Cow Power
The manure from pooping cows, collected by “alley scrapers” that run along the floor like a giant squeegee, is processed into renewable electricity.
Unearthed
Reforming Rice: Lundberg’s Greener Farms
Rice farming may look pretty from a distance, with its bucolic images of farmers in conical hats ankle deep in water as they cultivate green sprouts, but it has earned a bad environmental reputation because of its wasteful irrigation systems and incursions into wetlands. But not all rice farming is environmentally destructive.
New Hope for Horses
Last September, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 263 to 146 to pass H.R. 503, which bans the slaughter of horses for human consumption. The Senate will now consider its version of the bill, S. 1915.
Cups au Courant
Conscious consumers can pride themselves on pushing the global coffee market in a more eco-friendly direction, but what about the disposable cup industry? According to the Food Service and Packaging Institute, Americans use and throw out nearly 44 billion disposable cups for hot beverages each year.
Clean Cars: The Next Generation
It’s been a momentous year for cleaner vehicles (see "Getting There: A Guide to Planet-Friendly Cars," Consumer News, July/August 2004). DaimlerChrysler rolled out the first plug-in hybrid, albeit as a test vehicle, and announced it would soon import the fuel-sipping Smart city car. Several more manufacturers, including Ford, added new hybrids to their fleets. And the race to bring a fuel-cell car to market is getting hotter, as Honda and General Motors unveiled the latest versions of their hydrogen prototypes.
Blown Away in Australia
Like the beleaguered Cape Wind Project in Nantucket Sound, wind farms in Australia have faced opposition from communities that do not want their views disrupted by wind turbines. In 2004, Wind Power Pty Ltd landed government approval to build a 52-turbine wind farm in the rural area of Bald Hills, but then the locals protested, writing more than 1,500 letters to the planning board. So the governing party decided to kill the project and put the blame on an endangered local parrot.
Renewable Hydrogen Goes Maine-stream
Although it is the lightest element on the planet, liberating hydrogen from its molecular bonds can be a dirty process. However, a $250,000 demonstration project recently unveiled in Maine may be the bridge that leads to a clean hydrogen future.
The Climate at Yale
According to Yale University’s Climate Initiative, this Ivy League school in New Haven, Connecticut produced greenhouse gas emissions of 285,000 metric tons in 2002, more than 30 developing nations. Most of those emissions come from power plants, purchased power and on-campus buildings. But things are looking up. Last year, Yale President Richard Levin announced the university’s commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 10 percent below its 1990 levels by 2020.
Long Healthy Lives in Dominica
Dominica is now becoming known for something else than a long-ago visit by Christopher Columbus. The “nature isle” is now synonymous with longevity. At 29 miles long and 16 miles wide, with a population of 70,000, Dominica boasts 20 centenarians, and has the second-highest longevity in the western hemisphere (second only to Canada).
For Hawaiian Sea Turtles, A Last Resort?
For most visitors to the Big Island of Hawaii, the beautiful black sand beach at Punalu in the rural district of Kau is synonymous with one thing: giant sea turtles. But these awesomely beautiful marine reptiles may soon lose their visitation rights. Sea Mountain Five, a collaboration of California and Big Island investors, has recently proposed building a 2,000-unit resort complex on the site, which had previously hosted several failed hotel development plans. Environmentalists worry that the complex would put turtles, especially the critically endangered hawksbill, at risk.