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Kapor Klein House model, Marcy Wong Donn Logan ArchitectsThere is a fight going on in Berkeley, over the construction of a house for Mitch Kapor, the founder of Lotus and creator of Lotus 123, the program that made personal computers useful. Neighbours, architects and others call it “absurd” that the house should be called green, saying its 10,000 square feet is far too big. One neighbour complains that “green building begins with using ‘just enough’ and preserving what already exists. Clearly the idea of ‘just enough’ is not part of the design concept.”

But how much is too much?…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Images from Sanctuary Magazine, Rachel Pilgrim & Andrew LeckySo many of the green houses we see are single family, alone in the country, but there are more and more developers and builders trying to build green communities. On Munro court in the mining town of Castlemaine, outside of Victoria, Australia, eight lovely little modern houses have been designed by Robyn Gibson ofLifehouse design.None are over 1500 square feet, and it is sort of a cooperative, sharing responsibility for the communal vegetable gardens, emptying the compost and feeding the “chooks” [sic]

…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Images from Sanctuary Magazine, Rachel Pilgrim & Andrew LeckySo many of the green houses we see are single family, alone in the country, but there are more and more developers and builders trying to build green communities. On Munro court in the mining town of Castlemaine, outside of Victoria, Australia, eight lovely little modern houses have been designed by Robyn Gibson ofLifehouse design.None are over 1500 square feet, and it is sort of a cooperative, sharing responsibility for the communal vegetable gardens, emptying the compost and feeding the “chooks” [sic]

…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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NoMix Toilet. Photo: FlickrTechnological Innovations in the Bathroom? You Bet!Being green is all about solving problems and grabbing overlooked opportunities. It turns out that there’s such a double-win in most bathrooms around the world; if we had “NoMix” toilets that separate urine from solid waste, municipal wastewater plants would have a significantly easier task (and produce more methane to generate electricity),andwe could much more easily extract precious nutrients like phosphorus and nitrogen for use as fertilizer (instead of using fossil fuels). So what’s stopping us from going NoMix?…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Designers, engineers, inventors, and crafty gadgeteers, it’s time to get the brain juices percolating and submit for the 2010James Dyson Award. The competition is put up by the James Dyson Foundation, founded by the British inventor responsible for the now-iconicDyson vacuum cleaners, theAirbladehand dryer,Air Multip…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Image: KnossosInduction Lights Are Close, But No CigarMost people who have been following lighting tech seem to be convinced that light-emitting diode (LED) lights are the future, but it’s always good to see new research being done on them. The more sure we are that they’re the way to go, the better. It always sucks to invest a lot of time and money into something only to later realize that it’s not nearly as good as we were first led to believe (*cough* corn ethanol *cough*). Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have conducted the first cradle-to-grave assessment of LED streetlights, and the…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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Image: KnossosInduction Lights Are Close, But No CigarMost people who have been following lighting tech seem to be convinced that light-emitting diode (LED) lights are the future, but it’s always good to see new research being done on them. The more sure we are that they’re the way to go, the better. It always sucks to invest a lot of time and money into something only to later realize that it’s not nearly as good as we were first led to believe (*cough* corn ethanol *cough*). Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have conducted the first cradle-to-grave assessment of LED streetlights, and the…Read the full story on TreeHugger
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The guys who run FreeGreen, the free homeplan website, are so smart; they could have just hired architects to do plans, and would have had to go to the trouble of deciding which architect to hire; instead they write a brief and run a competition. Now they have the work of hundreds of architects to chose from; established firms with the works in the drawer, young designers hoping to be discovered. But they are not the only ones who benefit; everyone can look, vote and learn from over 400 submissions.

The challenge was to “re-envision the typical suburban home in an ecologically conscious manner that also reflects today’s modern lifesty…Read the full story on TreeHugger
By treehugger.com
Found on the net for you by the news bot

Image: KnossosInduction Lights Are Close, But No CigarMost people who have been following lighting tech seem to be convinced that light-emitting diode (LED) lights are the future, but it’s always good to see new research being done on them. The more sure we are that they’re the way to go, the better. It always sucks to invest a lot of time and money into something only to later realize that it’s not nearly as good as we were first led to believe (*cough* corn ethanol *cough*). Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have conducted the first cradle-to-grave assessment of LED streetlights, and the…Read the full story on TreeHugger
By treehugger.com
Found on the net for you by the news bot

The guys who run FreeGreen, the free homeplan website, are so smart; they could have just hired architects to do plans, and would have had to go to the trouble of deciding which architect to hire; instead they write a brief and run a competition. Now they have the work of hundreds of architects to chose from; established firms with the works in the drawer, young designers hoping to be discovered. But they are not the only ones who benefit; everyone can look, vote and learn from over 400 submissions.

The challenge was to “re-envision the typical suburban home in an ecologically conscious manner that also reflects today’s modern lifesty…Read the full story on TreeHugger
By treehugger.com
Found on the net for you by the news bot