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Posts Tagged “

Recycling

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environmental

Sony Ericsson Wins Greenest Electronics Company Award

Congratulations, Sony Ericsson, for winning what was ultimately a barely challenging competition to become the greenest electronics company around. Our favorite Swedish-Japanese conglomerate rose to the top of Greenpeace's Greener Electronics Guide by exceeding Energy Star requirements, making all its models PVC-free and banning the most harmful chemicals from phones launched since January 2008. Unfortunately, it was valedictorian in a class whose scores have plummeted all around. More »

10:00 PM on Sun Jun 29 2008
By Elaine Chow
7,604 views, 33 comments

eco-crazy

22-Year-Old Set To Sail The Mississippi On a Boat Made From Juice Cartons

A 22-year-old British adventurer by the name of Rhys Jones may have made a name for himself as the youngest person to climb the world's seven highest summits, but he may end up being known as the youngest lunatic to ever drown in a juice-carton boat on the Mississippi if his plans for this weekend don't pan out. Actually, the idea was conceived by his father after he received a book about origami. Naturally, his first thought was to build a 12-foot raft with a wooden cabin and a paper hull lined with juice cartons and sail 3,700 miles down one of the most treacherous rivers in the world. More »

7:00 PM on Mon Jun 23 2008
By Sean Fallon
8,201 views, 29 comments

Latest by GadgetPlay: @Futrell: Kilometers, maybe? more »

gas crisis

Origo Develops Recycling System that Turns Car Emissions Into Fuel

The concept has been around for a while, but Origo Industries is planning on being the first company to release a CO2 recycling system that turns your car emissions into fuel. The unit captures CO2 from your car exhaust and stores it until it can be recycled in a home unit that uses algae to produce bio-oil. According to the company, the system could produce as much as 660 gallons of free fuel per year—which sounds too good to be true. We shall find out soon enough as Origo is scheduled to unveil the technology for the first time at this year's Green-Car-Guide Live! in the UK starting on June 12th. [Tradingcharts and Gizmag]

4:00 PM on Thu Jun 5 2008
By Sean Fallon
4,757 views, 29 comments

Latest by superbryant: Now If we could figure out ho to harness all that engergy that is given off as heat our vehicles would be so much more efficient.... more »

best buy

Best Buy Testing Free E-Waste Recycling Program (No Catches, So Far)

It's rare we get to write something positive about Best Buy, but here goes! It's testing a free e-waste recycling program in 117 stores in eight states (Update: Here's the detailed list, thanks Loop!). You can bring in two items a day, like computers, monitors, TVs up to 32 inches, etc., even if it didn't originally come from Best Buy. They'll also take away your junk if you have a shiny new thing delivered. Okay, two gripes. More »

12:40 PM on Mon Jun 2 2008
By matt buchanan
8,396 views, 42 comments

electricity

Electricity Generator Gets Its Power From Waste Heat

Dallas' Southern Methodist University is now recycling energy with one of the first commercial electricity generators that use thermoelectricity—the act of drawing power from waste heat. The machine operates by using heat given off by other processes (such as manufacturing) to boil liquids, which then turn into steam, which then turns an electricity-generating turbine. More »

7:00 PM on Sat May 31 2008
By Elaine Chow
5,349 views, 33 comments

diy

Transform an Old CD Drive Into a Salami Slicin' Guillotine

The origins of this CD Drive salami slicer are unknown, so there are no details on the build itself. However, it seems that adding a decent blade to an old CD drive could score you a salami slicer that fits in with your geeky lifestyle. You could probably even rig it so that operates automatically off a power supply. Now that is what I call recycling. [justelite via about:blank]

2:30 PM on Wed May 28 2008
By Sean Fallon
4,696 views, 32 comments

Latest by MasterYong: Techno-mohels the world over rejoice! more »

pipe dream

Junk Computers Could Fuel Cars One Day: Holding Breath...Now

You know that crappy computer you have been meaning to toss out? Hold on there, my friend—the next breakthrough vehicle fuel source could be contained within its valuable circuit boards (although most likely not). Scientists in Romania and Turkey have employed a combination of catalysts, high temperatures and chemical filtration to remove toxic chemicals from old computers and other electronic devices, resulting in oils that could be used for fuel or raw materials in other consumer products. More »

8:00 PM on Wed May 14 2008
By Sean Fallon
1,825 views, 28 comments

Latest by brundlefly76: thats a better-than-average graphic and caption ') more »

recycling

CDs Get Into the Groove, Do Music the 45RPM Way

This is a story of a not so environmentally friendly, but rather groovy repurposing idea: reusing CDs as records (remember them?) At the UK's Futuresonic festival last week, a guy named Aleks Kolkowski had his vintage record-cutting machine ready to carve sound tracks into old CDs and DVDs. People simply had to turn up with an old disc and a sound file and he'd "overwrite" the CD with a track ready to be played on a turntable. Neat! I'd have been there asking Aleks for a copy of my first ever record (that'll be the theme to Watership Down— I know, I know) on a crappy old AOL CD I found recently. [Futuresonic via DIYDaily via ] More »

4:22 AM on Fri May 9 2008
By Kit Eaton
4,221 views, 24 comments

Latest by infmom: @ideaman2020: Yes! They had one on one of the upper floors of the Empire State Building in the mid-50s and I remember making a record for my mom in there. It'd probably be a laugh riot if it had survived into more »

ecomodo

How to Save The World...One Cellphone at a Time

Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek put together a logical plan of action for bringing cellphone recycling to the U.S. over on his blog. However, it requires the collective effort of all of you to make this happen. The idea is this—if we lobby enough executives in companies responsible for cellphone manufacturing and distribution, asking for a plan of action, eventually some of these people will reply and will publicly pledge to consider it. As an incentive, Ferriss is giving away free stuff to the best responses posted by June 1st? Sounds good to me... but then again, I'm a huge fan of this stuff. Get all the details over at Tim's blog. [Tim Ferriss]

5:20 PM on Tue Apr 29 2008
By Adrian Covert
1,502 views, 3 comments

Latest by n/a: I have about 5 tube TV's sitting in my basement ranging from 19" to 27" and shipping these would not be ideal. Two solutions come to mind, garage sale and/or driving up to the local college campus and seeing who more »

japan

Urban Miners in Japan Find Precious Metals in Discarded Gadgets

China isn't the only nation dismantling used electronics to get at the gold, copper and silver inside. This trend, called "urban mining", is even more profitable in the current market where precious metals are trading close to their all-time high. For example, a ton of ore from a gold mine gives about 5 grams of gold, but a ton of cellphones gives 150 grams of gold. Why would Japan be into this trend? Because their country has few natural resources outside of perverted old dudes, but if they stack up all the cellphones owned by their citizens, they could probably make a pile as big as Mt. Fuji. [Yahoo News]

7:00 PM on Mon Apr 28 2008
By Jason Chen
4,183 views, 14 comments

Latest by TheJollyGreenGiant: but let's not talk about the places where asian children have to pick apart at these discard electronics for shitty pay in unsafe conditions... or how tons of american electronics are "Recycled!" over here only to be sent to overseas to more »

bioplastics

Bioplastics: Environmentally Unfriendly, Contributing To The Food Crisis

About those bioplastic bags - you know, the ones you've been using to assuage your eco-conscious guilt - turns out not only are they not as green as you think, they could also be partially responsible for the global food crisis. A worldwide effort by bag-heavy industries to replace petroleum-based plastics with plant-based plastics could actually lead to more environmental problems, according to a study by the Guardian UK. More »

8:00 PM on Sat Apr 26 2008
By Elaine Chow
6,148 views, 67 comments

flavor country

Pig Urine Plasticware Could Add Some Flavor To Your Meals, Cigarettes

Denmark has a disgusting problem. The waste produced by the country's 20 million pigs is slowly choking the environment—which has prompted a local company named Agroplast to devise a unique solution. Specifically, they have developed a means of processing animal waste (pig urine most notably) and transforming it into plastics that could be used in just about everything—including plastic dinnerware. More »

6:00 PM on Tue Apr 22 2008
By Sean Fallon
4,817 views, 37 comments

cellphones

$20 Disposable Cell Phones Coming to Europe

Phone maker Hop-on Inc. apparently found success at CTIA in Las Vegas with its disposable cell-phone concept, a $20 (13 euros) phone with no LCD screen that can be thrown away or recycled after use. The company said on Thursday that a European distributor has purchased 10,000 of the phones for an initial test run. The phone uses a Texas Instruments chip set and works on the 900/1800 MHz frequency. More »

3:00 PM on Sat Apr 12 2008
By Elaine Chow
15,681 views, 35 comments

design

Washup: Toilet and Washing Machine All-in-One (Oh Yes!)

Alright, I get it. Eco-friendly types and people who have small apartments might appreciate a washing machine / toilet hybrid that recycles wasted wash water in the flush tank. It is a good idea, but there is something that is just plain wrong about having your clean clothes so close to the place where you poop—you know what I'm saying? Still, if you are a dude you could entertain yourself by watching the cycle spin while urinating.Nice. It may only be a concept, but I wouldn't be surprised to see this thing popping up in tiny apartments sometime in the near future. [Core77 via Apartment Therapy]

9:15 PM on Thu Mar 20 2008
By Sean Fallon
8,250 views, 55 comments

Latest by Khuluna: Do like. more »

eco kitchen

Whirlpool Kitchen is Eco-Friendly, Recycles Heat, Water

This new Whirlpool concept is an attempt to tackle some of the rampant energy and resource wasting that goes on in the average kitchen. How many times have you heated something up in the oven, and then wondered whether anything useful can be done with the spare heat once you've finished cooking? Okay, maybe that's just my eco-guiltiness, but this new concept is designed to be 70% more energy efficient than standard kitchens and 24% cheaper to run. More »

8:03 AM on Mon Mar 17 2008
By Kit Eaton
6,033 views, 13 comments

Latest by n/a: It looks like something that GE industrial designers did about 3 or 4 years ago for NextFest but only painted white and green instead of Black and wood. more »

recycled vase

Facade Vase: Recycle Your Water Bottles as Flower-Holders

The Facade Vase from Orcadesign is a wool slip-on cover that lets you turn an unwanted plastic bottle into a minimalist vase. It's a design that will clearly please eco-friendly types and cheapskates too. We can see the conversations now: "Here you go, honey, I've got you a flower and (glug, glug) a vase!"... "Oh, you cheapskate!" "Ah, that's what you think. Here, use this to cover it." "No." Or something like that anyway. Sadly, just a concept for now. [Orcadesign via Dvice]

12:00 PM on Wed Mar 12 2008
By Kit Eaton
3,120 views, 26 comments

Latest by kyel57: @Git Em SteveDave: The water in the vase would act as a base...you don't see half filled watter bottles tipping over all over the place...no one else adressed this issue cause THERE IS NO ISSUE more »

green

Panasonic Recycling Process Turns Plastic Into "Harmless" Gas

Panasonic has developed a recycling technique that uses titanium oxide to convert unrecoverable plastic and other organic compounds to a "harmless" gas. The key focus is on separating wires from their coatings and extract the other rubbers and plastics that make up the non-recyclable 20% of home-appliance waste. Panasonic's stated goal is to "completely eliminate mixed plastic waste." And if that ain't bold enough, the process reduces CO2 emissions, too, because the gasification process itself doesn't require much energy. Here's how it works: More »

10:25 AM on Wed Feb 27 2008
By Wilson Rothman
5,128 views, 20 comments

Latest by SuppleMonkey: @osnofla: Thanks for the clarification. It's been a long time since chemistry class, and I figured there might be more than one way to describe TiO2. more »

design

Barcode Scanner Bins Make Recycling Fun For Nerds

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for recycling, but it's the process I'm not so thrilled about. For bottles and newspapers things are fairly simple, but there is a whole gray area that makes knowing what is appropriate for recycling more complicated. The Barcode Trashcan offers a high-tech solution that utilizes the product barcode to help sort and separate items. More »

6:20 PM on Thu Feb 14 2008
By Sean Fallon
5,217 views, 28 comments

Latest by n/a: @madog: A tax is not a solution if it leads to nothing more than "the price of doing business". It's amusing that you think the customer is lazy for bringing something back to the store they bought it from. more »

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