L.A. Hires Goats to Help with Development Project

by Josh Lew on

If you pay a visit to downtown Los Angeles in the near future, you might expect to see the usual assortment of tall buildings and expensive retail shops. But what about farm animals? No, there isn’t going to be a new zoo located in city’s main commercial center. And there are no movies being filmed that are set in a post-apocalyptic world where wildlife runs free through urban areas . City officials have merely hired a herd of goats to clear shrubs on a plot of land where a new skyscraper is slated to be built.

Apparently goats are cheaper than people when it comes to clearing growth from an area. No wages, no gas-powered weed whackers, no overtime pay, no unions…what’s not to like? The goats have even become a bit of an attraction, with locals stopping by to look and snap photos. It should take about a week for the animals to eat their way through the lot’s undergrowth. I wonder if they’ll have to hire people to clean up all the goat poop before the construction crews move in. See a BBC report about the goats here.

World’s first ecological nightclub opens in London

by Abha Malpani on

Just opened in Pentonville Road, Islington (Greater London) is Surya (Hindi for “Sun” and Sanskrit for “Sun God”), the world’s first green nightclub.

It will generate its own electricity when people move on its floors, will operate on solar and wind energy, has air-flush waterless urinals and low-flush toilets, and free entry for cyclists and walkers. Otherwise club entry is £10 and customers must sign a pledge towards helping combat climate change.

Brainchild of Mr.Charalambous, head of Club4Climate, the club’s dance floor is made of crystal and ceramic, which when trodden on generates electricity under the concept of “piezoelectricity”. This current is fed into nearby batteries, which in turn fuel the club. It is estimated that if a large group of clubbers danced vigorously, they could generate 60% of the club’s energy needs.

With aim of inspiring the youth to get involved in tackling the issue of global warming, Charalambous said in the Times of India: “Unless we stop preaching to people and use an inclusive philosophy we’re never going to create the revolution to combat climate change.” I couldn’t agree more.

UK introduces movable, recyclable hotel concept

by Abha Malpani on

There seem to be a variety of recycled hotels around the world. New Zealand has a 1950’s Bristol Fighter that has been converted into a motel; The Hague has marine lifeboats converted into floating hotels, and Stavoren (also Netherlands) has 15,000 liter wine-vats converted into hotel rooms.

But the latest in the recycled hotels genre is a recyclable one that can move locations! Budget hotel operator Travelodge has come up with this cheap, quick to construct, and green accommodation solution for large scale festivals and events where they rent out some crates from China and put together a temporary, recyclable hotel in 12-weeks. The pre-built, container-like crates are stacked together and bolted to form an 8-floor, 120-room hotel structure, and come in modules with bathrooms installed; the rest of the furnishings will be added later.

It probably doesn’t get more inventively green, but I’d have safety concerns.

What will they come up with next? Recyclable houses? Cars? Planes?

New California Museum to be Greenest Ever

by Neil Woodburn on

It’s only natural that a Natural History museum is as eco-friendly as possible.

And, it’s only natural that “the world’s largest eco-friendly public building” will be a Natural History museum located in America’s most eco-friendly city.

Sometime next year, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park will throw open its front doors and invite the public into “one of the most expensive museum projects in a century,” according to Wired Magazine.

The $484 million building is incorporating a slew of green technologies to really put its money where its mouth is. How ironic it would be otherwise to celebrate the natural world while polluting it at the same time with an energy-consuming hog of a building.

With this in mind, the architects have implemented such innovations as a lawn roof that doubles as a natural habitat, 60,000 photovoltaic cells atop another roof, and shredded blue jeans as wall insulation (hey, isn’t Levi’s corporate headquarters located in San Francisco?).

When it is completed, the California Academy of Sciences is going to be one of the most impressive buildings around; what other piece of architecture so thoroughly practices what it preaches?

Travel by Flying Saucer?

by Martha Edwards on

There might soon be a new way to get around, and it’s something you would expect to see on the pages of a comic book from the 1960s — the flying saucer. Okay, it’s not really a flying saucer like the one that belonged to that little martian guy on the Flintstones. It just looks like one. It’s actually an eco-friendly plane of sorts, developed under the CleanEra Project at Delft University. It cuts down the environmental impact in a few ways, including:

  • Using propellers rather than fuel-hungry jets, though this creates a concern because it makes for longer flight times. And, as you’ll know if you’ve ever flown in a prop plane, it is freakin’ loud.
  • Using composite materials, which make the body of the plane weigh less and therefore use less fuel
  • Using a ergonomic design, which also decreases the amount of fuel needed.
  • Accommodating more passengers. One of these flying saucers could potentially hold up to 800 passengers.

It’s just in the planning stages right now, so we’ll have to sit tight and see if anything comes of it.

(Via Autoblog Green)