Got foam containers laying around that you don’t want to throw away. Here are some ways to upcycle styrofoam coolers and shipping boxes.
Charcoal Briquettes Made From Coffee Grounds? Yep, That’s A Thing… [Video]
Inspired by what he saw at a Guatemalan coffee farms, Rich Bruins created Coffee Coals: charcoal briquettes made from used coffee grounds.
Waste Water Treatment With Corn Cobs: A Google Science Fair Winner
Google Science Fair Community Impact Award winner Lalita Praside Sripada Srisai developed waste water treatment technology with waste corn cobs.
How To Make A Hobo Stove: 9 Plans
Got a tin can laying around? Then you’ve got the basic materials needed for a hobo stove, a portable cookstove made from cast-off materials.
The Story Of Our Waste
Each day we create an excess of waste that builds up in landfills, in our oceans, and in our bodies. Here is the story of our waste. We create a ton of waste everyday, there is no denying that fact. This is especially true if you live in the United States– we would need FOUR […]
5 Places To Donate Prom Dresses For Reuse
Wearing a dress for one night isn’t a particularly efficient use of resources. You can donate prom dresses to one of these organizations for reuse by a student who may not be able to afford a new dress.
33 Recycling Games For Teaching Your Kids (And Yourself) About Responsible Waste Disposal
Kids learn best through play, so these recycling games – online, mobile, and “live action” – teach them the ins and outs of responsible waste disposal.
Building Demolition Salvage, or, There’s Gold in Dat Thar Abandoned Building
Much waste from a deteriorating building can be salvaged and find new life through reuse or recycling. Markets already exist for much of this material.
The Human-Powered DIY Washing Machine: 5 Plans
Want clean clothes & opportunities to exercise? Check out these diy washing machine plans that only require a little arm or leg pumping to operate.
5 Gallon Bucket Gardening: Seven Ways to Reuse Plastic Buckets for Growing Food
We usually discuss container gardening in the context of space: if you live in an apartment, or have a small yard, containers might be your best bet. But even though I’ve got space for gardening – not a ton, but enough – I’m thinking about incorporating containers more this year. Not only are they mobile,
Forage the Urban Bounty: 11 Crowdsourced Maps of Edible Plants
The art of foraging goes back to our hunter-gatherer days, but most of us don’t spend much time any more walking the neighborhood looking for edible weeds and fruit trees. That’s changing, though, as many try to simplify and take advantage of food that’s available for the taking in our yards, parks, and other green
The DIY Soil Block Maker: 7 Plans
Want to try using soil blocks for starting your garden seeds this year? You can buy a soil blocker… or make your own from one of these DIY plans.
What is an Intentional Community?
Have you come across the phrase “intentional community,” but didn’t really understand what it meant? Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage resident Ma’ikwe Schaub Ludwig provides an insiders look at what it means to live in such a community.
The DIY Aquaponics System: 6 Plans for Bringing Fish and Plants Together to Grow Food
Putting fish and plants together in a closed loop (that’s organic by necessity) strikes me as a brilliant use of biomimicry… or, at least the notion that “waste equals food” in the natural world. But can a backyard tinkerer put together an aquaponics system on the cheap?
DIY Biomass: Briquettes, Presses, Logs, and More
“Biomass” is one of those terms like “alternative energy”: it could be a sustainable approach to energy generation, but isn’t always. I once sat through a talk by an energy services company executive in which he argued that forest biomass (think trees, undergrowth, etc., cut for burning) was carbon-neutral because “the plants could grow back.”
How to Build a Chicken Tractor: 4 Plans
Thinking about raising chickens for eggs or meat? A chicken tractor allows you to move the birds’ home around easily, so they’re getting a varied diet, and fertilizing your yard as you’d like.
6 DIY Rocket Stove Plans
The clean burning, super-efficient rocket stove is also pretty easy to build. Here are six plans showing you how to do so.
Building with Tires for Energy Efficiency and Disaster Resistance
Scrap tires have been a disposal menace for decades: the EPA notes that “There are at least 275 million scrap tires in stockpiles in the U.S.,” and in 2003 (the last year for which there are figures, I assume), approximately 290 million scrap tires were generated.” Yeah, that’s a lot of tires. State and local governments
5 Successful Reforestation Projects
Between the Arab Spring, the weird weather, and, well, the Casey Anthony trial, you may have missed the fact that 2011 was proclaimed “The International Year of Forests” by the UN General Assembly. This celebration is long overdue: forests not only provide habitat to animals and plants, but also purify air and water, prevent soil
Green Business Blog Carnival #10 at Cleantechies
Yep, moving a little slowly… I blame it on last week’s heatwave (which has finally ended). Fortunately, our friends at Cleantechies were right on the mark (and, in fairness, they had cool, pleasant weather), and got Friday’s Green Business Blog Carnival published right on schedule. Edition #10 was a little light (I’m blaming that on
What a Red Dawg Taught Me about Stray Animals and Sustainability
If you’ve spent any time at my Facebook page, or are even a long-time sustainablog reader, you know I’m an animal lover. I’m also a supporter of animal adoption (both my dog, Zelda, and my wife’s horse, Trey, are adoptees), and even volunteer occasionally at the Longmeadow Rescue Ranch. I haven’t written much about issues
Seven More Homes and Buildings Made from the Darndest Things
You might see “Seven More” above, and think “Where were the first ones?” That’s OK… we’re doing something a little unusual in the blogging world: creating a sequel to a post on another blog. Not quite a year ago, Brian Clark Howard at The Daily Green did a post on unusual green buildings that included
sustainablog’s Pedal-a-Watt Powered Blogathon coming in March
UPDATE: The folks at Convergence Tech, Inc. have given us a very generous deal on a Pedal-a-Watt pedal power generator for the blogathon, so we’ve changed the name of the event slightly… we’re grateful for their help! A few of you may remember the last time I stayed up for 24 hours to blog for
Top Global Warming Causes – Natural or Human?
If you’ve followed the debate over climate change even a little, you likely know the main causes of global warming: concentrations of greenhouse gases build up in the Earth’s atmosphere, and create a “greenhouse,” or warming effect. You’re likely also aware that evidence of past warming periods has fueled the argument that natural causes are
