy relevantes. http://FundacionAsis.Org

hmmm, If we HAD to pick from THAT list… I think the orbital mirrors are the best bet, everything beside the paint and arctic sheet have little chance to be reversed, and we already seen whats wrong with the paint idea, and the arctic sheet is too costly… the mirrors are the only thing on that list that can be reversed and is ‘reasonably’ priced…
then again hitting Yellowstone supper-volcano with a nuke has a certain appeal as well.

On behalf of the Greenloop Blog, I always loved the number 9… as in Revolution Number 9 honoring John Lennon.

You mention Boho as the very first green fashion magazine. Though I L-O-V-E Boho, it’s far from the first… iTch in Denmark historically was the first, which indirectly led to the birth of Nylon… Foam in Los Angeles is a full fledge green fashion magazine, and so are Sublime and Lunch in London. You can find more green fashion titles on this page:
http://www.remyc.com/paperproject.html

Great blogs, but I’m bummed I’m not on your list!

That’s an excellent point, Scott! We’ll try to address the issue in future articles, and look at some of the possible solutions that are being developed. For the most part, though, those solutions basically require that agencies and state boundaries become more cooperative. The technology isn’t the problem, after all, it’s the bureaucracy that needs to be overhauled.

Thanks for putting Greenloop’s eco fashion news source, In The Loop, on your eco fashion blog Top 10! We’ll continue rocking it out for all you sustainable stylephiles. ***Also, I most definitely second the emotion on Eco Chick and Victoria E!

[...] repellents:hello, my name is mosquito magnet. – suggestions from ideal bitenatural bug repellentsnatural mosquito repellents (marigolds, mint, cayenne pepper) — from ecoble (browse this website for even more green [...]

Number 6 on your list is one that really stood out to me. It’s so much more important to reuse and buy old and used goods. That’s so much greener than buying newly produced “green” and organic goods. And on the other side, make sure to donate your used items too.

Um. You completely missed the point of buying in bulk. When people say buy in bulk they’re not talking about purchasing a 50 pack of Hot Pockets at Sam’s Club. They’re talking about shopping in BULK BINS at places like Whole Foods or a community co-op where people are encouraged to bring their own containers and bags to fill up.

Also, you missed one of the cheapest ways to “be green”. Cutting out meat. Not only is it the most impact a single person can have on the environment, but meat is so expensive that it can often cut a food budget in half.

I wasn’t aware Whole Foods had a bulk bin, and for the record my list is ways you can save money, while going green. I would never suggest someone shop at Whole Foods to save anything, since it’s completely over priced. Many people DO however, shop at places like Cosco [amongst others] to buy items in bulk, for a low price, and I was against it.

And, as an avid meat eater [free range, which is my preference] I would be a hypocrite to tell people to become vegetarians.

Craigslist is great!

We moved down to LA a couple of years ago, and furnished our entire place via Craigslist for under $500. Some of the best stuff was free – including a couch that probably would have cost $1,000 alone.

We left LA a year later (we’re in a small town on the ocean north of Vancouver now) and sent everything out over Craigslist again…

I agree with Nebraska. I buy in bulk all the time, but it’s not at cosco, etc., and it’s not candy bars and milk. It’s stuff like flour, sugar, oats, basic staples. And it’s at local co-op’s. It actually saves alot of money. It might not be as expensive as you think.

[...] And “10 creative ways to recycle ordinary objects.” http://ecoble.com/2008/03/12/10-unusually-creative-ways-to-recycle-ordinary-objects/ [...]

i feel as though there are many people just go green to look trendy. sad

Thanks for the great list! Those sites are a fantastic resource for Eco-fashion!

Not Just Pretty Modern Organic Clothing has a green fashion blog now too! We would be honoured if you’d check it out:

Just something to Add to this If the Ice caps melt the Sea water will not rise at all do a test at home put an Ice cube in a glass of water mark the line put it in the dark so that you can’t blame evaporation then have a look when its melted because when water turns to Ice it expands then gets smaller when it melts.

Also has anyone actually seen any hard evidence that we are making the world warmer by driving cars ect I havn’t because if you ask me I think we are just recovering from an Ice Age and in a few thousand years time it will start getting colder again.

Just something to think about!!!

[...] Image via Ecoble [...]

[...] ecoble 21st century, earth day, invention, love, miles per hour, prototypes, uncanny resemblance, Weird [...]

[...] -Ecoble [...]

Another great example of piggybacking…Good article you brought a lot of points to my attention.

Haha! What a brilliant post. Thanks for making my day. Now, where are those reusable bags?

I love eco-design, and would like to signalize to the readers of this blog another kind of ecological furniture made by the italian company SIKALINDI. They make furniture utilizing the wood of Pirckly Pear Cactus, that is a rapid growth plant and requires annually a brash just to control his own expansion.
More info on the web site http://www.sikalindi.it

Great article!
The boondoggle is even much worse…
Peasants around the world can’t afford US corn anymore, so they’re burning rainforests to plant corn so they can eat and it’s accelerating GLOBAL WARMING! See “The Ethanol Lie” on youtube.com or go to http://www.ethanol-lie.com

I totally agree! I am so glad those people do all those things, because in the long run, it adds up. But having to deal with their snobbery demeans the whole movement as well as disheartens those who are new to the whole concept. Let’s do our part and be as helpful as we can be in order to help move the green wave forward and save our planet.
Theresa
http://www.embodies.com

“Doesn’t anyone remember that back in the 70s when our parents were getting fed from the so-called experts that there is a new ‘Ice Age’ coming. Now they’re aspiring for this generation to believe that the reverse is happening. Our parents didn’t buy it then, and there children shouldn’t buy it now. It seems pretty arrogant to suggest that our planet, which has been around for longer than we can imagine, can not take care of itself. Yes, the climate has changed, and will continue, to change. It is natural. At one point in time, most of the earth was ice. At another point, it was covered in water. At some point, it was hotter than you know what. We need not be careless, but I think the extremist-alarmist-environmentalists are a bit off. Mother Earth is capable of taking care of herself — Volcanoes, hurricanes, tsunamis and other anomalies are her weapon. All the earth is experiencing are the cycles it has been going through since it’s creation. The Earth warms up some, then cools down some. In other words the temperature will fluctuate over time. Nobody really knows how many times the earth has frozen and thawed. There are speculations by scientists, but these scientists are also paid by the contracts and grants that allow them to keep doing research. All we have is the scientist’s speculation, whose very bread and butter come from research on subjects like global warming.”

Brilliant information! Thanks so much for putting that together. I will definitely spread the news through Garments Without Guilt at http://www.garmentswithoutguilt.com, where we love eco-fashion for being guilt-free! Wheeeeee!

check out the eco bags by mat and nat on bleuclothing.com

Hot hot hotness!

FlatPak does amazing work. Finally a prefab with some flexibility in design.

This was a refreshing post.

It’s easy to get caught up in the movement, when the movement becomes who you are instead of what you do.

I’m a writer for a couple of green websites and when you get to the point where you know how much bauxite is in an aluminum can and how the growth of India and china is influencing the prices of aluminum, recycling your water bottle seems trivial and not using a reusable bag in the store seems downright criminal.

Thanks for the reality check.

Adam Shake

[...] of t­he­ T­op 10 G­re­e­n­ Fashion­ Blog­s by E­co­­b­l­e­. Th­an­­k­s [...]

fwiw, I shop at Costco all of the time, for simple household items and food. For food, what I do get can be separated easily and frozen. I intentionally look for reduced packaging. What I don’t get is supermarket single-use packaging like Styrofoam boxes and individually packaged snacks. A Costco bag of greens can last a week, and stays relatively fresh with minimal fuss. not to mention that I can share these foods with friends. Buying bulk isn’t just for big families.

Another thumbs up for another blogger, altering the eco and keeping up the good fight. Great Article.

Prefab is stylish and sustainable. Here s a great example.

[...] 9 Unusual Alternative Energy Options – the Potential of Biomass [...]

Just to update: Michael Pollen sums it up best:
<blockquote cite=”In fact there is nothing inherently efficient or economical about raising vast cities of animals in confinement. Three struts, each put into place by federal policy, support the modern CAFO, and the most important of these — the ability to buy grain for less than it costs to grow it — has just been kicked away. The second strut is F.D.A. approval for the routine use of antibiotics in feed, without which the animals in these places could not survive their crowded, filthy and miserable existence. And the third is that the government does not require CAFOs to treat their wastes as it would require human cities of comparable size to do. The F.D.A. should ban the routine use of antibiotics in livestock feed on public-health grounds, now that we have evidence that the practice is leading to the evolution of drug-resistant bacterial diseases and to outbreaks of E. coli and salmonella poisoning. CAFOs should also be regulated like the factories they are, required to clean up their waste like any other industry or municipality.
It will be argued that moving animals off feedlots and back onto farms will raise the price of meat. It probably will — as it should. You will need to make the case that paying the real cost of meat, and therefore eating less of it, is a good thing for our health, for the environment, for our dwindling reserves of fresh water and for the welfare of the animals. Meat and milk production represent the food industry’s greatest burden on the environment; a recent U.N. study estimated that the world’s livestock alone account for 18 percent of all greenhouse gases, more than all forms of transportation combined. (According to one study, a pound of feedlot beef also takes 5,000 gallons of water to produce.) And while animals living on farms will still emit their share of greenhouse gases, grazing them on grass and returning their waste to the soil will substantially offset their carbon hoof prints, as will getting ruminant animals off grain. A bushel of grain takes approximately a half gallon of oil to produce; grass can be grown with little more than sunshine.”

[...] 9 Unusual Alternative Energy Options – the Potential of Biomass [...]

[...] Man (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles | ecoble – ecological de… [...]

In Ireland our Government introduced a Plastic Bag Tax of 22 cent per bag and ran a television campaign at the same time, most people now only use reusable bags, its great not to see plastic bags littering the countryside and the landfills.

I am a Building Energy Rating Assessor from Ireland and am amazed by the amount of energy that is waisted in peoples homes, it seems that world Governments feel this is acceptable if you are able to pay for it!,surely if this waist of energy has a wider global impact then their should be some form of legislation introduced, after all if you have a car with a larger more polluting engine you are penalised with a much higher road tax?

This is the fun part about going green!

We have so many alternatives already available – stuff we’re currently just throwing away!

This makes so much more sense than mouthing “Drill, baby, drill!” (Especially since any new drilling this year won’t bring gas to the pumps for a minimum of ten years)

[...] 9 Unusual Alternative Energy Options – the Potential of Biomass [...]

[...] Ride on lawnmower? Photo by olsongirl via Flickr Eco-friendly lawn care is an important part of a sustainable future and there are dozens of options out there, but … goats? There are some with more potential than others but we have seen such examples as human powered lawnmowers, solar electric robotic lawnmowers, and even propane powered lawnmowers: But what about goats? Hiring 100 goats for the job of clearing an LA hillside was half the price of employing the labor of humans and is much Lawn Care Tips… [...]

[...] Ride on lawnmower? Photo by olsongirl via Flickr Eco-friendly lawn care is an important part of a sustainable future and there are dozens of options out there, but … goats? There are some with more potential than others but we have seen such examples as human powered lawnmowers, solar electric robotic lawnmowers, and even propane powered lawnmowers: But what about goats? Hiring 100 goats for the job of clearing an LA hillside was half the price of employing the labor of humans and is much Lawn Care Tips… [...]

[...] via Ecoble and Fort [...]

[...] This picture speaks for itself, but in case you are one of those people that still doubts the existence or effects of climate change, this should change your mind. In the past 30 years, there has been a massively noticeable difference between the Arctic Sea Ice Boundary at the North Pole. This ice cap lost 20% of its size in 30 years, which shows that this is not a natural cycle. The only question remaining is, whether it’s too late to do something about it.  Stumble It! Del.icio.us Digg Technorati [...]

I’m trying to find information about the use of Number 5 recyclable dinnerware for use in an elementary school.. and how they will properly sanitize these plates so that children won’t get sick; if they do sanitize them -however- ; in what length of time will they break down– could they break down and get into the food….
Any info appreciated.

Bravo! This is one of the best articles I’ve seen on green dining options. I love the recycled streetlight plates, think I’ll see about getting some for myself. They seem good regular use plates.

I consult for Verterra, the leaf based plates we’re honored you included here. I have to say that I’ve been often surprised at their durability as compared to other biodegradable plates, without depending on binders (glue) to keep their shape.

If anybody has questions about them, I’d be happy to answer, or find out for you.

Meanwhile, here’s a Time magazine photo essay on how they go from palm leaf to (nearly) bulletproof plates.

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1846838,00.html

I work at an eco boutique called Embodies and I love this list you put together! Thanks!
http://www.embodies.com

Loved this article – great job! You are right – there is no easy solution to the oil crisis – but we must invest in change. Perhaps the election last night was a beginning. Thanks for the great blog!

[...] Random Feed wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe information revolution helped spark the green revolution. Computers have been instrumental in everything from designing more-efficient engines to running alternative-energy power plants to distributing information on the Internet that allows us to make smarter, greener choices. But computers themselves can be a bit of a problem. Many of their components are manufactured using noxious chemicals, other components present safe disposal problems, and of course, they can be power-hungry consum [...]

Paul: Thanks for the comments and for sharing the process of making Verterra’s plates! I think it is amazing that just leaves can make such a beautiful, durable product!!

Anne: Number 5 recyclables are plastics with polypropylene. These are very durable and resistant to chemicals and heat. Most no. 5 plastics are safe in the dishwasher and can be reused without worry as far as I know. I personally wouldn’t recommend using any type of plastic container or dish if it becomes dinged, dented, or chipped – just to be safe – but these should hold up through regular use and sanitizing. I don’t have any information on how many uses you may get though!

I love the chicobag. Weighing just 1.5 ounces and being so compact, I keep it in my purse every day. It’s great for trips to the farmer market and light grocery shopping. My office gave us each one for free when implementing our recycing program and I use it often. Being in San Francisco, the first city in the US to ban plastic bags, it’s great to have a reusable bag handy.

Energy Conservation and green auto retooling is Job 1. As the Big 3 has failed to do their job, they should all be fired, including management and each board. They want $50 Billion to retool, fine after they the leadership is gone and new green design leadership is put in place. The Big 3 Leadership has been a total disgrace by missing the market in search of more horsepower and higher prices.

It is the green design people within the Auto Workers Union that need to stand up. No Fed Funds should go to green retooling without both management and each board stepping down. 40 and 45 MPG should be the low end target. 100 MPG should be the new goal.

Cutting US Domestic demand by 30% is a very easy goal to reach when you have a green Energy President who is advocating Green Energy conservation and the people are with him. New green composite materials are here to reduce the weight and increase the strength of each auto and truck.

Great collection!!!

I’ve been wishing for $150,000 for a Tesla of my own – but the Loremo is pretty nice!!!

The Zoop is pretty intriguing – wonder if they could add a tinted window version?!

I’m really amazed at how quickly we’re moving from carpooling to single passenger vehicles! I can’t wait to see more family cars coming through!

Note to self: Never invent a new product and put it on a website.

Whaat, no Aptera? C’mon, I almost miss the Jetson’s jokes now.

The Helios looks pretty nifty. Unlike most hand-waving solar powered cars, it looks like it might have sufficient surface area to actually power the thing for a reasonable distance each day.

However, it suffers from the same problem that all solar cars have – it’s a poor use of solar panels. Much of the time your car is in a garage, shaded, or at a non-optimum angle to the sun. In the case of the Helios, the panels are folded most of the time.

Put the solar panels on your house so they get used to their full capacity (thus paying off their embodied energy faster). Then plug in your car at night and enjoy that off-peak power.

[...] T­r­a­nsi­t­: 10 Vehi­cl­es f­o­r­ 2010 (h­e­re­) « Nissan on electric cars: Buy the car. Lease the [...]

Hi, this is Scott Wilcox owner of Goat Buster i just wanted to say thank you for mentioning us in your article. It is nice to know their are other like minded people out there.

Sure they say this stuff will be available in 20 years. That way they will get the “green” audience to buy and support their cars now and not have to worry about broken promises 20 years from now. Heck, if they get in trouble they can just do what US automakers do and report bankrupcy.

Nice post. I saw a video on another blog somewhere on the internet telling in 2020 the oil is depleted and that we have to look for a new source. I find the number 7 in your post a good solution for now. In the video that i saw they had an even better solution. The electric car. Electric car isn't a new solution only they have improved a couple of things. The energy from the accu comes from the wind and solar energy. They had the idea to give all people a car without a exposable accu. You could go with your car to a accu-station and get your accu replaced by a new one. I think this is the future. People must pay per driven mile. Two big car builders are building such a car already. I'll post the link of the site where the video was placed when i find it.

amazing what people can do to be eco friendly these days

OK, I admit it — I just bought pre-packaged gluten free pie crusts!

OK, I admit it — I just bought pre-packaged gluten free pie crusts!

Okay sometimes we have to juggle our various priorities….

Okay sometimes we have to juggle our various priorities….

amazing what people can do to be eco friendly these days

OK, I admit it — I just bought pre-packaged gluten free pie crusts!

Okay sometimes we have to juggle our various priorities….

Practical advice for the average person who wants to buy an island:

http://www.howtobuyaprivateisland.com/

These are very cool ways to recycle different things I never would have thought of any of these. I just wish there was a little more information on each one and not just a discription.

This is nice to see that someone so famous will do such an action.

Any move towards alternative , environment friendly and renewable energy is a move to the right direction. Their technology may have several shortcomings and pitfalls , but it's to be expected to a new and untried technology.

I have a strong preference towards the hybrid cars because of how much progress have been made in this particular technology , all that's left to develop the technology that will make a superior quality battery that it small , durable and affordable , this could be the new wave of green vehicles.

I am an aspiring fashion designer, and learning fashion designing from the Indian institute of fashion designing. As blogging are very popular these days. I am looking forward to make my own blogs. Your list contains top blogs from every aspect. Thanks for sharing the list.
Wish me best of luck

Wow, my only question now is where do I get one!

LOL.

Abi.
xx

Please i will be very happy if you will give me the opportunity to share with you what i know as far as solar energy is concerned.
thanks Hermann

Corn is the only thing the dumb-fucks in the corn belt can do good! Re- educate them into growing a more diversified sorts of things and stop corn subsidies too! Corn is just too good, too cheap and too useful! America runs on corn and its products! The Koreans won't eat our meat, and riot in the streets to stop it from being sold in the stores! Why? What do they know that we do not know? We also factory farm pigs and let all that methane (pigshit) go down our rivers, growing huge oriental catfish we are too good to eat – the fish should be caught, canned and sold to Asia! The pigshit should be fermented for the methane and sold as fuel! – same with cowshit! One day when the Arabs find out we print up the money we pay them for oil, and cut us off, we will all be sorry for wasting all that shit!, and we will be walking a lot more too! Right now though, we slide our fat asses into our Vettes and blast off down the highway and we don't have shit to worry about!

some great pictures and some interesting thoughts

gaby
x

some great pictures and some interesting thoughts

gaby
x

I'm waiting for WalMart to sell me a propane conversion kit for my gas lawn mower! Gasoline stinks, and we import it from unhappy countries! We have our own natural gas, and propane, so if we all converted, the air would be cleaner, our trade imbalance improved, our lungs would suffer less, and terrorists would be deprived of money! this is a win, win, win, win for America and needs to be advertised as such, Bravo!

Thanks,very interesting and useful post

God made the earth and people. God is in control.

Delete

Brett Stark

cell: +1 847 481 9736
skype in: +1 312 957 6007
skype: brett.stark (w/voicemail)
twitter: http://twitter.com/ecoaussie
friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/ecoaussie
blog: http://ecoble.com

Yep, gas mowers are definitely a good start. There are a lot of options
there including electric.

Delete

Brett Stark

cell: +1 847 481 9736
skype in: +1 312 957 6007
skype: brett.stark (w/voicemail)
twitter: http://twitter.com/ecoaussie
friendfeed: http://friendfeed.com/ecoaussie
blog: http://ecoble.com

Good Luck!

Yep, as long as some of the politics and money can be taken out of the
equation or alternatively, used for the benefit of Eco, hybrids should be a
good starting point to weaning off of oil.

There's an urban clothing brand gino green global that uses the same concept.

Yeah I'm with Coupons, I wouldnt invest in something that is promised just 2 years ahead of time, let alone 20 years. It sounds great and all but I'll believe it when I see it.

The issue though is that someone has to 'adopt early' and invest ahead of
time. Otherwise, innovation won't happen. Nothing comes for 'free' and
nothing just 'appears' on the market without some early adoption and
innovation.

You might consider adding the Aptera and the VentureOne.

Thanks for the suggestion! Will have to look into those and add the next
time we do a round up.

Opening and closing curtains at the appropriate times can make a huge difference. Where I live in Australia we have measured a 10 degree celcius difference between days when we had the curtains the wrong way and when we had them the right way. This works just as well in summer to keep the house cool as in winter to keep it warm.

Obviously, the thicker the curtains the better the insulating effect.

wow… thanks for the video and the pics… those pics are really breath taking!!!!!!!!!!! super cool cars!

dino

If my memory is strong may be iam right that the chimical reaction takes place in the sun is due to hydrogen gas well. And these uses of hydrogen gases proved once again that the gas useful for us, in all the ways.

HI

how cane i get this block i want to build with it

thanks
Architect ophir

That's a great tip, thanks!

HI

how cane i get this block i want to build with it

thanks
Architect ophir

That's a great tip, thanks!

[...] Offbeat Off-the-Grid Green Gadgets, Inventions, and InnovationsNew Light Source Lasts 15 Years Without a RechargeMan (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles10 Creative Ways to [...]

Although the DutchTub is off-the-grid it is not green by any standard. Burning wood releases loads of carbon dioxide (which is the current buzzword) into the atmosphere along with all sorts of metal oxides and other soot.

I also vaguely remember the Gravia floor lamp being featured on Slashdot a while back. It turned out that the four hour power time was an exaggeration and it actually lasted 15 minutes on each lift of the weight.

In fact, the Slashdot link is here: http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/20/1446256 and the miscalculation was by a factor of 1000. Presumably Clay didn’t actually BUILD one of these devices to test it…

I’m quite interested in seeing that fridge however. If it really is 60% more efficient it will be a big improvement. The most useful and effective application of the technology would be in air conditioners which are pretty bad for the environment presently.

[...] 7 Offbeat Off-the-Grid Green Gadgets, Inventions, and InnovationsNew Light Source Lasts 15 Years Without a RechargeMan (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles10 Creative Ways to Recycle Ordinary ObjectsSustainable Prefab Living in Custom Style – Homes by FlatPakAwesome: Solar Powered Bicycle Boat DesignUpdate: New Floating Man-Made Island About to be Open to the Public8 Foot Catfish Caught in Cambodia and Other Strange Environmental NewsHow to Live in a Shipping ContainerBrilliant Green Architectural Design Concept? Skyscraper Retrofits for Power and Food [...]

I think the wood-fired hot tub violates the “green” portion of the title of the article. Burning wood is far from green.

The gravi-lamp has been thoroughly debunked. Quick back-of-the-envelope calculations show that it could not possibly produce more than a few minutes worth of light. It's designer (Clay Moulton, a student at Virginia Tech) has admitted that he never did the calculations to support its claims, and has recanted them. Unfortunately, the contest judges didn't do their homework either before giving the award.

Burning wood releases exactly the amount of carbon that the tree sequestered while it was alive. It's a closed loop as long as the timber was grown in a sustainable method. The excess carbon in our atmosphere is caused by burning hydrocarbons which sequestered carbon eons ago. The carbon in trees is released by burning or by natural decomposition in the same quantity.

http://www.watsoncrombie.com/wchawking.html

LMAO @ you green knuckleheads. When are you going to get it through your heads that carbon dioxide is at best a trace gas in the atmosphere. Water vapor is the key, not co2. Dolts!

Imagine a 100 story sky scraper. By comparrison the amount of co2 in our atmosphere would equate to the WAX covering the tile in the first floor of said sky scraper.

Your argument would be like saying Sarin gas “couldnt possibly have killed a room full of people, its only 1 part in 100,000″.
The propertys of the gas are important, and its effects can outweigh its ratio. In Co2's case, its because it reflects heat in ways water vapour does not.

I'm assuming the fridge story was wrong…seeing as that tech DOES use electricity, merely less.

Sarin? Oh my, great analogy. Fact is there has always been co2 in the atmosphere, way before man invented the internal combustion engine. Do you understand why dinosaurs were the size that they were? Because there was more co2 in the atmosphere back then than there is now – fact.

Here's another tidbit for you… when Mt Pinatubo blew it spewed more shit into the atmosphere in two days than man ever has or ever will. We are still here, aren't we?

Again, co2 is at best a trace gas. Get over it. Study sun spot cycles and clue yourself in.

Wow, I really like these inventions. All of them.

That's some waxy buildup.!

If we assume that 1 story = 10 ft, a typical handwave, then a 100 story building is about 1000 feet and as Google will show you, (0.038%) * 1000 feet = 4.56 inches, and 0.038% is the percentage of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere. Personally, I'd avoid any buildings with four and a half inches of wax on the floor.

If I told you once, I told you a million times… don't exaggerate.

Remove

true, but natural decomposition takes much, much longer than burning.

Okay, I'm a chemist. And I want to say please verify your facts.
The effect that water vapor has on the heat reflected towards and away from the surface of earth is so massive that if there was no water vapor in the atmosphere our planet would be approximately 31 degrees Celsius BELOW our current temperature! This is resultant because at the wavelengths that thermal radiation travels at (between 3,000nm and 100,000nm) water vapor is practically opaque! That means that the said thermal radiation would reflect off of it the majority of the time.
On the other hand if all Carbon Dioxide was removed from the atmosphere of our planet the temperature would drop by a much smaller amount, approximately 15 degrees Celsius. This is because Carbon Dioxide is relatively transparent at the wavelengths of thermal radiation.
I mean at least look at Wikipedia if your going to pretend to know what your saying. Second section of the global warming entry it gives a breakdown of the effect of the effects of different greenhouse gasses. I wish you people would at least make have a try at getting your facts straight.

EDIT
sorry 1.5 degrees Celsius not 15 degrees Celsius.

I didn't realize a 100 story building was a straight vertical line. I thought it would look more like a box, if anything…

this was actually featured in believe or not, i with i can visit that island

Structural Bamboo as Sustainable Construction Material:
The Chinese Academy of Sciences correlates the use of bamboo as construction material with the end of the Stone Age and the beginning of agriculture and animal husbandry in the Neolithic Age about 8,000 years ago.

Modern Day Processing:
Structural Bamboo has been brought into the modern age by Maui-based Bamboo Technologies. In conjunction with the International Bamboo Foundation, the Environmental Bamboo Foundation, and The International Network for Bamboo and Rattan, Bamboo Technologies modernized an ancient process using a pressure and vacuum chamber and a simple borate (salt) solution. The borate permeates the bamboo and is unpalatable to beetles and termites that would otherwise love nothing better than to feast on the sugars and starch in untreated bamboo.

With proper protection from the elements, using a marine grade varnish, the same as wood requires, the borate does not leach out over time and the Structural Bamboo has a useful life expectancy as long as any commercially available building material.

Modern Day Testing:
Standards were developed to grade and rate the treated poles. Strength and wear tests preformed at the wood materials laboratories of The University of Hawaii and Washington State University showed that bamboo’s long fibers and round, thick-walled, hollow-core form make for a relatively lightweight, yet extremely durable and strong building material. Structural Bamboo exceeded 14,000 psi in tension, comparable in strength to mild steel! And by many measures Structural Bamboo outperformed Douglas Fir and concrete as well.

Modern Day Construction Material:
All of this research and testing bore fruit when, in 2004, the Structural Bamboo poles as produced by Bamboo Technologies were certified by The International Code Council (ICC) as complying with International Building Code (IBC), International residential Code (IRC) and Uniform Building Code (UBC) standards. This opened the door for the use of Structural Bamboo by architects and builders in modern building code approved residential homes and many commercial structures anywhere in the world.

Bamboo Technologies also pioneered several methods of joining bamboo poles together to deliver complex structural elements and trusses that allow a wide range of elaborate architectural designs for a variety of high stress applications.

Hurricane and Earthquake Strong Designs:
Bamboo Technologies has developed technical and real life expertise in bamboo construction since it started all this over fourteen years ago. To bring to market the first and still only building-code certified Structural Bamboo buildings in the USA, Bamboo Technologies developed and tested a construction system that plays off the natural strengths of Structural Bamboo to manufacture very strong buildings and allow for straightforward analysis by structural engineers.

The system uses certified bamboo poles to prefabricate finished bamboo structural panels. The finished panels allow for rapid onsite erection of the structures and ease shipping to assembly sites around the world.

Many of the structural panels serve as single and double member trusses with bamboo struts and steel joint connectors built in. Vertical truss elements in the walls with the bamboo struts and steel connectors tie together to withstand the lateral forces exerted by high winds. The main roof trusses have ridge trusses between them to resist longitudinal forces on the roofs. On the larger buildings additional trusses are added between the mains at the top of the walls to transfer forces to the vertical elements in the walls. These vertical trusses are then anchored to the foundation.

Exceptional Performance:
Bamboo Technologies’ factory in Vietnam built several cottages for assembly at a resort on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands off New Zealand. Structural engineers rated the buildings’ design to withstand a wind load of 80 mph. In fact, in 2005, the buildings withstood winds measured at 173 mph in three separate hurricanes.

http://www.bambooliving.com/

You're not calculating volume. The Sears Tower is about 100 stories and it has 4.5 MILLION square feet of floor space alone. That's not including the space in between the floors…

So the wax analogy is about right.

i agree with Jeremy, we need LESS stuff not more. the more products and crap thats being produced the more pollution. there needs to be more human powered vehicles and devices, (bikes, winding flashlights and watches etc.) this world has survived for thousands of years with none of the technology we have now, what makes us think that now this tech is necessary for basic life? we wouldn't need water purifiers if there was nothing to purify the water from! simplicity is the only way…

Little known fact: Turds can be recycled as paperweights and teacozys.

Yeah, newspapers for insulation. Ever heard of cockroaches? They'll love this harborage/food source combo!

i agree with Jeremy, we need LESS stuff not more. the more products and crap thats being produced the more pollution. there needs to be more human powered vehicles and devices, (bikes, winding flashlights and watches etc.) this world has survived for thousands of years with none of the technology we have now, what makes us think that now this tech is necessary for basic life? we wouldn't need water purifiers if there was nothing to purify the water from! simplicity is the only way…

OMG no way dude that is WAY cool.

http://www.privacy-center.be.tc

Regarding the cardboard bridge: what happens when it rains?

looks cool and useful too m/

We haven't all stopped using tapes. I have more MP3s than the next guy, and more vinyl too, but I still rock my tapes in my 20 year old Alpine in my car. Some 15+ year old recordings sound better than MP3s.

Hennnnyway- some interesting ideas which will hopefully help spawn more. This is the future- believe.

This is a great site. Thanks for all the wonderful things you are doing plus, at the S.C.R.A.P.

that would be 10 kg not a tonne

Great list. Tnaks!!!

Facts are facts. CO2 is not new in the atmosphere. Volcanoes and meteors have caused all sorts of things to end up in the atmosphere for as long as they have been around. CO2 is a trace gas… no arguments there.

The trouble is caused when we move from measurable facts to predictions about what would happen if the facts changed.

Science has measured that the average global temperature has gone up in line with the level in CO2 in the atmosphere. Science has also measured that temperatures were much greater than today back when the dinosaurs lived and the level of CO2 was greater. There is no doubt in my mind and the minds of any scientist who has studied these facts that there is a link between atmospheric CO2 and global temperature. Trace gas or not, it's clear that CO2 is important.

Most scientists predict that even a small rise in global temperature would be a very bad thing for humans on this planet. But predictions are not facts. I accept that they may be wrong.

I'm not willing to take that chance, however, so I visit sites like this one to do what I can to help prevent it. If I'm wrong, the world will continue on as it is, if you're wrong, we'll all die in a fiery hell.

What are you here for ?

You might also want to read up on sun spots yourself…

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v443/n7108...

This is proper, peer reviewed stuff. It has credibility. It says that sunspots have a short-term effect on global temperature but no long-term effect. Sunspots are not responsible for the rise in global temperature we have seen over the last 30 years.

This is not peer-reviewed but is much more accessible: http://astroblogger.blogspot.com/2007/03/sunspo...

From Wikipedia ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming#Gre... ):

“Naturally occurring greenhouse gases have a mean warming effect of about 33 °C (59 °F), without which Earth would be uninhabitable.[18][19] On Earth the major greenhouse gases are water vapor, which causes about 36–70 percent of the greenhouse effect (not including clouds); carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 9–26 percent; methane (CH4), which causes 4–9 percent; and ozone, which causes 3–7 percent.”

So Carbon Dioxide is responsible for between about 3 °C and 8 °C.

If you're going to complain about someone's fact checking, make sure you get it right yourself. (OK, I know I'm being pedantic… but you started it. )

The comment below the image is misleading. It starts with “Instead of using electricity” and ends with “60% more efficient than standard refrigerators.” These two fragments are incompatible with each other.

The link is also broken.

The page on the magnetocaloric fridge at the Risø research institute is here: http://www.risoe.dk/Risoe_dk/Home/Research/sust...

The magnets are permanent but a cooling liquid is pumped in between them which uses electricity. They also move the magnetocaloric material (Gadolinium currently but the Cambridge guys have found something better) in and out of the magnetic field using an electric motor. Since these are both mechanical processes I don't see why a very small windmill wouldn't do the job quite nicely if you wanted to take one camping…

I haven't been able to find anything in there about a 60% efficiency improvement however, when compared to the function of a normal fridge, there is no compression of a gas involved which is the most energy intensive part of a fridge. The PhysOrg page I linked earlier says 40% more efficient which is a rather suspicious number. I suspect “only 60% of the energy of a normal fridge” has been turned into “60% more efficient” somewhere along the line.

So, it's the only one that's not “off-the-grid” and at the same time it's by far the most interesting (and green) innovation.

What about the historical snow event in Las Vegas???

Hi Sarah, I'd really like to bang you. Do you reverse cowgirl? Call me some time.

Very nice list. I'm still amazed at how creative some people can get about recycled materials. My son plays soccer and now I'm seeing soccer balls that are made from some type of recycled plastic material. It looks and feels very similar to a traditional leather soccer ball. Hopefully, we can learn to recycle everything one day.

Completely crazy but I love it!! Going to ask the same island for Christmas

Thank you so much for this blog posting. Really cool resource on Green Fashion. Although this is not a blog you should check out http://www.recommendshirts.com. They are a new up and coming company I just discovered and am very excited about.

excellent post!!!

i love this blog ,thanks for share it.

Wasn't 1978 the height of Artic Sea ice when everyone was worried the next ice age was upon us? It does not seam fair that a graphic comparing an abnormally high period of sea ice be compared against today. The real question is how would a 50 year average sea ice limit compare against today's ice cap?

i think this is awful it is just so sad ifyou go to http://www.google.com and search polar bear foundation cllick on the one that say ADOPT A POLAR BEAR! and you can save their lives!

[...] About to be Open to the Public8 Foot Catfish Caught in Cambodia and Other Strange Environmental NewsHow to Live in a Shipping ContainerBrilliant Green Architectural Design Concept? Skyscraper Retrofits for Power and [...]

The newspaper insulation in the house wouldn't work very well anywhere there were cockroaches, as “wild” cockroaches live in between tree bark, so they love cardboard and newspaper. Your house would become a cockroach house. And God forbid there was a fire. I don't even want to think about it..

Theres a ting we dont get it .. ( we= you , me, and the rest that consider sun power usefull ) . They DONT WANT to understand, because power plants would loose to much money

God gave man free will– with the means to destroy OR create.
Humans control their destiny.

Is this for real? Is fashion really going to be eco? I like the Boho mag being eco friendly and using recyclable paper. This is really an innovation.

reuse newspaper into recycle shopping bag!!!!
watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSfusvAP1vw

Is this for real? Is fashion really going to be eco? I like the Boho mag being eco friendly and using recyclable paper. This is really an innovation.

hmmm..

Its amazing what we do on less than 1% of our brain. I think thats what they say we use but I can't remember. See I use less than that!!

Those afterlite bulbs look awesome.

My company is a small structural engineering firm, and right now we're working with a home designer on two shipping container houses, one in Louisiana and one in Texas. We're also working on an “off the shelf” design that we can sell to people. We are also working with three potential clients who are in the funding stages of projects they want to build. There are problems with shipping container houses, some of which aren't serious, others are:
- There isn't any really good references on how to design with these, in particular I've had a hard time getting information on the basic structural design of them. Most of my information is from field measurements of many containers at a large container yard.
- There really hasn't been a large number of buildings built with these, so there isn't a good body of knowledge on standard details, pricing per square foot and other odds and ends that come only with experience.
- You have to choose the neighborhood you build a container house in very carefully so you don't get resistance from the neighbors or permitting authorities.
- Of course there is a glut of houses on the market right now, so can you really build a new house out of shipping containers and hope to sell it for a reasonable price?
- Finally, one of my potential projects died because the bank wouldn't loan for a building made of these. Right now banks are looking for reasons not to lend money they are so scared.

We have designed one container house that was built in Atlanta, GA. Here's the link: http://www.runkleconsulting.com/Container%20Hou.... As more are built I'll update my website.

My company is a small structural engineering firm, and right now we're working with a home designer on two shipping container houses, one in Louisiana and one in Texas. We're also working on an “off the shelf” design that we can sell to people. We are also working with three potential clients who are in the funding stages of projects they want to build. There are problems with shipping container houses, some of which aren't serious, others are:
- There isn't any really good references on how to design with these, in particular I've had a hard time getting information on the basic structural design of them. Most of my information is from field measurements of many containers at a large container yard.
- There really hasn't been a large number of buildings built with these, so there isn't a good body of knowledge on standard details, pricing per square foot and other odds and ends that come only with experience.
- You have to choose the neighborhood you build a container house in very carefully so you don't get resistance from the neighbors or permitting authorities.
- Of course there is a glut of houses on the market right now, so can you really build a new house out of shipping containers and hope to sell it for a reasonable price?
- Finally, one of my potential projects died because the bank wouldn't loan for a building made of these. Right now banks are looking for reasons not to lend money they are so scared.

We have designed one container house that was built in Atlanta, GA. Here's the link: http://www.runkleconsulting.com/Container%20Hou.... As more are built I'll update my website.

This is certainly very innovate design.

That's a great thing this wood heated Hot tub. Now that Global Warming Hoax is finally out in the open we don't need to feel bad about burning wood.

Wow, everyone wants a simple answer to a complex question. Ok, here it is …yes, and no. Yes, global warming is real. It is documented that the temps have risen one degree in 150 years. That comes out to .007 degrees per year. The real questions are, is this increase natural or man-made? Can we actually change this trend, or is this just like us trying to change the path of a hurricane? We know there have been fluctuations in average temperatures as long as the Earth has existed. At the same time, we owe it to future generations to care for our planet. I believe we need to explore new energy sources, reduce consumption of resources, and, most importantly, DON'T PANIC! This planet is bigger than all of us, and will be here long after we are gone.

Wow, everyone wants a simple answer to a complex question. Ok, here it is …yes, and no. Yes, global warming is real. It is documented that the temps have risen one degree in 150 years. That comes out to .007 degrees per year. The real questions are, is this increase natural or man-made? Can we actually change this trend, or is this just like us trying to change the path of a hurricane? We know there have been fluctuations in average temperatures as long as the Earth has existed. At the same time, we owe it to future generations to care for our planet. I believe we need to explore new energy sources, reduce consumption of resources, and, most importantly, DON'T PANIC! This planet is bigger than all of us, and will be here long after we are gone.

Thanks for pulling these together! Gives me hope that there is creativity with form and function at work!

Thanks for pulling these together! Gives me hope that there is creativity with form and function at work!

Sweetening with Agave nectar is a great idea, it doesn't spike your blood sugar like regular sugar does.

Great post. People trying to lose weight (and that includes me) shoudl get the human-powered one.

that is utterly amazing. well done him.

This is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. Just get me some broadband access and a few hotties, and I'd move there myself.

Sweetening with Agave nectar is a great idea, it doesn't spike your blood sugar like regular sugar does.

Johny, you're wrong. Solar power is currently too expensive and too unwieldy to be even remotely viable as a fossil fuel replacement. I want the human race to go primarily solar as much as you do, but until it's cheap, easy, and efficient to implement, it will be decades before we can wean ourselves off of fossil fuels.

This is such an incredible idea. I've often wondered at the gym why some of the muscle power (whether it be lifting machine weights or riding a stationary bike) can't be converted into energy.

that is utterly amazing. well done him.

This is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. Just get me some broadband access and a few hotties, and I'd move there myself.

Johny, you're wrong. Solar power is currently too expensive and too unwieldy to be even remotely viable as a fossil fuel replacement. I want the human race to go primarily solar as much as you do, but until it's cheap, easy, and efficient to implement, it will be decades before we can wean ourselves off of fossil fuels.

This is such an incredible idea. I've often wondered at the gym why some of the muscle power (whether it be lifting machine weights or riding a stationary bike) can't be converted into energy.

The cassette tape wallet is just right.

Brett, I dig your site–you've done an extraordinary job!
Also many thanks for your time and passion–it makes this world a better place for all of us!

God is and illusion, don't play yourselves, and yes we shouldn't panic. panicing solves nothing.

Interested in several shipping containers, do you supply ones witha small kitchen/bathroom one end,
living bedroom other end

The cassette tape wallet is just right.

Brett, I dig your site–you've done an extraordinary job!
Also many thanks for your time and passion–it makes this world a better place for all of us!

Interested in several shipping containers, do you supply ones witha small kitchen/bathroom one end,
living bedroom other end

Ahhh 'yuppie lip service' and 'real world environmental concerns' ,,typical environmental nazi douchebag gobbledygook. Get down to the real issues in the world and stop worrying about the chemical makeup of cow farts. Fucking hippies.

Interested in selling your items on website! need more info.

Interested in selling your items on website! need more info.

suppose they could build another one? there's plenty of scrap cardboard around.
Gotta do something on rainy days hey?!

suppose they could build another one? there's plenty of scrap cardboard around.
Gotta do something on rainy days hey?!

Hi I wanted to mention that we have just launched a new service on AboutMyPlanet.com called “Green QuestionVille”… it's a place where you can ask green questions you have and other memebers will answer them and vote for the best answers. Very cool stuff… take a sneak peek at http://www.aboutmyplanet.com/qv/

Many even now come pre-programmed to drop the temperature during down-times, like work hours during the day or when you’re all in bed at night, and then bring up the temp just before you come home or wake up, so you’re always comfy.

I love science this site is out of this world and to all you haters oiut there i say the jokes on u when im livin on mars wiuth my alian family! Go green call me 2 discuss the horrors and catastrophies of the world 617-877-0924

nice post, thank you for sharing

i poop all day and night

if these are such great sources, why aren't they being sold as fuel

i like pussy

:*l im……………….speechless

dirty diapers are stinky and shouldnt be used for diesel you stink while going down the road

Let's face it though. As cute as these kinds of things are, plastic bags are all about utility. Can they hold everything you need to carry? Are they readily available when it's time to use them? Can they be easily cleaned if they get dirty? I've been trying to ditch plastic for years, failing pretty bad. I'm better since I've got my Breezy Bags (http://www.breezybags.com) since they're small, I have them with me.

There's one more that I thought was cool. It's a thing you heat over a fire for a half hour, and then it can refrigerate a big cooler for 24 hours. Might not sound like much, but if you live where there's no electricity (Africa, for instance), it's HUGE! That, and clean water and we're talking about really doing something. I laugh at my “green” efforts (using Breezy Bags and driving a hybrid) and all of this technology when I contrast it with the rest of the world.

Great post, very outside of the box thinking here!

dirty diapers are stinky and shouldnt be used for diesel you stink while going down the road

Let's face it though. As cute as these kinds of things are, plastic bags are all about utility. Can they hold everything you need to carry? Are they readily available when it's time to use them? Can they be easily cleaned if they get dirty? I've been trying to ditch plastic for years, failing pretty bad. I'm better since I've got my Breezy Bags (http://www.breezybags.com) since they're small, I have them with me.

There's one more that I thought was cool. It's a thing you heat over a fire for a half hour, and then it can refrigerate a big cooler for 24 hours. Might not sound like much, but if you live where there's no electricity (Africa, for instance), it's HUGE! That, and clean water and we're talking about really doing something. I laugh at my “green” efforts (using Breezy Bags and driving a hybrid) and all of this technology when I contrast it with the rest of the world.

Jesus Christ. Give the guy a break. You friggin wackos are insane about some shit. The hot tub isn't “green” enough for you? Oh, wait, you probably would rather see some dumb ass sit there and pedal for 12 hours and heat the pool water with friction generated from the pedaling. Cmon guys. Lets be real about some things. What if the wood had already fallen and not been cut down? Is that ok? Or are we disturbing the natural system of life by picking up that tree and using it for a fire or, say, to knock you on the fucking head with. How's that? I'm all for changing our habits, gas consumption, etc. But there has to be a line somewhere that we can all just chill the frig out about everything. If he said it was solar, you would have found a way to complain that the factory that produces the solar panels actually emits more harm for the environment than if you were to throw a downed log or 2 in once a week. Get over yourselves guys. The guy is just trying put a blog with some interesting info on it.

Jesus Christ. Give the guy a break. You friggin wackos are insane about some shit. The hot tub isn't “green” enough for you? Oh, wait, you probably would rather see some dumb ass sit there and pedal for 12 hours and heat the pool water with friction generated from the pedaling. Cmon guys. Lets be real about some things. What if the wood had already fallen and not been cut down? Is that ok? Or are we disturbing the natural system of life by picking up that tree and using it for a fire or, say, to knock you on the fucking head with. How's that? I'm all for changing our habits, gas consumption, etc. But there has to be a line somewhere that we can all just chill the frig out about everything. If he said it was solar, you would have found a way to complain that the factory that produces the solar panels actually emits more harm for the environment than if you were to throw a downed log or 2 in once a week. Get over yourselves guys. The guy is just trying put a blog with some interesting info on it.

I think it would be even better, if the VW can hang around like the hanger, as it can help to save up many parking lots…

If you read the patent application (there's a link to it in the article) you can see that it's manufactured with a “radioactive gas” which is probably tritium. The safety and health issues are not very troubling, but not negligible. Many products already on the market use tritium illumination. My wristwatch, for example. Read the Wikipedia article if you want. On the other hand, tritium-powered light sources glow rather weakly. Riding a bicycle at night, I'm not sure I would want to depend on a tritium-powered light source to keep me alive. Around streetlights and headlights, it might be barely visible. The bottom line — if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

and only causes a little bit of cancer lol

and only causes a little bit of cancer lol

You are very bizarre, but funny.

this looks like a bat mobile but I don't think this will beat the atmosphere of a gym. it might be like a gym but it's still not a gym.

i was so amazed on what he made. i wish i could make my own island….

Thanks for posting the links. It's awesome that these are free, so now no one doesn't have an excuse not to read them.

i was so amazed on what he made. i wish i could make my own island….

It's very important!! also nice pics

Thanks for posting the links. It's awesome that these are free, so now no one doesn't have an excuse not to read them.

[...] Years Without a RechargeMan (Re)Builds Mexican Island Paradise on 250,000 Recycled Floating Bottles10 Creative Ways to Recycle Ordinary ObjectsSustainable Prefab Living in Custom Style – Homes by FlatPakAwesome: Solar Powered Bicycle Boat [...]

[...] Other Strange Environmental NewsUpdate: New Floating Man-Made Island About to be Open to the PublicHow to Live in a Shipping ContainerBrilliant Green Architectural Design Concept? Skyscraper Retrofits for Power and [...]

wow unbelievable what a nice one were did u get the 250,000 bottles and use a miniral woters in the world wowwwww

wow unbelievable what a nice one were did u get the 250,000 bottles and use a miniral woters in the world wowwwww

Great to know the new products out there. Nokia has always been ahead of the curve in creating earth-friendly products. I want to get one of those bamboo phones, myself!

The list is good but other cars featured are impractical enough for day to day use.

There is only one problem with the above technology. Its radioactive and consumers will never purchase it.

The list is good but other cars featured are impractical enough for day to day use.

There is only one problem with the above technology. Its radioactive and consumers will never purchase it.

Did you actually read the site? It requires light to recharge it. It is nothing more than glow in the dark paint. That's all. Uses solar energy to recharge it, and then re-emits the solar energy.

Not a bad thing, but nothing revolutionary.

Good lord.

Did you actually read the site? It requires light to recharge it. It is nothing more than glow in the dark paint. That's all. Uses solar energy to recharge it, and then re-emits the solar energy.

Not a bad thing, but nothing revolutionary.

Good lord.

very nice list of blogs about clothhing!

GLOBAL WARMING IS BULLSHIT… THERE WAS RECENTLY A STUDY THAT SHOWS THERE IS JUST AS MUCH ICE NOW AS THERE WAS IN 1979.

@ People saying wood burning is not green —

Burning wood is MUCH more green than burning coal, as wood is a renewable resource. The CO2 released into the air is taken up by trees which are then burned again. It's cyclical, meaning it has virtually zero footprint.

This is assuming the trees are grown at a rate matching the rate of burning, which is more and more becoming the case. Logging companies are beginning to log only new growth forests which they then replace. Coal on the other hand, takes millenia to replenish. If we were burning the coal at the rate it was being produced, it would also be zero footprint. This is obviously impossible for us to do with our current energy consumption.

@ People saying wood burning is not green —

Burning wood is MUCH more green than burning coal, as wood is a renewable resource. The CO2 released into the air is taken up by trees which are then burned again. It's cyclical, meaning it has virtually zero footprint.

This is assuming the trees are grown at a rate matching the rate of burning, which is more and more becoming the case. Logging companies are beginning to log only new growth forests which they then replace. Coal on the other hand, takes millenia to replenish. If we were burning the coal at the rate it was being produced, it would also be zero footprint. This is obviously impossible for us to do with our current energy consumption.

Thanks for writing such a unique article on going green. We're all about going green nowadays who knew though? THanks again!

Now that is incredibly cool – makes you want to get out there and get fit – especially looking that good.

why would you want to get one?

Why not just use sails?

GOod Stuff!!

Some great insights! I appreciate the focus on packaging. I would add to that that when appropriate purchasing used or refurbished gear is actually pretty green. A lot of waste comes from the manufacturing process and not just the finished materials.

Agreed, but the need to be “green” must always be balanced with other considerations. A President who lived off the grid and walked everywhere by foot would be very green but not a very good President. While I'm not a big fan of American cars, at least that tank, errr . . . limo, wasn't shipped from overseas. There is a bit relativity to buying local I think.

Why not just use sails?

GOod Stuff!!

Some great insights! I appreciate the focus on packaging. I would add to that that when appropriate purchasing used or refurbished gear is actually pretty green. A lot of waste comes from the manufacturing process and not just the finished materials.

Amen to Michael Pollen!

Obama!! Inauguration!!

There are ten poitns to be noted in Obama speech aand we must all keep this in mind till he is in charge.
http://controversial-affairs.blogspot.com/2009/...

I like hybrid cars. Thanks for the bonus information. keep it up!

yeah that car was pretty crazy, but still cool…

A big thanks for posting these. This should keep me busy for awhile : )

The photos are mind blowing. Thanks!

I agree with the first commenter that special considerations have to be taken for the president, such as protection. Let's face it, him being driven around in a little Prius just ain't gonna cut it.

That having been said, there's no need for excess in other areas, particularly in the inaugural celebrations, both in terms of wasting energy and $$ being spent. Now that the liberals are in power, get used to this kind of hypocrisy.

yeah that car was pretty crazy, but still cool…

A big thanks for posting these. This should keep me busy for awhile : )

The photos are mind blowing. Thanks!

I agree with the first commenter that special considerations have to be taken for the president, such as protection. Let's face it, him being driven around in a little Prius just ain't gonna cut it.

That having been said, there's no need for excess in other areas, particularly in the inaugural celebrations, both in terms of wasting energy and $$ being spent. Now that the liberals are in power, get used to this kind of hypocrisy.

Another magazine going green with soy-based inks , that amazing.

GUCCI!! YA DIGG

I wish to wish all pregnant women of good mood, easy pregnancy and natural sorts! Good luck also are happy! Give birth easily and independently! Let not doctors give birth for you, and you! Also adjust itself on chest feeding of the kid! Read the necessary information! Be, lovely pregnant mums and expecting posterities of the daddy, are healthy and wise!

GUCCI!! YA DIGG

Wow the ocean booze looks great!

that lawn mower look strange

This article is truly a good read for me! Informative and very interesting!

Very interesting. Never ceases to amaze me what you find online or happening on the net these days.

hehehe lol at that cars

I was cleaning out my freezer and found a package of beef that expired two weeks ago. It wasn´t frozen when I bought it, I put it in the freezer and then forgot about it. Is the expiration date only for when the beef is fresh, or would it matter now too? I´d like to find out if it is still safe to use it or not, because it seems like a waste to throw it out. Plus, isn´t freezing something supposed to keep it longer?

why don't you have a newer picture?!? and what about the south pole which has been growing?

Great picture!

I was hoping to actually learn something other than the standard generic statements. What are the real facts? The article states “Scientists have also discovered a correlation between these temperatures and the level of carbon dioxide (and more recently methane gas) in the atmosphere.” but it doesn't say what the statistical correlation was (.37 or .87 or -.5), nor does it mention what was actually correlated.

I agree with rayne. we are in big trouble with global warming. once the average temp rises above 2 degrees celcius, around 12 degrees F, it is almost if not impossible to reverse the effects of global warming. Storms are getting stronger, sea levels are rising. there is so much proof that global warming is in effect. i will garauntee that the president will make a national address on the topic. take my word. remember this.

I am not such a big fan of human fat as fuel idea… Can you image how this idea could evolve if we decided human fat is the ultimate fuel for future machines? Leaving this aside I find this boat is an extraordinary piece and it sure worth the investment.

I love global warming, I live in Cleveland and hope to have lake front property in the next 5 to 10 years,
although my winters are getting more brutal and summers shorter I dont know if I can stand it here that long. GW cant come fast enough for me keep up the roderic it keeps me all warn and fuzzy inside.

JW

I agree with rayne. we are in big trouble with global warming. once the average temp rises above 2 degrees celcius, around 12 degrees F, it is almost if not impossible to reverse the effects of global warming. Storms are getting stronger, sea levels are rising. there is so much proof that global warming is in effect. i will garauntee that the president will make a national address on the topic. take my word. remember this.

I love global warming, I live in Cleveland and hope to have lake front property in the next 5 to 10 years,
although my winters are getting more brutal and summers shorter I dont know if I can stand it here that long. GW cant come fast enough for me keep up the roderic it keeps me all warn and fuzzy inside.

JW

cool make em in inkjet form

Interesting post. Some of the designs are a bit over-reaching, but the one chair / bench made from the recycled tire could definitely work in a lot of different residential and commercial instances. The aluminum shaving countertops are also pretty practical, an do look nice.

cool make em in inkjet form

the earth was warmer the the artic was tropical, dont you think the earth is just
continuing in its cycle and getting warm againa/

have some faith, God didn't put us on this earth to either freeze or burn over, he has a plan.
all this stuff happening is just a sign that he is coming soon, the Bible says that there will be earth quakes and other things in various places so dont be scared, it's all in God's plan!
im a christian just to let you know! he he…

God controls our destiny.

Well well well, these pieces don't look that bad at all, they do look like modern interesting furniture and yes, I would go for few pieces like this in my house, they look aesthetic and cheerful.

NO he is not he is real how can people write a Enormous book ( the bible if you even know what that is) on someone that is just an allusion?!?!?!?!?! if you dont believe in him……well we all know were your going to spend internal life……

I love how the lights are being set-up. They look very pleasing to the eyes..

I don't think you would mind if I save the images and send it to all my friends. The architect used in the making of this building is just stunning.
A new inspirational modern technology.
Wow…!

I would like to appreciate the efforts you have made in writing this article and i am hoping the same good work from you in the future as well.

Very nice post. Thank you!

Very interesting read…
BTW, I wouldn't want to see that twister coming towards me

It seems this alternative fuel concept is very feasible in becoming the majority in the very near future. The new ford focus hybrd, 2010, appears to be the next big hybrid concept.

I will keep this in mind.

Mint?! Boy, this was a very informative article. Being in the field all the time, I can definitely use some of this information.

Guys, that translates to under the next decade! It's hard to fathom, but just imagine what has happened to the ozone in the last decade.

Yeah, I think the problem would be moving the stored wind energy to the necessary places that needed it. I would imagine the energy would slowly dilute and ebb out from the storage if traveling far.

Man, those cars look nice! I know it's not as nice and sporty looking, but the 2010 Ford Fusion is a nice car to check out as well.