Fueling the Modern World with… Air?

Of all the wacky things that fuel can be made from nowadays – ranging from dirty diapers to confiscated booze – somehow, this one takes the cake. Soon, we may be able to power our vehicles and heat our homes with nothing but air. A biofuel firm called Joule Biotechnologies has discovered a way to produce fuel from carbon dioxide in the air, using photosynthetic microbes.

From Gas 2.0:

Inside specially designed reactors, Joule’s engineered microbes thrive off of sunlight and CO2. In return, depending on the type of organism, they can produce straight ethanol, diesel or a number of other types of hydrocarbons.

Although the process sounds similar to algae-produced biofuels, the Joule process is incredibly (and beneficially) different for several reasons:

* Doesn’t produce biomass
* No agricultural feedstock needed
* Can be conducted on non-arable land
* Doesn’t need fresh water
* Produces fuel directly without the need for extraction or refinement

Fuel from thin air. Amazing, isn’t it? There is literally a world of possibilities out there when it comes to earth-friendly, renewable fuels.

Link [Gas 2.0]
Photo credit: Joule Biotechnologies

Eco Surgical Masks & More Bizarre Greenovations

The never-ending parade of amazingly strange “green” inventions continues even through the recession with bizarre inventions that will make you ask, “why?” Some are awesome – like reusable tote bags that turn into Mexican wrestling masks (WIN!) while others will have you scratching your head in confusion, like male floral fascinators.

Trendhunter has a great gallery of 30 weird eco innovations, some more earth-friendly than others. Here are some of our favorites:

We’ve all seen floral fascinators and hair accessories for women, but Nissa Quanstrom’s ‘Green Streets’ shoot turns the tables and lets men wear flowers on their faces as well.

By adding an image of a Mexican wrestler on the bag, the sack looks super-radical when filled. Now what happens when it is empty? The Eco Warrior Bag is the best reason to have a costume party! Put that bad boy on your head and you have a night of hilarity ahead of you.

Designed by Australian industrial designers Ben Landau and Brittany Veitch, each Bio-Accessory includes a living organism that is supposed to create a ‘mobile natural environment.’ The idea behind the Bio-Accessories is to have nature within an urban setting.

Japanese wood design company Sasaki Kogei has created stunning, eco-friendly wooden guns. The gun is a replica of a Smith and Wesson model 2 Army gun. The company also offers another eco-friendly wooden guns including the 357 Korutopaison.

Check out the other 26 weird inventions over at TrendHunter.

Link [TrendHunter]

Weirdest Green Cars of the Future

In the future, will we all be traveling in green flying saucers? Probably not, but that doesn’t stop extra-creative sci-fi enthusiasts from dreaming up bizarro vehicles that could have been props in Plan 9 from Outer Space.

According to this strange video (which is apparently narrated by a British robot), all of the craziest concepts from the past half-century are “the green cars of the future”, including the Ford Nucleon – designed in the ‘50s. It’s hardly a round up of green transportation that will actually be produced any time soon, but it’s a funny look at some of the wilder ideas that have been proposed.

Why the hell is the underwater car a convertible? “Hold your breath, honey, we’re going under!”

Link [Treehugger]

Robot Seeks Out Toxic Waste Dumped by the Mafia

The mafia is going to have to rethink dumping toxic waste into Italian waters now that there’s a robot submarine on their trail. Italian authorities have deployed the underwater surveillance robot to a shipwreck off the Calabrian coast to see if it’s loaded with radioactive waste. An informant has told police that the ship may be part of a lucrative toxic waste-dumping scheme.

From The Huffington Post:

Calabrian prosecutor Bruno Giordano has cautioned in TV interviews that that until the contents of containers on the sunken ship are known, he can’t say if the allegations by a mob turncoat about the ship are true.

The robot sub began filming Saturday. On Tuesday, it was still unclear what the cargo held, or even if the ship was the Cunsky cargo vessel that turncoat Francesco Fonti has spoken about to magistrates and in interviews on Italian TV.

No name of the ship is visible, and it wasn’t known if someone had removed the name or if algae might have covered up writing.

Giordano said the former mobster, Francesco Fonti, from the Calabria-based ‘ndrangheta crime syndicate, has claimed the mob sank “hundreds” of barrels of illegally disposed of waste.

It won’t be surprising at all if it turns out the ship is carrying toxic waste. The Italian mob is renowned for orchestrating serious offenses against the environment in addition to their other crimes, dumping toxic waste on rural lands and in the waters off foreign countries for huge sums of money.

And, crazy as it may sound, this surveillance submarine is far from the first robotic pollution-detector. UK scientists developed creepily lifelike robotic fish that will be released off the coast of Northern Spain in 2011 to collect data on pollution.

Link [The Huffington Post]

Could Salting Clouds Buy Precious Time in Fight Against Global Warming?

Once considered a risky last resort, geoengineering is becoming more accepted as a possible way to slow down global warming – but that doesn’t mean some of the ideas scientists are coming up with don’t sound downright kooky to the layman. One proposal involves lightening clouds with salt to improve their ability to reflect sunlight.

Scientist John Latham suggested that increasing the number of droplets in maritime layer clouds (stratocumulus), which cover a third of the ocean, could significantly increase their reflectance.

From BBC News:

The water droplets in clouds reflect solar radiation back to space. And the numbers of droplets they contain are largely controlled by the number of cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), such as specks of dust.

Many of these nuclei are produced over the land. Land-locked clouds therefore contain many hundreds of cloud droplets per cubic centimetre, whilst clouds that form over the sea contain substantially fewer.

Generally, the more droplets that are present in a cloud, the smaller they are. For a given mass of water in a cloud, clouds with smaller droplets tend to be whiter.

So the proposal is to inject a fine spray of sea salt from the ocean surface into the clouds; to artificially increase the number of drops, reduce their size and increase the reflectance of the clouds, making them whiter.

The cooling that could result from this experiment could buy us 25 years in the battle against global warming – certainly, a lot of precious time to make other changes that could improve the outlook. But this method will take quite a bit of testing to get it just right, including experiments to determine the ideal size of the sea-salt nuclei. Research is expected to cost about $10 million.

So how exactly would we go about salting clouds? Edinburgh University scientist Stephen Salter (yes, that’s really his name) suggested a fleet of “cloudseeders”, wind-powered yachts that would inject the clouds with sea salt.

Link [BBC News]
Photo credit: John McNeill via WFS.org

Lower-Cost Solar Cells Can be Painted onto Rooftops

Nanoparticle ‘inks’ could soon be used to produce solar cells that can simply be sprayed onto a rooftop or other surfaces, and though this sounds like expensive technology, the chemical engineer who created it says it could reduce costs to one-tenth of their current price. Brian Korgel of the University of Texas at Austin says he believes that this reduction in price could thrust solar power into competition with fossil fuels.

From Science Daily:

For the past two years, Korgel and his team have been working on this low-cost, nanomaterials solution to photovoltaics – or solar cell – manufacturing. Korgel is collaborating with professors Al Bard and Paul Barbara, both of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, and Professor Ananth Dodabalapur of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department. They recently showed proof-of-concept in a recent issue of Journal of the American Chemical Society.

The inks could be printed on a roll-to-roll printing process on a plastic substrate or stainless steel. And the prospect of being able to paint the “inks” onto a rooftop or building is not far-fetched.

“You’d have to paint the light-absorbing material and a few other layers as well,” Korgel said. “This is one step in the direction towards paintable solar cells.”

Currently, Korgel and his team at Innovalight, a company he founded, have been able to develop solar-cell prototypes using copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) with efficiencies at one percent. If they can get to 10 percent, there’s great potential for commercialization.

That’s definitely promising considering the fact that America’s solar industry is lagging behind China’s due to the fact that we just can’t seem to compete with their prices. It will be interesting to see how far Korgel and his team can take this technology.

Link [Science Daily]

Robot Removes Pollution from Water

As potable water becomes more scarce, a new invention offers hope, with the potential to clean up polluted waterways and make them suitable for drinking once again. The WatCleaner robot,  created by Chinese industrial designer Ye Yao, floats on the surface of the water and automatically filters oil, trash and other pollutants. It has the ability to detect fish, making sure that none are harmed during the cleaning process.

From Blue Living Ideas:

The WatCleaner has detectors on the bottom that monitor water for pollution, everything from basic garbage to oil, and clean the water. Absorbent socks on the top of the WatCleaner absorb oil and cleanse it. Additionally, garbage is taken in and directed to a disintegrator- clean water is then sprayed through the top of the WatCleaner and returned to the water system. Along the way the WatCleaner also detects fish in order to clean the water in their area.

Beyond just cleaning the water of contaminants, the WatCleaner is also set up to transmit water condition information to land based controllers and ask for help if it encounters conditions too polluted to handle alone. As the WatCleaner takes on oil and garbage, the bin and oil bags can be removed and replaced.

First a trash-cleaning robot, and now a robot that cleans up polluted water? Science fiction is really coming to life. This invention has major potential for use all around the world. If we could clean up dirty waterways and make them safe again, that would go a long way toward easing the coming water crisis and preventing a lot of suffering. Perhaps the team that’s trying to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch should give Ye Yao a call.

Link [Blue Living Ideas]

Car Tires Made from Orange Peel Oil

The problem with tires isn’t just that they’re a huge waste material, collecting by the thousands in huge piles all over the world. It’s also that they’re made from petroleum. A new tire by Yokohama solves at least half of that problem, producing a car tire made with orange oil as the primary ingredient to make vulcanized rubber.

From Earth 911:

The new tire is called the Super E-spec™ and has already received the Popular Mechanics Editor’s Choice Award in 2008. Yokohama will initially market the tire for hybrid car models such as the Toyota Prius.

“The eco-focused dB Super E-spec mixes sustainable orange oil and natural rubber to drastically cut the use of petroleum, without compromising performance,” Yokohama vice president of sales Dan King said. “It also helps consumers save money at the gas pump by improving fuel efficiency via a 20-percent reduction in rolling resistance.”

Orange oil is considered sustainable because it is produced from a renewable resource. The same philosophy of reducing petroleum use is utilized in producing plastics from corn starch or vegetable oil.

Check out the video:

Yokohama hasn’t stated whether orange oil will biodegrade over time, or if it would burn in quite the same way as petroleum, which can smolder for months and be difficult to extinguish.

We’ve been told for so long that we need petroleum, that there are so many things we can’t make or do without it. Isn’t it nice to find that that isn’t true at all?

Link [Earth911]

Real Life Wall-E: Scientists Develop Robot Trash Collector

The shiny green robot with wide plastic eyes looks like it sprung out of the fictional world of Wall-E, and its friendly look helps people accept its presence in their lives. But people in the Italian town of Peccioli likely would have accepted it no matter what it looked like, given its purpose: cleaning up trash. Peccioli is home to one of the most advanced dumping sites in Italy, and trash is big business here.

Global Post has all the details on how the ‘DustCart’ was received and how exactly it works:

During a recent test-run at Peccioli’s main terrace, the future of garbage collection zoomed in on two wheels, rounded and shiny, devoid of arms, and with two big round inspiring eyes.

“We are about to begin,” said a researcher over a microphone.

The scientists had transformed the terrace into an outdoor laboratory, laying wires on the cobblestone, installing webcams at street corners, and setting up a control room to monitor DustCart’s every move.

“Our colleague will now simulate a user’s call,” said the researcher.

Like a taxi answering a call, DustCart rode across the terrace to meet the caller.

Once the robot arrived, it asked for a personal ID number that both identifies the user and tracks the garbage. It also asked for the kind of trash being dumped — organic, recyclable or waste. DustCart then opened its belly bin, collected the trash and took it to a fake dumping site.

Check out the whole story over at Global Post.

While many of us are a bit wary of the idea of living with robots, the DustCart is pretty cool. It’s pretty clear that we need a major overhaul of our waste management systems, and while a fleet of robots isn’t going to solve our problems, it’s an interesting way to approach them.

Link [Global Post]

Dirt-Powered Clock Hooks Up to Your Houseplants

From the very same innovative designer that brought us the soil-powered LED lamp comes a clock that also runs on dirt. Marieke Staps’ soil clock has copper and zinc electrodes that plug into the soil. Inhabitat explains that “The soil functions as an electrolyte, or conductive medium through which an electrical charge can flow. The natural metabolism of biological life produces enough electricity to keep the clock working.”

But if your plant dies from lack of watering, so will the clock – you’ve got to keep the soil moist.

Sure, this is no miracle invention – it’s a simple electrochemical cell – but it’s still cool, and the promise of harvesting energy from soil certainly doesn’t stop here. It could be a valuable asset in third world countries, where anodes and cathodes could be made from scrap metal. It’s certainly an idea worth investigating further.

Link [Inhabitat]

New Yamaha Electric Bike Goes Twice as Far Per Charge

Yamaha Motors is making a good thing even better by debuting an extended range version of the PAS Brace, an electric bike equipped with an assistance system that controls how much electrical power to send to the motor depending on what gear the bike is in. Once a top speed of about 24 km/h is reached, the electric system shuts down. An eight-speed rear hub allows shifting at any time, even from a dead stop.

In Japan, electric bikes are a common sight – you’ll see them whizzing past you in every major city, and most of the smaller cities as well. They’re also enjoying a major surge of popularity in China. They’re definitely an efficient way to get around, taking the convenience and earth-friendliness of a bicycle and giving it a big boost of extra power.

The Yamaha PAS Brace-L is expected to hit stores on July 1st at the very affordable price of roughly $1,500.

Link [EcoFriend]

Smart Green Design: Indoor Vertical Gardening for Apartment Dwellers

Sometimes, windows just aren’t enough to grow anything but shade-loving plants. Depending on what side of the building your apartment is on – or whether it’s looking out into an alley or courtyard – you might not get anywhere near enough sun to keep plants alive. So, what’s a wannabe gardening urbanite to do?

If a new concept by Ingela Viks + Liina-Kai Raivet takes off, you’ll have a way to grow all kinds of stuff inside your apartment, even if you’re short on space. The ‘Green Indoors’ is a vertical planting system that provides both light and water to growing plants with space for up to 24 plant pots.

From Inhabitat:

We’ve seen other indoor growing lightpots, but they tend to take up precious counter space. The Green Indoors plant stand consists of a flat metal base fitted with a light filled tube with a matte cover to minimize glare. The stand not only provides necessary light, but also automatically waters each plant individually according to its needs. When there is enough natural light, the plant stand shuts off its light, and it also turns off automatically at night.

Since it provides light, it has a double function as a lamp with that daylight tinge that people in rainy regions can really appreciate. This concept was created as part of the Designboom/BÜSSEL design competition – we really hope it goes into production! Cool green design that brings fresh homegrown food to anyone regardless of where they live = awesome.

Link [Inhabitat]

Green College Tech: Water-Cooled Supercomputer Doubles as Dorm Space Heater

Massive supercomputers use a lot of energy, but a new innovation by IBM could at least recycle some of the waste heat to help heat the universities where they are housed. The company also plans to use water to keep the supercomputers cool, which could lead to a reduction of overall energy consumption by at least 40 percent compared to similar air-cooled supercomputers.

From Wired via ENN:

“Energy is arguably the number one challenge humanity will be facing in the 21st century,” says Dimos Poulikakos, lead investigator of the project. “We cannot afford anymore to design computer systems based on the criterion of computational speed and performance alone.”

Supercomputers are used in energy research labs such as Argonne National Laboratory, in space research by NASA and at universities for scientific research, all applications which have a nearly insatiable demand for processing power. The new supercomputer, called Aquasar, will be housed at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich and will have a top speed of 10 teraflops. (A teraflop is a trillion floating point operations per second, a measure of computing capacity.) While that’s a lot of computing power — a Core 2 Duo processor is capable of about 20 gigaflops, or 1/500 the speed of Aquasar — it’s a fraction of what some of the fastest supercomputers today. For instance, IBM’s Blue Gene/L supercomputer, which ranks fourth on the top 100 list, has a peak speed of 596 teraflops. Meanwhile, IBM has moved on to create its first supercomputer in Europe capable of one petaflop, or one thousand trillion operations per second.

Keeping these machines cool is a challenge: many of the chips used in supercomputer systems put out ten times as much heat as a typical kitchen hot plate. They have to be kept below 185 degrees Fahrenheit for optimal performance. It takes a whole lot of energy to do that the conventional way, so using water could potentially be a huge energy saver.

And to use the excess heat to keep students warm in the winter? Sheer brilliance!

Link [Wired] via [ENN]
Photo credit: CNET

LED Lighting Could Help Reduce CO2 Emissions 50 Percent Over 20 Years

Just by switching to LED lights, we could decrease carbon dioxide emissions from electric power use by up to 50 percent in just over 20 years. A recent report by McKinsey & Company states that making this switch is possibly the most cost-effective way to tackle global warming using existing technology.

From The New York Times:

LEDs are more than twice as efficient as compact fluorescent bulbs, currently the standard for greener lighting. Unlike compact fluorescents, LEDs turn on quickly and are compatible with dimmer switches. And while fluorescent bulbs contain mercury, which requires special disposal, LED bulbs contain no toxic elements, and last so long that disposal is not much of an issue.

“It is fit-and-forget-lighting that is essentially there for as long as you live,” said Colin Humphreys, a researcher at Cambridge University who works on gallium nitride LED lights, which now adorn structures in Britain.

The switch to LEDs is proceeding far more rapidly than experts had predicted just two years ago. President Obama’s stimulus package, which offers money for “green” infrastructure investment, will accelerate that pace, experts say. San Jose, Calif., plans to use $2 million in energy-efficiency grants to install 1,500 LED streetlights.

LEDs have a high initial cost, no doubt – an outdoor spotlight can cost up to $100, compared to $7 for an incandescent bulb. But, imagine not having to change that light bulb again for 20 years or more, and paying pennies on the dollar for power consumption compared to ‘regular’ light bulbs.

They’re still not perfect, being better suited for directional lighting than general lighting needs, but scientists are already finding new ways to address these problems. It’s a start!

Link [The New York Times]

Photo credit: ledlite-power.co.uk

Is the Emerald Express the Next Big Thing in Public Transit?

Could the Emerald Express be the future of public transit in America? That’s what the Virginia tech students who created the concept are hoping. Phil Padilla, Irfan Bhimji, Catherine Crenshaw, Matthew Decker and Aly Moreno designed a passenger rail system that uses the GenSet (GP-38) locomotive as the primary propulsion platform.

From Ecofriend:

This rail system would be used for both regional and intercity transportation. With a top speed of 100 mph and capacity for 250-350 passengers, the train would provide a cost-effective and environmentally-friendly form of transportation for many people in the state of Virginia and surrounding areas.

The primary focus of the Emerald Xpress is to offer passengers a holistic brand experience, both on and off the train. The brand experience begins with the exterior design of the locomotive and passenger cars, is carried throughout the interior, and even reaches a personal level through membership cards and accounts. The name Emerald Xpress is meant to reflect the environmentally-friendly characteristics of the train, along with the luxury and comfort it would provide its passengers.

The design emphasizes comfort and convenience, providing passengers with ample storage and power outlets. It’s a pretty slick concept, echoing all of the things that are right about European rail systems.

Fast, efficient, up-to-date public transit may be closer than it seems – U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood recently predicted that high-paying jobs will be available for Americans building high speed rail systems by the end of this summer.

Link [Ecofriend]

5 Innovative Eco-Friendly Fibers of the Future

As gorgeous as organic cotton, hemp, peace silk and bamboo can be, they’re hardly the only eco-friendly fabrics around. In fact, some of the innovative new eco-friendly fibers are emerging that are way more sci-fi than granola. Check out the list gathered by Summer Rayne Oakes, eco-fashion model and activist, at The Huffington Post:

SILVER

Silver (yes the metal not the color) is commonly used in the medical and healthcare fields due to its known healing properties, but is slowly making its way into consumer markets, particularly in undergarments and athletic wear. Silver is a conductive element, which means it is naturally antimicrobial, thermally conductive, and electrically conductive. “The silver particles attach to the microbes and short-circuit them. Basically they suffocate,” says Bennett Fisher from Carolina Silver.

MORPHOTEX

Teijin Fibers Limited of Japan has recently produced Morphotex®. The biomimetic fabric refracts light like the wings of the Morpho blue butterfly, completely eliminating any need for pigment or dyes, which has always been a challenge for sustainable designers who love and want color. All the color seen on the fabric’s surface is created by the strength and angle of the light refraction against the material. Though extra dye is not used in the fabric, the material itself is made out of 85 percent polyester and 15 percent nylon. There is no word whether the manufacturers are using recycled polyester and nylon, which they have available in other products.

NETTLE

I was first introduced to nettle fabric by Norwegian designer, Leila Hafzi, who commonly works with artisans in Nepal. It was there where she saw craftswomen spinning the Himalayan Giant Nettle (also known as Allo), which grows in the mountains. Fabric from nettle has been used for thousands of years, but it fell out of favor as cotton became the fabric-of-choice. Nettle has many properties similar to linen, but it’s long staple can provide for some interesting fabrications if proper technology and scale is brought to the industry.

Read more about each fabric – and get the full list – over at The Huffington Post.

Link [The Huffington Post]

A House Made from Sh*t… Literally

Twenty years ago, proposing to use fecal matter as building material would have gotten you laughed out of town. Nowadays, it’s just another wacky – yet brilliant – green building solution. And, once inside a building made from EcoFaeBrick, you probably wouldn’t even be able to tell that the bricks were made from cow dung instead of clay.

EcoFaeBrick is 20% lighter, 20% stronger and far more earth-friendly than clay brick, which damages the environment during the production process – yet it costs the same. It’s meant for use in developing areas of Indonesia, where traditional brick-making materials are hard to come by but cow dung is available in copious quantities.

From EcoFaeBrick, via Treehugger:

EcoFaeBrick, in conjunction with Faerumnesia, produces high quality and low price bricks by utilizing the abundant cow dung in Godean and Sayegan, Jogjakarta. The utilization of the cow dung will not only solve the hygiene problem but also reduce the exploitation of the un-renewable clay. The replacement of firewood with the cow dung methane biogas in the combustion process brings a lower production cost with a more environmental friendly process. EcoFaeBrick also empowers rural people through close partnership with local communities.

Using business model which involves the housing developers, NGOs, and local communities, EcoFaeBrick builds a sustainable market demand to ensure an interesting financial return to the investors. The EcoFaeBrick’s expansion plan focuses on areas with rapid development and high concentration of cattle farm. EcoFaeBrick offers a feasible solution for rapidly developing areas not only in Indonesia but also in other emerging countries.

EcoFaeBrick was invented by a team of students at Prasetiya Mulya Business School in Indonesia, and won the $25,000 top prize at the University of California, Berkeley’s Global Social Venture Competition.

Well, it’s a great way to get rid of all that cow shit. You’d have to come to terms with the idea of living in a brick shithouse – er, shit brick house – but it seems like a great alternative to conventional bricks.

Link [Treehugger] + [EcoFaeBrick]

Bizarro Green Inventions: Shower Curtain Inflates to Trap You

Some of us need gentle reminders not to spend too much time in the shower, especially in the  middle of winter or in the midst of a raging hangover. And, there’s nothing more gentle than a shower curtain that slowly inflates while you’re bathing, giving you the subtle message that it’s time to turn off the water by trapping you in a tube of air-filled plastic.

Or, if that’s too much for you, perhaps you’d prefer a model that inflates spikes that literally push you out of the shower stall like some kind of medieval torture device.

Both shower curtains are prototypes invented by Elisabeth Buecher, who asked herself “How can your shower fight water overconsumption in either a disturbing or a gorgeous way, using innovative materials, printing techniques and inflatable technology?”

From Elisabeth’s website:

My approach to design can sometimes appear shockingly radical but I have got different reasons to legitimise that. An alarm clock is not what we can call a pleasurable object. It is often even painful to be awoken by it. However it is a necessary object, which regulates our lives and the society. That’s what I call the “design for pain and for our own good”. Some of my designs seem to constrain people, acting like an alarm clock, awaking people to the consciousness of their behaviour and giving them limits. People often need an external signal to behave more. In France the government added thousands of new radars on the roads to fight excessive speed. And it worked: there are far less people killed on the roads of France today. I call it “design of threat and punishment” and I use it as an educational tool.

Well, it’s certainly creative.

Link [Elisabeth Buecher] via [CasaSugar]

Robot Nixes Stench of Indoor Composting

Composting couldn’t be easier – if you’re doing it the old fashioned way, throwing food scraps and garden waste into a pile or bin in the backyard and letting nature do its thing. But for people who have limited outside space – or just don’t want to walk out to their compost pile after every meal – there can be some worries about indoor compost bins that start to reek all too quickly.

There are quite a few solutions to that problem, but the none are quite so amazingly high-tech as the Nature Mill kitchen composter. It’s like your own little Jetsons-style robot that devours your food scraps and regulates temperature and airflow for kitchen composting that’s (allegedly) stank-free.

The Nature Mill robot composter isn’t necessary by any means, and some would see it as just another ridiculous piece of electronic junk – but for others, it might mean the difference between turning their waste scraps into rich, organic, free garden compost and sending it to landfills to rot and produce methane, a potent greenhouse gas. So, by all means, if you’re lazy or cramped for outdoor space – let this little robot do the dirty work for you.

Via [MNN.com]

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