Solving problems: India aims to plant 50 million trees… in a day
India is a country of big numbers. In a not so distant future, India will surpass China as the world’s most populous nation. But here’s another record: The government of the state of Uttar Pradesh aims to plant 50 million trees in one day. It has recruited more than 800,000 people for the job Read More...
Eating more fruit and vegetables can substantially increase happiness levels
University of Warwick research indicates that eating more fruit and vegetables can substantially increase people's later happiness levels. To be published shortly in the prestigious American Journal of Public Health, the study is one of the first major scientific attempts to explore psychological Read More...
Researchers help blind mice to see for first time
Once the optic nerve that’s responsible for sight is damaged, it’s impossible to see again. At least that’s been the dogma. But a group of U.S. scientists has upended that thinking and helped mice with destroyed optic nerves to see again. It does not have immediate implications Read More...
This guy spends $2.75 a year on food and eats like a king
Over the last two years, William Reid has spent just $5.50 on food. Reid is a committed dumpster diver: He dredges unsold grub from supermarket dumpsters and collects food scraps wherever he finds them. And he feasts. A graduate student in film and electronic media at American University in Read More...
Cutting the cable: Kangaroo Island eyes switch to 100% renewable energy
Kangaroo Island is one of the great icons of Australian tourism. As Andrew Boardman, the chief executive of the Kangaroo Island council, says: “You can’t buy a name like that.” But now the third-biggest island in Australia, which lies just 120kms from Adelaide, wants to make its Read More...
Californians just saved $192 million via rooftop solar & energy efficiency
The solar-friendly voices at CleanTechnica.com have been saying it; solar advocates everywhere have been saying it; Californians have been saying it — solar saves. Solar saves money, saves the environment, and saves lives in this way. Yes, Californians just saved $192 million via rooftop Read More...
Businesses have seen the light with solar energy and it's finally paying off
A visit to a small hospital in northern Ghana changed Mahama Nyankamawu’s life forever. “It was dark, they had no electricity and the medicines they had had all gone bad,” recalled the 40-year-old, who went to the hospital after a car accident in 2014. The experience inspired Read More...
Serena Williams: The hope black America needed
Last week, for me, was about Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, and the list of names of hundreds more black bodies that they joined. It was about protests and it was about anger. It was about 11 police officers wounded and five killed in a tragic slaughter in Dallas. It was about grief, and it was Read More...
British businesses must meet the challenge of the circular economy
The environment was conspicuous by its absence from any of the mainstream campaigning ahead of the referendum, yet it is not only one of the areas most likely to be affected by the Brexit vote, but also the area where I believe business has the biggest responsibility and opportunity to act. Read More...
Robotic stingrays show the power of biomimicry
Looking to the natural world for engineering inspiration is an idea at least as old as Leonardo da Vinci. Copying nature directly, though, has often proved hard. For example, birds flap their wings to achieve both lift and propulsion, but flying machines that imitate this action have tended not to Read More...