Poo Power!

POO POWER: 200 Homes In UK Heated By Human Waste

POO POWER: 200 Homes In UK Heated By Human Waste

Over 200 homes in Didcot, UK are now being heated with human waste! Before you lose your lunch, allow us to explain that the waste is highly purified at a nearby sewage station and converted into an

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PARK SPARK: Public Park Converts Dog Poo to Energy

PARK SPARK: Public Park Converts Dog Poo to Energy

A new project in Cambridge, MA dubbed the “Park Spark” has dogs powering the street lights in their own dog parks. Designed by Matthew Mazzotta, a visual artist with a degree from MIT, the

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PISSKY: Gilpin Whisky is Recycled from Diabetic’s Urine

PISSKY: Gilpin Whisky is Recycled from Diabetic’s Urine

James Gilpin has Type 1 Diabetes -- his pancreas doesn't work, forcing him to take shots of insulin to process glucose from food. Gilpin got to thinking about elderly patients with diabetes, like his

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Poo-Powered VW Bug Hits British Streets

Poo-Powered VW Bug Hits British Streets

POO POWER! GENeco, a waste treatment company in Bristol, UK set out to prove that bio-gas could be a reliable alternative transportation fuel, so they imported special equipment to help process their

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Stanford Scientists Transform Raw Sewage Into Eco Rocket Fuel

Stanford Scientists Transform Raw Sewage Into Eco Rocket Fuel

Photo by Brian Cantwell Here's a pretty elaborate way to process sewage waste: Stanford researchers propose using anaerobic bacteria to break it down, producing nitrous oxide or laughing gas. Then, use

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Nanotechnology Makes Poop Power 20 Times More Efficient

Nanotechnology Makes Poop Power 20 Times More Efficient

Engineers at Oregon State University have their minds in the gutter. They're working on getting more energy from sewage, and they've made a discovery that boosts electricity production substantially. By

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First Self-Sustaining Biomass Bot Eats, Excretes, Runs for a Week

First Self-Sustaining Biomass Bot Eats, Excretes, Runs for a Week

The premise of any science fiction movie worth its salt is robots operating without human supervision for long stretches of time. (Those pesky robots do get into trouble, don't they?) Researchers at the

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Sewage Sludge Biodiesel Costs Just 10¢ a Gallon More Than Petrol

Sewage Sludge Biodiesel Costs Just 10¢ a Gallon More Than Petrol

Photo courtesy American Chemical Society The key difference between biofuels that are truly green and those that aren't is the source material: is it genuinely waste, or is it something like food or

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Google, HP and Microsoft Consider Poo to Power Data Centers

Google, HP and Microsoft Consider Poo to Power Data Centers

Photo credit: Skinnyde Tech giants like Google, Hewlett Packard and Microsoft have been considering everything from wave to solar power to keep their massive data centers running, but did you know that

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Japanese Company Turns Adult Diapers into Energy Source

Japanese Company Turns Adult Diapers into Energy Source

Wearing adult diapers just got a whole lot cooler -- a Japanese company called Super Faith has developed a miraculous system that turns used diapers into a clean fuel source in about 24 hours. The elderly

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First Train Fueled by Beef Biodiesel Hits the Rails in Texas

First Train Fueled by Beef Biodiesel Hits the Rails in Texas

The nation's first commuter train using a cleaner renewable biodiesel fuel blend launched yesterday as Amtrak's Heartland Flyer chugged from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to Fort Worth, Texas on a blend of

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UK Prepares to Use Human Poop to Power Homes

UK Prepares to Use Human Poop to Power Homes

We talk about poop all the time -- pig poop, cow poop and chicken poop -- so why not start talking about our own? This stinky taboo might be keeping us from a great energy source. Scientists in the UK are

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POO POWER: Researchers Make Crude Oil Out of Pig Manure

POO POWER: Researchers Make Crude Oil Out of Pig Manure

Pig manure: it's good for more than just smelling up pig pens. Researchers from the University of Illinois and Innoventor have figured out a way to make crude oil out of the pungent stuff -- and one day,

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L’Oreal’s Cosmetics Factory Set to Run on Poop

L’Oreal’s Cosmetics Factory Set to Run on Poop

Poop and perfumes are not two words that normally go together, so we were surprised to find that L'Oreal truly embraces this association. At one of their factories in Libramont, Belgium, the company has

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TRANSPORTATION TUESDAY: Oslo Buses to run on Poo Power!

TRANSPORTATION TUESDAY: Oslo Buses to run on Poo Power!

Rather than let all their sewage go to waste, the city of Oslo recently announced that it plans to cut carbon emissions by converting 80 public buses to run on biomethane generated from raw sewage. These

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Singapore’s Ecological EDITT Tower

Singapore’s Ecological EDITT Tower

Currently pending construction in Singapore, the EDITT Tower will be a paragon of “Ecological Design In The Tropics”. Designed by TR Hamzah & Yeang and sponsored by the National University

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Chicken Manure to power 90,000 Homes in the Netherlands!

Chicken Manure to power 90,000 Homes in the Netherlands!

Here at Inhabitat we love to see innovative reuses for organic waste, and so we're perpetually fascinated by the potential of poo to be used as a renewable source of energy. Last week Dutch agriculture

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Burp Catching Backpack Traps and Contains Methane Released by Cows!

Burp Catching Backpack Traps and Contains Methane Released by Cows!

Ah, green design at its finest. Here at Inhabitat we pride ourselves in bringing you the freshest eco-friendly innovations, so how could we pass on the merits of this bright pink burp-trapping bovine

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OILGAE TEST DRIVE: Algae Power Hits the Road

OILGAE TEST DRIVE: Algae Power Hits the Road

Corn and soybean derived biofuels have long been the most promising options on the table for escaping the clutches of fast depleting petroleum. However, acquiring the space necessary to produce ethanol

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PIG-POWERED Eco Lodge in Costa Rica

PIG-POWERED Eco Lodge in Costa Rica

While you may not naturally associate pig feces with 'clean' energy, the Lapa Rios Ecolodge in Costa Rica manages to makes pig poo power seem smart, sexy and super sustainable with their environmentally

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TOP 5 Weirdest Ways to Power Your Home

TOP 5 Weirdest Ways to Power Your Home

As solar panels and wind turbines become more and more commonplace in homes, it appears that green energy is finally moving into mainstream. But lest you fear that solar power is becoming too played out,

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DOG POOP POWER FOR SAN FRANCISCO

DOG POOP POWER FOR SAN FRANCISCO

Anyone who's ever spent time in San Francisco (and perhaps stepped in a stinky patch in Duboce park) knows that this is a city that loves its dogs. So much so that dog poop is a real issue in terms of

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POO POWER: Could Cow Poo Power Your Home?

POO POWER: Could Cow Poo Power Your Home?

When it comes to finding cleaner greener sources of electrical power, we're going to have to start thinking out of the box a bit if we want to reduce carbon emissions and increase efficiency. Coal,

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