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Bamboo flooring is NOT green. Puma's New Tack on Sustainable Consumption: Compostable Clothes. In the last 18 months or so, Puma has hit the ground running with a number of industry-leading (and, truthfully, world-leading) sustainability initiatives. From their groundbreaking environmental profit-and-loss statement to green packaging plans to a commitment to zero toxic pollution by 2020, the sportswear company has made big strides on addressing its environmental impacts. But as with all consumer-facing companies, one of the biggest hurdles to overcome is what happens to your goods when your customers no longer want them. Another sustainability-minded brand, Patagonia, recently took steps to get people to buy used clothes first, but Puma is taking a different tack: Making their clothes compostable.

In The Guardian, Louise Osborn reports on comments made by Puma CEO Franz Koch suggesting that the company is looking at closing the loop on its products. Osborn writes: You can read more about Puma's sustainability plans in this profile from our own Adam Aston. What's the Greenest Way to Dry Your Hands? Editor's Note: This article, originally published on November 15, 2011, was updated today with a response from Kimberly-Clark Professional. It's a question that bedevils facility managers. What's the most environmentally conscious and cost effective way for people to dry their hands in company and public restrooms? Paper towels made from recycled content? Electric hand dryers? Dyson, the maker of the cold air-driven hand dryers, contends its Airblade is the best option when it comes to energy efficiency and commissioned a study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to look into the matter.

Researchers at MIT's Material Systems Laboratory conducted life cycle assessments on the use of paper towels made from 100 percent recycled content, paper towels made of 100 percent virgin content, cotton towels on a roll (the kind on a spindle), a generic warm-air dryer, an XLERATOR hand dryer by Excel, and two Dyson Airblade models, one with a plastic cover and one with an aluminum cover. An Uninvited Thanksgiving Guest: BPA. We've reported on Bisphenol-A extensively at GreenBiz.com, including how the gender-bending chemical is pervasive in everyday products, ranging from receipt paper and baby bottles to the epoxy lining of cans used as food packaging.

So it was not much of a surprise to see a study released today concluding that many families may receive a hearty serving of BPA alongside their Thanksgiving turkey next week. The chemical mimics estrogen and has been linked to reproductive and developmental problems. The Breast Cancer Fund tested BPA levels in seven products that frequently make their way to the Thanksgiving table.

The nonprofit also tested the four products purchased in four different states, for a total of 28 samples. They found that 12 of the samples had BPA levels above 11 parts per billion (ppb) the amount that has been associated with disrupting in utero brain development in lab studies. No BPA was detected in samples of Ocean Spray Jellied Cranberry Sauce.

The U.S. Kindle Fire Gets Torn Down – No Surprises Here. iFixit, bless their hearts, have taken a Kindle Fire to pieces, though as it turns out, there aren’t too many pieces to begin with. The battery is one huge unit, and all the processing and I/O occurs on a single PCB at the bottom of the device. Those expecting a carbon copy of the Playbook both outside and in will be disappointed: the layout, batteries, PCB, and all the components are different, making the form factor more or less the only real similarity between the two devices. That said, it is possible they share a processor unit; reports had TI as the supplier, and 1GHz sounds about right. Curiously, it’s not visible on the surface of the PCB, or is integrated in such a way that it can’t be identified without a more invasive teardown.

But TI provided the transceivers, power manager, and so on, so it’s a safe bet. Update: yes, it was hiding under the RAM module, and it is a TI OMAP 4430, the same type used in the Playbook. S latest iPhone and iPad apps course now free on iTunes U. By Sarah Jane Keller Steve Fyffe Paul Hegarty teaches students how to program applications for iPads and iPhones in a free online course that's the most popular download on Stanford's iTunes U site, with more than 10 million views. Students may covet seats in Stanford's popular iPhone and iPad application development course, but you don't need to be in the classroom to take the course. Anyone with app dreams can follow along online. Stanford has just released the iOS 5 incarnation of iPhone Application Development on iTunes U, where the public can download course lectures and slides for free.

Some of the most talked-about features of Apple's latest operating system include iCloud, streamlined notifications and wireless syncing. When Stanford's first iPhone apps course appeared online in 2009, it made iTunes history by rocketing to a million downloads in just seven weeks. Alberto Martín is an engineer and independent iOS developer in Salamanca, Spain. His apps provide him with extra income. Taylor Fravel decodes China’s foreign policy. Taylor Fravel Photo: Dominick Reuter When Taylor Fravel was a teenager, his father, an engineer for Bechtel, accepted a job in Taiwan. It turned out to be a significant career move for both of them. Up until that point, the younger Fravel had barely been outside of his native Michigan.

After two years as a high school student in the Far East, though, he was engrossed by the new culture and society he had seen, and determined to learn more about it. “For me it was a really transformative experience,” says Fravel, who began to learn the language in Chinese-speaking Taiwan while attending an American school. Today, Fravel is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science and a member of the Security Studies Program at MIT, with a distinctive specialty: Chinese foreign policy.

Diplomatic resolutions, most of the time As Fravel tells it, one root of his current research actually extends back further than his time in Taiwan. China’s evolving military. Cold Fusion Heats Up. Clean Power Published on November 14th, 2011 | by Silvio Marcacci Could cold fusion technology revolutionize energy generation? Editor’s Note: I wouldn’t bet on it… Cold fusion is considered by many to be the Holy Grail of energy production: a contained, low-energy nuclear reaction that could theoretically produce endless, self-sustaining, and incredibly cheap energy.

But, just like the Holy Grail, it has been more myth than reality. Countless scientists have tried to successfully demonstrate cold fusion, and all have failed – until now. energyNOW! Late last month, an Italian inventor named Andrea Rossi, claimed a successful test demonstration of cold fusion at the University of Bologna. Rossi says his technology succeeded where others have failed because he uses a secret catalyst to react with small amounts of nickel powder and hydrogen gas.

Nonetheless, Rossi says he expects the E-Cat to go into mass production soon, so time will tell if cold fusion has finally found a place in the sun. Chris Huhne: UK's nuclear policy is most expensive postwar failure - 14 Oct 2011. Opportunities in Mobile Health (August 16, 2011) The United States and other industrialized countries can learn from experiments in the developing world that use the humble cell phone as a platform for innovation.

(Illustration by Keith Negley) More than three-quarters of the world’s 5.3 billion mobile phones are located in the developing world. These increasingly powerful devices are proving to be a lifeline for people who need improved access to health services. The trend of using mobile phones for health—known as mHealth—represents an unprecedented opportunity for improving public health. Much of the innovative thinking in mHealth is coming from programs that target populations outside the United States, often in developing countries. Now in a twist of fate, the innovations emerging from the developing world could prove to be a significant springboard for innovation in the developed world. One prominent example is GE’s portable ultrasound device.

The Tata Nano is another example of reverse innovation. Lack of Evidence. Notes 1 J.R. Shopping 2.0: Interactive Hangers Used In Japanese Clothes Store (Videos) Shopping 2.0: It’s no surprise that “interactive hangers” [scroll down for an explanation in English] are first introduced in Japan, a country obsessed with service, shopping, fashion and technology. Vanquish, the shop in question, is located in a department store in central Tokyo called 109MEN’S.

The way it works is pretty simple: every time a shopper picks up a hanger, a computer screen above the item displays relevant pictures and videos, for example showing how a T-shirt looks when worn or other clothes that would fit the item chosen. The trick is an sensor placed inside the hanger that automatically triggers the action but can also be used to instantly change the background music or light in a store, for example: The maker of the interactive hangers, Tokyo-based Team Lab, started experimenting with the concept last year. Trend consulting firm Cscout Japan has tried the hangers out: Here are two more videos from Team Lab themselves: Via Japan Trends / CScout Japan. Carbon-Based Cable Achieves Milestone. Uncategorized Published on October 13th, 2011 | by Nicholas Brown I have been hearing about carbon nanotubes for a while now, and they are indeed very promising, as this news proves: Rice University researchers have developed a carbon-nanotube-based cable that is able to carry as much electric current as copper, and it is lighter.

This has potential sustainability, durability and efficiency advantages. Hollow pure carbon nanotube wires are an order of magnitude more electrically conductive than copper, and copper is actually the best electrical conductor in widespread use today. Sustainability: The sustainability advantage is that it can be made of pure carbon, which is an abundant element that does not have the demand and supply issues that copper does. Another sustainability advantage is that it helps to facilitate the use of sustainable energy sources such as wind farms and solar power plants, which are often very far from civilization in deserts and out on plains. H/t Technology Review. Everybody’s a winner.

Two students who invented a window that can automatically deploy a set of internal blinds to prevent a room from overheating on hot summer days won the $10,000 first prize in this year’s Making And Designing Materials Engineering Competition (MADMEC), which took place Thursday evening. The window, called iReflect, developed by graduate students Elizabeth Rapoport and Ahmed Al-Obeidi of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE), has strips of infrared-blocking film in the space between its two panes. When warmed by sunlight, the strips unfurl to block some of the incoming light — especially the infrared light responsible for most heating — while still allowing occupants to see out. The principle is simple, and similar to the bimetallic strips used in typical thermostats: Two materials with different thermal characteristics (the rate at which they expand when heated) are bonded together.

iReflect was not the only window-blocking technology in the contest. Engineering Professor Donald Dunn is dead at 85. Stanford University Donald Dunn Donald A. Dunn, professor emeritus at the Stanford School of Engineering, died at Stanford Hospital on Sept. 27 after a long illness. He was 85 years old. Dunn was a passionate teacher and innovator. In the 1960s, he helped form Stanford's Department of Engineering–Economic Systems (EES), which applied engineering systems methods and economic analysis to policy and decision making, both in government and industry. Dunn served as a professor and associate chair of EES for many years, retiring in 1995. Born and raised in Southern California, Dunn attended South Pasadena–San Marino High, taking chemistry courses at Pasadena Junior College. Dunn next attended Stanford Law School, where he won the first Hellman Legal Writing Prize.

He was a pioneer in the field of microwave tube research, working with Dean Watkins, Hubert Heffner, Lester Field, Ed Ginzton, Karl Spangenberg and Marvin Chodorow. Upon his retirement, Dunn spent time at the beach in Aptos. IF11: The Value Proposition Driving Recyclebank's Explosive Growth. We talk a lot at GreenBiz.com about engaging employees for sustainability, but what about consumers? How do you engage them to change behavior when pocketbook issues have moved sustainability issues to the back burner? Reward them. That's the innovative approach Recyclebank takes to engaging consumers to eliminate waste and take other environmentally friendly action. Also, don't forget the value proposition. "Unless they feel like they're making a tangible, real-world improvement in their day-to-day lives, you've got nothing," said Recyclebank CEO Jonathan Hsu. In a keynote interview this morning at the GreenBiz 2011 Innovation Forum, Hsu described to Senior Editor Marc Gunther how Recyclebank cuts through the clutter to spur behavioral changes in a population going through a recession and bombarded with green messaging and products.

Here is how Recyclebank works: As mentioned, the company gives discounts and deals from its business partners to consumers who earn points for green actions. Graphene shows unusual thermoelectric response to light. Graphene, an exotic form of carbon consisting of sheets a single atom thick, exhibits a novel reaction to light, MIT researchers have found: Sparked by light’s energy, the material can produce electric current in unusual ways. The finding could lead to improvements in photodetectors and night-vision systems, and possibly to a new approach to generating electricity from sunlight. This current-generating effect had been observed before, but researchers had incorrectly assumed it was due to a photovoltaic effect, says Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, an assistant professor of physics at MIT and senior author of a new paper published in the journal Science.

The paper’s lead author is postdoc Nathaniel Gabor; co-authors include four MIT students, MIT physics professor Leonid Levitov and two researchers at the National Institute for Materials Science in Tsukuba, Japan. The reason for this unusual thermal response, Jarillo-Herrero says, is that graphene is, pound for pound, the strongest material known. Graphene shows unusual thermoelectric response to light. Three women's rights activists share Nobel Peace Prize. (L-R) Yemen's Arab Spring activist Tawakkul Karman, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and activist Leymah Gbowee NEW: Tawakkul Karman is the first Arab woman to win the peace prizeThe prize is divided between three women; two in Liberia and one in YemenJohnson Sirleaf says she accepts the prize on behalf of all LiberiansRights group Amnesty International welcomes the award (CNN) -- Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, activist Leymah Gbowee of Liberia and rights activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen share this year's Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced Friday.

They were chosen "for their nonviolent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work," the committee said in Oslo, Norway. "We cannot achieve democracy and lasting peace in the world unless women obtain the same opportunities as men to influence developments at all levels of society. " Three share Nobel Peace Prize Where is 2010's Peace Prize winner?

Neutrinos plus rapides que la lumière, une illusion d'optique ? Asia Pacific's largest green business community | Sustainability and Environment | News, Opinion, Events, Press Releases, Jobs, Directory, Resources. Asia Pacific's largest green business community | Sustainability and Environment | News, Opinion, Events, Press Releases, Jobs, Directory, Resources. How Steve Jobs Inspired a Sustainable Future. One Up: Gamers Help Scientists Solve Molecular Puzzle That Could Lead To AIDS Vaccine. Top 5 Things Cleantech Entrepreneurs Fail to Understand About Raising Venture Capital. 3 Questions: Faster than light? +330,000 Jobs in 2 Decades from Energy Efficiency. Plasmonics intensifies a novel nanoscale light source, Stanford engineers find.

Sur la planète, les obèses sont plus nombreux que les malnutris. Daniel Kraft: Medicine's future? There's an app for that. Marco Tempest: The magic of truth and lies (and iPods) Geoffrey West: The surprising math of cities and corporations. Julian Treasure: 5 ways to listen better. Dan Ariely: Beware conflicts of interest. Government 2.0 (August 16, 2011) Reinventing Health Care Services (August 16, 2011) Gaypon Is The Gay Groupon. How Pepsi and Coke's Plant-Based Bottle Wars Affect Manufacturers | Business.

Adidas to Work With Greenpeace to Remove Toxics from Global Supply Chain | Business. Wacom Inkling May Become My Favorite Gadget of All Time. Martin Jacques: Understanding the rise of China. Thandie Newton: Embracing otherness, embracing myself. King Solomon: Stanford scholar considers how the man who had everything ended with nothing. "La plus grosse mine d'uranium du monde" aurait été découverte en Inde. Half of Earth's Heat Is from Nuclear Fission.

EcoModo - The Best of Treehugger. Sauvignon Blanc From Northern California - Wine Review. The Key Subtle Notes From Apple’s Earnings Call. Top Stories: Tuesday July 19, 2011. With $5 Million In Their Pockets, Ness Has Quietly Built A Subjective Search Engine. Robotics students show off class projects. Freshmen to debate war ethics in 2011 'Three Books' program.

Researchers find that a simple change in phrasing can increase voter turnout. Japan’s crippled nuclear plant reaches stability | Eco-Business. Is Going Green Elitist? Making Green Marketing Less Niche-Oriented? A Meat-Eater's Guide for Easing Climate Change Impacts | Business. What Are The 20 Most Expensive Keyword Categories In Google AdWords? To respond to new NYC request for proposals. 160-Year-Old American Express Out-Innovates Google and Groupon. Robert Hammond: Building a park in the sky. Nina Tandon: Caring for engineered tissue.