Posts Tagged ‘sustainability’

Earth choice

Friday, July 23rd, 2010

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Erin Hearn


What is it: Although launched quite a while ago, this is an ad for Earth choice cleaning products.

Why is it cool: The latest Green Pulse results show that individuals feel responsibility for recycling. The Earths choice ad really pushes responsibility onto individuals in terms of the products they choose to use, it would be interesting to see how well this ad performs in terms of converting this responsibility into behaviour change! What‘s next for Green Pulse is to investigate top brands in being green, and investigate what makes people change their behaviour to buy/be green.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Erin Hearn

Who gives a scrap

Monday, June 28th, 2010

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Linley Barden


What is it: A compost service which collects leftover food from grocery stores, restaurants and coffee shops and turns it into organic soil conditioner. The gardens of Utah Valley are dining out!

Why is it cool: Next time you don’t eat everything on your plate, you can tell mum it’s ok the man will come collect it and trees will grow from it. It might not totally defeat her “just think of all the starving children in Africa” but it makes headway on doing something good for the world and innovative thinking. Also it holds up the golden virtues of  “waste not want not” and “making something out of nothing” – all cool too.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Linley Barden

Living walls

Friday, June 25th, 2010

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Bernard Visperas

What is it: A Spanish company has invented two types of tiles: one that can grow a number of different plants, including one that can suck pollution out of the atmosphere.

Why is it cool: Apart from the fact that they can make city buildings easier on the eye with funky patterns and designs, they are also great for the environment. The two tiles work in conjunction, where one tile uses natural light to convert nitrous oxide into fertilizer, which is then used by the plants growing on the other tile, and this plant matter removes carbon dioxide from the air. Both processes improve air quality, making it easier for locals to breathe.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Bernard Visperas

The village bicycle

Monday, May 31st, 2010

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Hilde Swendgaard

Yeah, baby, the environment is hot!

What is it: An inexpensive way to travel in a city, it required no responsibility for maintenance or insurance. For the equivalent of $5 per day, one can buy an annual ‘key’ and pick up a Bixi Bike from any port/depot. Ride where you want to, find a Bixi port and drop the bike.

Why is it cool: It will add a significant flexibility, and an alternative, to commuters as the ports can be picked up and dropped off into areas of high demand. If it’s a clear sunny day on the way to work, you can opt to go home by bus/train if it’s raining later that afternoon.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Hilde Swendgaard

Ecofootprint

Friday, May 28th, 2010

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David Tunnicliffe

Give unsustainable footwear the boot!

What is it: An open source shoe brand which seeks to harness the power of grass-roots capitalism to create a new fashion paradigm – one built on environmental and human sustainability.

Why is it cool: A great example of how the net nurtures the growth of ‘alternatives’.I just love the way in which giant brands (mentioning no N-N-N-N-Names) are having to become increasingly mindful of the backlash against their crushingly predictable old skool values.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: David Tunnicliffe

Cleanup in the deathzone

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

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Erin Hearn

The view from the top of the world. Yuck.

What is it: Much like the middle of the pacific, Mt. Everest and Antarctica are a couple of the last places that one would think to have been marked with our foot print of rubbish. But wherever we go, we leave behind a trail of debris and even dead bodies. This article describe a cleanup underway at the top of Mt. Everest.

Why is it cool: It’s great to see that people are doing something! According to Pollinate’s latest Green Pulse survey, concern for the environment is high amongst Australians, as is taking responsibility for environmental issues. Two-thirds of Australians consider the federal government responsible for addressing climate change, while 48% consider recycling to be the responsibility of the individual. People power is key.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Erin Hearn

Affluence is effluence

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

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Howard Parry-Husbands

What an affluent planet may look like

What is it: A new report from a consortium of Australian, US and Singaporean Universities has ranked countries in terms of their impact on the environment. The key finding was that increased wealth was linked to increased negative environmental impact.Or simply put: the richer we get, the more shit we cause.

Why is it cool: This effectively puts paid to any notion that rich nations can afford to alleviate their polluting ways. The methodology includes land clearing and species extinction – which effectively gives the ‘old world’ a better report card but, European damage is done.

This has important ramifications for attitude/behavior change research in Australia, lets not do any more damage!And the buck (mostly) stops here (America, Asia, Europe and Australia)!

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Howard Parry-Husbands

Seed bomb

Friday, April 30th, 2010

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Linley Barden

Oh, sorry, I thought you said 'sex bomb'

What is it: Old coin-op candy machines are being converted for use selling seed bombs – mixtures of clay, compost and seeds that can be thrown anonymously into derelict urban sites to (at least, temporarily) reclaim and transform them.

Why is it cool: There’s something poetic about obsolete candy machines (that are essentially trash) being repurposed to sell disposable “bombs” that can be “thrown away” …to bring growth and renewal.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: Linley Barden

Spray construction

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

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John Cucka

One house... two house... spray house... new house!

What is it:An Italian inventor has developed a construction scaffold that operates like a digital printer. Using CAD software, it sprays alternating layers of sand and a magnesium-based adhesive to build sandstone buildings from the ground up. With this process, the buildings go up in only a quarter of the time and cost half as much as conventional buildings. Even better, the resulting structures are as durable as sandstone buildings, and without the restrictions of conventional right-angle building (imagine oval rooms, oval windows, etc.)

Why is it cool: We may not all have flying cars yet, but spray-building homes could revolutionise construction. Imagine the public works projects that could be done in developing regions.

Where to find it: here!

Submitted by: John Cucka

Islands of floaty crap

Monday, April 19th, 2010

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Howard Parry-Husbands

I knew I should have taken a left at Albuquerque

What is it: A huge vortex of flotsam debris in the north Pacific

Why is it (not) cool: If we truly want to understand the scale of change required to move to a sustainable way of living it’s worth noting that this patch of floating plastic waste and chemical sludge is twice the size of Texas. Think about it – that’s a lot of plastic bags! And that’s merely a percentage of the worlds plastic and ‘floaty’ debris – the amount of waste we generate every day is huge and increasing and we are being confronted with the reality of our profligate and irresponsible modes of production and disposal. Once legislation begins to kick in to mitigate humanity’s harmful wasteful practices there will be a huge economic opportunity for those who can help to engineer change.

Right now, however, this is right down near the bottom of likely-to-be-fixed-in-a-hurry environmental issues – but it’s a timely reminder that we just don’t know the half of the mess we’re in just yet!

Where to find it: here! (and bobbing around in the north Pacific)

Submitted by: Howard Parry-Husbands

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