Two Lisbon-based entrepreneurs have devised a way to build a new bike from discarded car parts – and they’re planning to ride it the same number of miles that the original vehicle drove to compensate for its air-polluting past. The initiative is called the Carma Project, and it was organized by Leo Burnett Lisbon and B-Bicycle Culture Magazine to raise awareness and provoke constructive debate about urban mobility and alternative modes of transportation.

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Post tags: B-Bicycle Culture Magazine, bicycle design, bicycle sharing, bike out of car parts, CARMA bicycle, green bicycle design, green design, green transportation, Leo Burnett Lisbon, Rcicla Bicletas, recycled car parts, Recycled Materials, recycling, shared bicycles lisbon, urban cycling

Last week, NASA unveiled a $17.7 billion spending plan for 2014 that included proposals to capture a small asteroid and position it near the moon so that astronauts could explore it by 2025. In order to pull off this audacious mission the administration is considering developing a Solar Electric Propulsion (SEP) satellite, which allows for greater flexibility than traditional crewed spacecraft.

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Post tags: asteroid, ion thruster, mars 2030, nasa, Satellite, SEP, Solar Electric Propulsion, solar propulsion, space exploration, spacecraft

As the Tesla Model S sedan rockets in popularity and sales, and as the electric automaker begins to turn a profit, Elon Musk just announced that the next Tesla production model will go on sale “hopefully” in 2016, but no later than 2017. Speaking to Engadget, Musk suggested that the car would be “slightly smaller” than the Model S and could retail for around half the price—the electric sedan currently starts at $70,000.

Read the rest of New, Cheaper Tesla EV to Hit the Market by 2017, Says Elon Musk

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Post tags: affordable ev, cheaper tesla, electric car, electric vehicles, elon musk, ev, fourth tesla, green transportation, new tesla, tesla, tesla model-s, Tesla Motors, tesla production

We’ve shared lots of great ways to compost, recycle or reuse your old Christmas tree – but blasting it off into space never crossed our mind. Two DIY’ers have decided to “reuse” their Christmas tree by turning it into a rocket and launching it skyward. The already shedding tree was sent 120 feet into the air, revealing its unexpected aerodynamic properties.

Read the rest of XMS MissileToe: Recycled Christmas Tree Rocket Shoots for the Stars

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Post tags: christmas tree recycling, Christmas tree reuse, Christmas Tree Rocketry, holiday recycling, Rocket Christmas Tree, rocket-powered Christmas tree, XMS MissileToe

Beauty is truly fleeting, especially when it is frozen in liquid nitrogen and shattered by a spring-loaded contraption.  New York photographer Jon Shireman immerses flowers for up to 30 minutes in LN2, and rockets them into a hard surface, recording their destruction with a high speed camera for his 2010 “Broken Flowers” project.  Displayed against a stark white background, the blooms resemble splintered china plates or floral fireworks.

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Post tags: broken flowers, jon shireman, liquid nitrogen, ln2, New York., Photography

A few months ago we posted “5 Crazy Ways To Stop Climate Change” – a list of geoengineering concepts put forward to stop the planet from warming. One of the ideas was to essentially “wrap Greenland in a blanket” in order to reflect the sun’s rays back into space and prevent the country’s glaciers from melting. While it sounds insane, a new study published this week in the journal Environmental Research Letters reveals that reflecting sunlight back into space is actually “the cheapest way for us to combat global warming”.

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Post tags: Design, Environmental Research Letters, geoengineering, global warming, green design, greenland, reflecting sunlight, space, sulphur, sunlight, sunlight reflecting cloud, sustainable design, wrap up greenland

Traditionally, people visit the US Space and Rocket Center to view the massive Saturn V booster rockets and the Space Shuttle. But there’s now a new attraction, and one that has set a Guinness World Record. The center now boasts a massive Tyrannosaurus Rex sculpture made from 160,000 K’NEX pieces, which stands over 12 feet tall!

Read the rest of US Space & Rocket Centre Employees Build World’s Largest K’NEX Sculpture!

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Post tags: Guinness World Record, K'NEX, K'NEX dinosaur, K-REX, sculpture, T-Rex, US Space & Rocket Center

Designer Aaron Cheng has come up with an innovative design that solves the twin problems of parking and housing in congested urban areas. Designed for single young professionals, Parking + Housing combines parking and living spaces to maximize space efficiency. During the day, the small prefabricated housing units are compressed to create parking spaces, and then in the evening, the pneumatic shelters expands to turn back into living quarters. Under consideration for a James Dyson Award, Cheng’s thoughtful idea opens up a whole new set of pesky questions for urban planners as well as the commuters who would possibly live there.

Read the rest of Aaron Cheng’s Parking + Housing Building Is a Parking Garage That Converts to Housing at Night

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Post tags: Erin Chan, ETFE skin, housing + parking, james dyson award, parking and housing, parking garages, pneumatic structure, space utilization, urban planners

There has been a lot of debate about the merits of space tourism over the last few years. Some see it as a luxury for the super-rich, others an opportunity to go where only a lucky few have gone before — but one thing that is unavoidable is the environmental impact. With Virgin Galactic officially announcing that next year will see the start of their space tourism flights, we look at the impact of the industry on our planet.

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Post tags: black carbon, environmental impact, space tourism, Space tourism flights, spaceship two, virgin galactic, Virgin Galactic flights, VSS Enterprise, VSS Voyager

A new type of plasma thruster, currently in development at the Australian National University, could be a game-changer for deep space missions. Researchers at ANU believe that the new plasma thruster will help satellites travel for longer and farther into deep space. And unlike most plasma thrusters, which use expensive noble gases like xenon, the ANU’s helicon double layer plasma thruster (HDLT) will be able to use virtually any kind of propellant, including human urine.

Read the rest of New Pee-Powered Plasma Thruster Could Allow Astronauts to Travel Farther Into Deep Space

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Post tags: "plasma", ANU, australia, Helicon Double Layer Thruster, ion thruster, outer space, Plasma thruster, rockets, Rod Boswell, space propulsion, space travel

An Egyptain teenager has patented a next-generation propulsion system that could send spacecraft to other solar systems—without using a single drop of fuel. While it is not quite warp-drive technology, young physicist Aisha Mustafa’s system is based on quantum physics and could see mankind boldly go where no man has gone before.

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Post tags: Aisha Mustafa, Casimir effect, Casimir effect Aisha Mustafa, dragon X, quantum physics, quantum propulsion, satellites, space shuttles, space travel, warp speed

Believe it or not, this wooden racer is powered by nothing more than an everyday electric drill. Dubbed Rennholz, which translates to “Race Wood,” the ride represents the ultimate in e-mobility. Not only is the vehicle powered by a Bosch electric drill, it’s also made of custom-fabricated bent plywood, which was chosen as the material for the vehicle since wood is a renewable material.

Read the rest of Rennholz: This Wooden Racer is Unbelievably Powered by an Electric Drill

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Post tags: bent plywood, bosch electric drill, car powered by an electric drill, electric vehicle, green transportation, HAWK, Jirka Robert Wolff, racer powered by a drill, Rennholz, Sustainable Materials

Other than the fact that it was constructed in Russia, we aren’t entirely sure who’s responsible for this mean-looking chainsaw bike. While it may look like it’s designed for the sole purpose of cutting down everything in its path, the chainsaw’s motor does in fact power the front wheel of the bike. Apparently it’s not an uncommon practice – there’s a few instructional videos, and even an instructable out there for attaching a chainsaw motor to your bike, and with a 49cc engine or higher, it looks as though you can get a decent speed going. (If you lack a spare chainsaw, a weed wacker or any other small engine can do the job).

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Post tags: art bike, chainsaw bike, chainsaw motor, hacked bike, insane bike, motor bike, russian bike, russian vehicle, weedwhacker motor

It takes a lot of energy to launch a spacecraft into orbit – the Space Shuttle, for example, used over one million pounds of solid propellant to power its rocket boosters. As you can imagine, over the last 28 years of shuttle service it has been responsible for over 42,000 tonnes of pollutants in the atmosphere. However we still need rockets to get supplies and astronauts to and from the International Space Station. This, as well as the growth of the space tourism industry, has seen NASA lay down a challenge for US engineering firms to design and build ‘space taxis‘ able to take at least four people into space.

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Post tags: Commercial Crew Program, commercial crew program space taxis, green transportation, NASA commercial crew, NASA International Space Station, NASA space taxi proposal, NASA space taxis, sustainable design

Microsoft is one of the biggest companies in the world, and probably has a lot to answer for when it comes to global power consumption and social responsibility. While founder Bill Gates has done his part for the less fortunate by reportedly donating $28 billion to charity, his co-founder Paul Allen hasn’t made any kind gestures quite as large. In fact, it was recently reported that Allen put $13 billion behind a project that will see the construction of the world’s largest plane, the Stratolaunch. The massive plane will measure larger than The Spruce Goose, and be designed to carry rockets to high altitude.

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Post tags: Stratolaunch billionaire, Stratolaunch investment, Stratolaunch microsoft, Stratolaunch paul allen, Stratolaunch rockets, Stratolaunch rockets space, Stratolaunch scheme, Stratolaunch space travel, Stratolaunch spruce goose, Stratolaunch world's biggest plane

China‘s boom in industry and population has put a strain on its natural resources – not to mention the health of the environment – over the past few decades. In order to alleviate the stress of growing crops for an ever-increasing population, the government is intervening with nature by rolling out four regional programs to artificially increase precipitation across the country by 10 percent before 2015. The program, which was included in the newly released 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015), is anticipated to bring in an additional 230 billion cubic meters of precipitation per year. This is on top of the 50 billion China already artificially creates annually in the northeastern province of Jilin.

Read the rest of Chinese Government Says it Will Control Rainfall to Generate 10 Percent More Precipitation by 2015

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Post tags: china, china controlling rain, china farm irrigation, china making rain, china rain, china weather, china weather control, cloud-seeding, controlling mother nature, controlling nature, controlling rain, faux rainfall, man made rainfall, weather control

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Post tags: American Philosophical Society Museum, cornell university, eco design, French Natural History, green design, greenhouse, greenhouse architecture, Naturalists, Of Elephants & Roses, recyclable materials, Recycled Materials, sustainable design

Space Shuttle Atlantis made its final landing today at the Kennedy Space Center in Orlando, Florida officially marking the end of NASA’s 30 year-long space shuttle program that included 5 vessels, 135 missions and millions of gallons of fuel. We are sad to see the space shuttle go — it is endlessly amusing to watch people float in zero-gravity — but we are a little relieved to know that the blast of emissions from each shuttle launch will no longer be spewing into the atmosphere adding to the effects of global warming. NASA’s future mission is deep space flight and because of the massive amounts of thrust and probability of light-weight future vessels, fossil fuel will most likely be pushed aside for a lighter, more environmentally friendly propellant.

Read the rest of Space Shuttle Program Officially Retired, Millions of Gallons of Fuel to Be Saved

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Post tags: deep space missions, future deep space, future space program, last space shuttle mission, nasa, nasa space exploration, nasa space program, space shuttle, space shuttle atlantis, space shuttle atlantis lands, space shuttle program, us space exploration

Read the rest of Guerrilla Gardening: Mini Ecosystem Installations On the Streets Of Madrid Take Root

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Post tags: Art, art installation, eco-art, Gardening, green art, green design, green spaces, guerrilla gardening, implanted nature, luzinterruptus, madrid, sustainable art, urban green space

The changing Atlantic jetstream is slowing down the United Kingdom’s wind, raising questions about the efficacy of ambitious offshore wind farm programs. Wind speeds have reduced by 20% since 2008, according to a Telegraph report, and 2010 was the stillest year in the decade. Scientists predict that the jetstream over the UK will continue to slacken over the next four decades as a result of changing solar activity. Meanwhile, the coalition has plans to build thousands of wind turbines in order to meet the European Union goal of supplying 15% of the UK’s energy using alternatives to fossil fuels by 2020.

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Post tags: alternative energy, atlantic jetstream, britain, eco design, EU, green design, Offshore Wind Farm, renewable energy, sustainable design, united kingdom, wind energy, wind speed, wind turbines