Surprisingly enough, central banks are leading calls for climate action
As groups of Extinction Rebellion protestors glued themselves to public transit and closed down large swathes of central London last week in a series of demonstrations that continued Thursday, a very different group was gathering just a couple hours’ train journey away in Paris. They, too, Read More...
This foundation is on a mission to plant 100 million trees by 2022
The largest non-profit dedicated to planting trees announced a special goal during America’s oldest environmental celebration: Arbor Day. The non-profit, which goes by the name Arbor Day Foundation, made it known to the world that it wants to plant 100 million trees by 2022. As the foundation Read More...
A silkworm-based coating could soon replace the toxic chemicals in our clothes
More than 150 chemicals are now regularly used to enhance the characteristics of the clothes we wear each day. Some of these chemicals are demonstrated carcinogens, or capable of reproduction, nervous, and endocrine system dysregulation. Others are allergenic or irritating. And even when we wash Read More...
How community solar is pushing New York towards 100% renewables
Even if many New Yorkers would like to power their homes with solar energy, they wouldn’t be able to—unless they own a building and put solar panels on the roof themselves. But as the city pushes for 100 renewables, providing the opportunity for everyday New Yorkers to get involved in solar Read More...
Startups are helping the city of Flint turn the tide after the water crisis
Whenever the city of Flint, Michigan, finds itself in the headlines, it’s rarely for anything good. The city has long suffered from divestment and exodus, and the water crisis five years ago didn’t help fix the national image of Flint being a site of intractable poverty. But all of this fails Read More...
Tiny teeth-cleaning robots could soon calm your fears of the dentist
A visit to the dentist typically involves time-consuming and sometimes unsettling scraping with mechanical tools to remove plaque from teeth. Plaque deposits are usually the product of biofilms – little communities of micro-organisms, bacterial and otherwise, that gather together and coat on your Read More...
A South Korea school is enrolling illiterate grandmas to save it from closing
South Korea’s birthrate has been plummeting in recent decades, falling to less than one child per woman last year, one of the lowest in the world. The hardest hit areas are rural counties, where babies have become an increasingly rare sight as young couples migrate en masse to big cities for Read More...
Washington becomes first state to make human composting legal
Isn’t it weird that humanity has advanced so far when it comes to technology, and yet, we have only two options for disposing of human bodies after death? There’s a traditional burial, which requires wood and steel and means leaking dangerous chemicals into the ground, and cremation, which both Read More...
Turn your leftover eggshells into an all-natural fertilizer for your plants
You may not realize it, but the leftover eggshells from your sunny side up can help your garden grow greener and stronger. You see, eggshells are full of calcium, which is an essential plant nutrient, as well as other minerals. By fusing hot water and eggshells, you can make an eggshell tea (yum!) Read More...
The London Marathon replaced plastic bottles with edible seaweed pouches
If you’ve ever been to a huge sporting event such as a marathon, you’re probably aware of the massive amount of plastic waste that gets left behind. The London marathon is usually no different, but this year, the organizers arranged for participants to be handed edible pods made of seaweed Read More...