Sustainability

Recently the Cleantech Group, with the assistance of an advisory panel of corporate executives, sat down to decide upon the third annual Global Cleantech 100: the hundred "most promising and innovative" clean technology companies of 2011. The listed companies span a range of industries, and though solar energy firms, chemical recyclers, LED manufacturers and energy-monitoring software programmers certainly aren't under-represented, many companies in the hundred are defined by a single product or idea. Gizmag scoured the Cleantech 100 to find what we thought were the ten most innovative companies. Read More

Corrugated cardboard can be traced back to the latter part of the mid-19th century, although cardboard itself goes back much farther than that. Most of us will have encountered it at some time, probably as the outer packaging of our latest digital must-have, but it has recently been breaking away from such traditional uses. Over the past few years, we've seen everything from a cardboard record player to a festival tent to a USB drive. Now, industrial design student Jake Tyler has created a prototype cardboard vacuum cleaner - the Vax ev. Read More

Victorinox has opened a public online vote to choose the best sustainable design submission to its "Time to Care" competition. The call for entries has been open since January 2011, and the seven best were chosen by jury in May. Throughout June, July, and August, the top seven designs are open to a public vote. The ultimate winner will be awarded prize money at a ceremony in October, and work with Victorinox to bring the design project to fruition. Read More

Commissioned by Living Architecture and Artangel, the challenge of "A Room for London" was to design a one-bedroom temporary installation to be perched on top of the Queen Elizabeth Hall at the Southbank Centre, well known to be one of London's most visible sites. The project attracted the attention of 500 architects worldwide and the winning design went to a beautifully crafted timber boat structure from David Kohn and Fiona Banne, but it was the remarkable design from Spanish architects Sanzpont which really caught our eye. Read More

One of the four permanent venues in the London Olympic Park, the velodrome was one of the last to be commissioned, and the first to be completed on time and on budget. Unveiled in February, the sinuous velodrome was chosen to represent London's claim for the "greenest games ever," because of its sustainability and efficiency initiatives. Inspired by lightweight and streamlined racing bikes, the Hopkins Architects-designed velodrome will provide a venue for the indoor track cycling events at the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Read More

The European Commission has released a white paper detailing ambitious plans to transform Europe's transport infrastructure by 2050. The roadmap for a Single European Transport Area includes forty initiatives for road, rail and air travel that aim to increase mobility, reduce reliance on oil imports, cut emissions by 60% and combat congestion by halving the use of "conventionally fueled" cars in urban transport by 2030 with a view to phasing them out in cities by 2050. Read More

The U.S. Department of Energy's 2011 Solar Decathlon competition is set to kick off at the National Mall's West Potomac Park in Washington, D.C., in September. The event challenges 20 collegiate teams to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive and in the lead up, the University of Maryland Solar Decathlon team has unveiled its entry called the WaterShed – a structure designed to capture more than just energy from the sun. Read More

As cities become more densely-populated, the trend for multi-dwelling complexes has been to build up – hence the advent of the highrise as we know it today. Building down doesn’t seem to be much of an option, as it would be very labor-intensive, and residents would justifiably freak out at the thought of living hundreds of feet below the surface of the Earth. Malaysian architect Sarly Adre Bin Sarkum, however, has proposed a multi-level building that goes down – into the ocean. While his hO2+ concept is pretty unlikely to ever be built, the imagination behind it was enough to merit a Special Mention in eVolo magazine’s 2010 Skyscraper Competition. Read More

Joining products like the Life Straw, the Bobble and the Katadyn Vario in the portable water filtration market, the Revolve filter bottle is designed to remove up to 99.99% of all contaminants found in tap water and one filter will produce the equivalent of 800 single use 16 oz bottles of water. Read More