Solar Energy: Stanford scientists build the first all-carbon solar cell. The Bao group's all-carbon solar cell consists of a photoactive layer, which absorbs sunlight, sandwiched between two electrodes.
(Photo: Mark Shwartz / Stanford University) inShare6 October 31, 2012 By Mark Shwartz Stanford University scientists have built the first solar cell made entirely of carbon, a promising alternative to the expensive materials used in photovoltaic devices today. "Carbon has the potential to deliver high performance at a low cost," said study senior author Zhenan Bao, a professor of chemical engineering at Stanford. Unlike rigid silicon solar panels that adorn many rooftops, Stanford's thin film prototype is made of carbon materials that can be coated from solution. The coating technique also has the potential to reduce manufacturing costs, said Stanford graduate student Michael Vosgueritchian, co-lead author of the study with postdoctoral researcher Marc Ramuz.
Taking the buzz out of office lights. Wake Forest University physics professor David Carroll works with graduate student Greg Smith on new FIPEL lighting technology.
Say goodbye to that annoying buzz created by overhead fluorescent light bulbs in your office or residence hall. Wake Forest scientists have developed a flicker-free, shatterproof alternative for large-scale lighting. The lighting, based on field-induced polymer electroluminescent (FIPEL) technology, also gives off soft, white light – not the yellowish glint from fluorescents or bluish tinge from LEDs. “People often complain that fluorescent lights bother their eyes, and the hum from the fluorescent tubes irritates anyone sitting at a desk underneath them,” said David Carroll, professor of physics and director of the Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials.
Greenhouse Management Workshop - January 2008 - OSU. Home - Butter Valley Harvest. Finger Lakes Fresh - Our Product Range. Vandana Shiva On Strombo: Full Extended Interview. Appropedia. Elevated Bike Lane System Proposed for London. Click & Grow Smartpots. Canada / Abri Internationale : Focused on disadvantaged communities worldwide. EarthBox. Homegrown Revolution (Award winning short-film 2009)- The Urban Homestead. Check us out at: Dervaes Family on Facebook: Urban Homestead on Facebook: more on the film: purchase a copy for public screening: film features: Jules Dervaes, Justin Dervaes, Anais Dervaes and Jordanne Dervaes Homegrown Revolution is a short introduction to the homegrown project that has been called a new revolution in urban sustainability.
In the midst of a dense city setting in downtown Pasadena, radical change is taking root. For over twenty years, the Dervaes family have transformed their home into an urban homestead and model for sustainable agriculture and city living. Through the creation of the "Urban Homestead" the Dervaes family shows that change is possible -- one step at a time. Sell anything from anywhere in minutes. The Urban Cultivator Blog. The Urban Farm Container Vegetable Gardening Systems. Vertical Gardens and Living Walls. New York Hydroponic Tomato Farm. High Tech Greenhouse. Homegrown Hydroponics Inc. - MINI HYDRO-HARVEST 4' COMPLETE. How to Store Vegetables & Fruit Without Plastic.
Brightfarms. Can Urban Farming Go Corporate? Farms have sprouted in cities across the country over the past several years as activists and idealists pour their sweat into gritty soil. Now Paul Lightfoot wants to take urban agriculture beyond the dirt-under-your-nails labor of love. He wants to take it corporate. In June, Lightfoot's company, BrightFarms, announced a deal with The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Co., or A&P, to provide New York City-grown vegetables to the local chain's supermarkets year-round. The goods will grow in what the company says will be the country's largest rooftop greenhouse farm, a high-tech hydroponic operation that will boost yields, allowing the company to face-off with organic vegetables trucked from California, cutting thousands of miles from the supply chain while aiming to provide a fresher product at a competitive price.
With similar deals announced for St. Media Library ‹ Truly Local — WordPress. Live Green Toronto. The Eco-Roof Incentive Program promotes the installation of green and cool roofs on Toronto’s existing buildings and new buildings not subject to the Green Roof By-law. Applications are currently being accepted for green and cool roof projects and will be reviewed on a monthly basis, subject to funding availability. The City of Toronto launched the Eco-Roof Incentive Program in 2009 to support the uptake of eco-roofs by building owners, make buildings more sustainable and promote the creation of green jobs.
Performance criteria for the Eco-Roof Incentive Program are consistent with the Green Roof Bylaw and the Toronto Green Standard. Learn more: Read the Eco-Roof Case Studies Map: All projects supported by Eco-Roof Incentive Program to May 2013 Eco-Roof Overview. StillTasty: Your Ultimate Shelf Life Guide - Save Money, Eat Better, Help The Environment. How The Taste Of Tomatoes Went Bad (And Kept On Going) : The Salt. Hide captionNotice how some of these tomatoes have unripe-looking tops?
Those "green shoulders" are actually the keys to flavor. Hydroponic Produce Gains Fans and Flavor. The Produce Worker's Guide to Storing 25 Common Fruits and Veggies. Popular in Food & Drink Unless you belong to a CSA or grow your own garden, produce can take up a huge chunk of your grocery budget, and throwing away food can also feel like throwing away money.
As a former professional cook and produce worker, however, I know that getting the most out of your produce can be tricky if you don't know the best way to store or prep it. Your source of daily updated funny pictures and gifs. Vertical Veg – inspiring and supporting food growing in tiny spaces.
TD Centre’s ‘living roof’ like a farm in the city. This week I stood on the freshly greened roof of the Toronto-Dominion Centre banking pavilion, surrounded by a field of creek sedge grass.
Bounded on all sides by steel and concrete skyscrapers, the oasis was surreal and thrilling. It felt strangely illicit – as if a tract of farmland had been floated down on the city’s financial district. The transformation of heat-absorbing asphalt roof-scapes into energy-saving canvases of greenery is being embraced not only by businesses, but university and condominium developers.
Living roofs are also increasingly being promoted as therapeutic tools for health-care facilities. There are courtyards at CAMH on Queen Street West, an extensive fragrant garden at the CNIB, and the Royal Victoria Health Centre in Barrie has just installed nine green roofs. The TD Centre, one of the urban masterworks by architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe with John B.
Botanical Garden Forums. TERRA - Home. Future Growing LLC. A Vertical Garden Feeds 10,000+ Visitors to Chicago O'Hare Airport. Growing Your Greens/Video screen capture John of Growing Your Greens has been busy in Chicago.
No sooner does he post a video of an old meat packing plant morphing into a gigantic vertical farm and food processing facility, than we also get a visit to an urban garden that is bang in the middle of Chicago O'Hare airport. Using an aeroponic Tower Garden growing system, the garden is growing lettuce, greens and herbs for airport restaurants with an almost zero transportation footprint. There is always a significant energy footprint involved with growing food indoors. Urbio - My Urbio. Grow Your Own Vegetables and Fruits. For GTA residents, Young Urban Farmers has a variety of services to get your edible garden set-up, planted, and maintained in tip-top shape.
Whether it’s help with creating a garden design plan, help in setting up the garden, or help in taking care of the garden, you can signup for one of our service packages below or we can tailor something to suit your needs. Please contact us to arrange for a free, no-obligation consultation. Garden Setup Service: Our garden setup service includes delivery, setup, and materials for your edible garden along with the initial round of soil / plants you have chosen. In addition, we will provide you with our vegetable growing guide which gives you lots of information on how to best take care of your plants. Garden Maintenance. Urban Aquaculture: Fish Farming in the City. 'Above ground' Wicking Raised Garden Bed - Water Installations and Greywater Reuse Sys. Build a PVC Greenhouse. Building a Greenhouse" If you want the biggest tomatoes in your neighborhood next season, need somewhere to over-winter your orchids or love the idea of having your own blooming flowers year round, a backyard greenhouse may be just right for you.
Building your own greenhouse used to be a difficult process requiring complicated building plans, expensive materials and professional assistance. Now, with the widespread availability of prefabricated kits, the process is easier and more affordable. The most popular greenhouse size is around 8 feet by 6 feet (2.4 meters by 1.8 meters), probably because it doesn't require a poured foundation. Whatever the size, placing the greenhouse so that it receives enough strong light and is in proportion to the rest of the property is an important consideration when considering a greenhouse addition. Garden as if your life depended on it, because it does. Spring has sprung — at least south of the northern tier of states where snow still has a ban on it — and the grass has ‘riz.
And so has the price of most foods, which is particularly devastating just now when so many Americans are unemployed, underemployed, retired or retiring, on declining or fixed incomes and are having to choose between paying their mortgages, credit card bills, car payments, and medical and utility bills and eating enough and healthily. Many are eating more fast food, prepared foods, junk food — all of which are also becoming more expensive — or less food. Healthy food and garden education. Toronto Becomes First City To Mandate Green Roofs. Summer is just around the corner, and for those who live in big cities, that means spring warmth will soon give way to searing heat. Green roofs can help regulate city temperatures, giving people, and the electrical grid, a much needed break. Toronto is the first city in North America with a bylaw that requires roofs to be green. And we're not talking about paint. A green roof, also known as a living roof, uses various hardy plants to create a barrier between the sun's rays and the tiles or shingles of the roof.
The plants love the sun, and the building (and its inhabitants) enjoy more comfortable indoor temperatures as a result. Toronto's new legislation will require all residential, commercial and institutional buildings over 2,000 square meters to have between 20 and 60 percent living roofs. Under the direction of Mayor Richard Daley the city of Chicago put a 38,800 square foot green roof on a 12 story skyscraper in 2000. Image via Flickr/pnwra. Mexican group tackles pollution with vertical gardens. When people think of Mexico City, they think of many different things — traffic congestion, for example, or colonial churches, or snow-covered volcanoes . . . or traffic congestion. They do not think of the pristine quality of the air. There’s a reason for that. Although far cleaner than it used to be, the atmosphere that sustains the city’s roughly 20 million residents remains severely laden with contaminants.
Open Source Permaculture On Its Way to the Internet. Israel: The complete greenhouse solution. Israel: The complete greenhouse solution. Types of Greenhouses" The Advantages Of Greenhouse Gardening For Survival. Got Weeds? Use Vinegar, Not Roundup. Urban Farming: Zoning for Growing and Distributing Food in Portland Neighborhoods « Northwest Land Law Forum. In a continued effort to encourage all things local, the City of Portland is taking steps to impose order onto the booming business of local, urban food production by formally recognizing market and community gardens, farmers markets, and food co-ops within its zoning code. Open Eco Building and Greenhouse Technology. Bubble Insulated Greenhouse. 1 MILLION pounds of Food on 3 acres. 10,000 fish 500 yards compost. Growing Power - A Model for Urban Agriculture. Ancient Tomato Growing Secrets Increase Your Tomatoes and Keeps Plants Healthy. Seed Saving Handbook: Learn How to Save Seeds From Common Garden Vegetables—Free! Growing Industrial Hemp in Ontario.
7 Foods Even Food Safety Experts Won’t Eat. Wild Yards are Best. 15 houseplants for improving indoor air quality. Wild About Gardening. DIY Aquaponics - Aquaponics made easy so you can do it yourself - Benefical Bacteria for the Growbed. Bacteria play an important role the health and well being of your aquaponics system by removing the ammonia from the water. SIP- sub irrigation planters. Farmer's Pal Forums - Gardening Without a Garden: 10 Ideas for Your Patio or Balcony.
Farmer's Pal Forums - Why do I plant marigolds in my vegetable garden? Farmer's Pal Forums - Why Eat Grass-fed Meat? Backyard farmers by necessity: self-sufficient and debt-free. Smart tips to make life easier. Posted on February 24, 2012 in Humor. A Book that aims to bring the farm to the city. Carrot City Creating Places for Urban Agriculture. Video. Video. Pt. 1: Hippychick's Gardens Victory Chickens. High-tech greenhouse planned for downtown Vancouver parkade rooftop. THE ISLAND PRESIDENT—A Documentary Film By Jon Shenk. Premium quality locally grown vegetables and herbs. World's Largest Urban Farm Planned for the City of Detroit. Urban gardens: The future of food? - Dream City. With penny-farthings, handlebar mustaches and four-pocket vests back in fashion, the rise of urban farming should just about complete our fetish for the late 1800s.
Today, you can find chicken coops on rooftops in Brooklyn, N.Y., goats in San Francisco backyards, and rows of crops sprouting across empty lots in Cleveland. Is a 60-storey skyscraper the farm of the future? Sky Farm by Gordon Graff. Vertical farming: Does it really stack up? VertiCrop™ Launch @ Paignton Zoo. Digest: Vertical Farming Startups Seek Profit by Bringing Sustainable Agriculture to Cities. Grow The Easiest Garden on Earth. Bottle Garden Part2. Freedom Fuels. Transition Toronto’s winning film! ‘The people in my neighbourhood’ Britta Riley: A garden in my apartment.
O'Hare Airport Debuts Aeroponic Vegetable Garden. Sproutman, Steve Meyerowitz, World Authority in Sprouting, Wheatgrass and Indoor Gardening Books & Sprouts Products. VERTICAL VEGETABLES: "Grow up" in a small garden and confound the cats! How to Grow a Hanging Tomato Garden.