Turning Trash Into Toys

At school we used to make rocket ships from toilet paper rolls and washing up liquid bottles. Make Do from Australia have turned this into a business and taken it one step further with their product that enables people to make fun stuff out of waste materials such as cardboard, plastic and fabric.

A Make Do “Kit for One” (US$25) consists of a reusable construction tool that cuts and perforates new or old materials safely. It also comes with 8 hinges and 30 connectors, which use a ziptag-style mechanism to fasten pieces together.

“Packaged in a recycled cardboard tube, the components are designed to last, and are made from materials that can be recycled.”

“Make Do adds value in the form of community workshops, educational resources for teachers, a newsletter/blog for inspiration and … downloadable construction plans.”

You can read about their environmental credentials here and watch a video on how it all works below:

[Via: Springwise]

Turning Trash Into Gas

Or “Turning Rubbish Into Petrol” for those in the UK. Recently, Coskata Inc., a leading developer of alternative bio-fuels, announced the successful start-up of its semi-commercial flex-ethanol facility.

Unlike other technologies and facilities that often rely on one primary source of feedstock, the company’s flex ethanol facility will be producing ethanol from numerous sources, including wood biomass, agricultural waste, construction waste and even household garbage. In addition, their patented microorganisms and bioreactor designs will produce ethanol for the same as, and in some cases less than, the cost of producing a gallon of gasoline. This new technology also reduces CO2 emissions up to 96 percent compared to gasoline.

Flex Fuel vehicles that can run on gas, E85 or a combination of both, are already available from Chevrolet, Ford, Dodge and GMC. GM has built 5 million of these vehicles to date, watch the video below to learn more.

Is There Really A Toxic Garbage Island?

Apparently some people have been talking about a patch of rubbish/garbage the size of the US state of Texas floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, ingeniously dubbed the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Basically, the theory is any rubbish/trash that gets dumped in the water rides the currents to this one spot and joins an ever-increasing flotilla. However, no one seemed to have a picture of the buildup, so Thomas Morton went out to sea to investigate. Below is part one of the 12 short part series, if you can’t see it you can click here.

Are You Up For The Zero Waste Challenge?

Rachelle Strauss (aka Mrs Green) and the three other members of her family from the UK are about to set about challenging themselves to creating zero waste!

By recycling all that they can and changing their shopping habits, they hope to be able to produce nothing for the landfill each week. The first week in September will be their official ‘zero waste week’. When they started preparing for this challenge, an ‘average’ week was about 100 liters (26.4 gallons) of landfill waste. Recently they put out just under 200 grams (7 ounces) – less than half a carrier bag.

They’ve launched a website to track their progress. As well as a blog, they have articles on how people can reduce the amount of rubbish they have, polls, competitions (22 prizes!), review products and discounts. Why not take a look and see how they’re doing?