The Solar Roadways project is working to pave roads with solar panels that you can drive on. Co-founder Scott Brusaw has made some major steps forward since our first visit back in 2007, so we visited him again earlier this year for an exclusive update on the project, including the first ever video recorded of the Solar Roadways prototype! For more information visit http://www.solarroadways.com . This Solar Roadway project will be featured in the upcoming feature film by YERT - Your Environmental Road Trip. To learn more about YERT, visit http://yert.com .

We've all heard of green roofs, but a company named Green Living Technologies even makes green walls. Their proprietary system of panels, made from recyclable aluminum or stainless steel, can go completely vertical yet are designed to be deep enough to support grass and even vegetables, while still allowing airflow and waterflow between it and the building.

Their wall on Pittsburgh's PNC building--the largest green wall in North America--supports some 15,000 "ferns, sedums, brass buttons and other plants" over its 2,400-square-foot surface. And while Gary Saulson, PNC's Head of Corporate Real Estate says "We really view the green wall as public art," it's art with benefits: They estimate the office space behind the wall will be about 25% cooler in the summertime.

A graduating industrial design student at Leicester’s De Montfort University (DMU) is hoping for award-winning success with his innovative design which transforms falling wastewater into electricity.

DMU Industrial design student, Tom Broadbent’s money and energy-saving brainwave is called the HighDro Power and works by harnessing the energy from falling waste water in the soil pipes of high-rise buildings, converting it to electricity through an ingenious device.

As well as having developed a potentially commercially viable product, Tom is waiting to hear whether he will win accolades from the Institute of Engineering Designers (IED) and the Dyson Awards. He is also entering the Kevin McCloud Green Heroes award to win the opportunity to show HighDro Power at the NEC’s Grand Designs Live show.

The invention was developed in answer to targets set at the G8 Summit by governments to reduce their country’s carbon dioxide emissions and dependency on fossil fuels for energy production by 2050. In HighDro Power, the electricity can either be utilised in the building to save £926-per-year for a seven-storey building or sold back to the national grid on a buy-back tariff.

Tom, who is from Cropwell Butler, near Nottingham, said: “The inspiration for HighDro Power was literally a ‘Eureka!’ moment that came when I emptied a bath in a hotel and found that it cleared very quickly and with a large amount of force. It seemed logical that this energy should be harnessed in some way to create green electricity and help governments meet targets and it filled an obvious gap in the market.”

To make a working prototype of the design, Tom used rapid prototyping techniques – laser sintering and CNC milling machinery – as well as vacuum forming. He sourced bearings, gears and other materials from companies supplying standard components.

He added: “HighDro Power works by using the water discharged from appliances such as showers, toilets and sinks in high-rise apartments. The water goes down the pipe and hits four turbine blades that drive one generator.

“The whole thing was influenced by traditional waterwheels to ensure that any solids passing through had limited effects on whether they could function.”

In the future, Tom hopes to take his innovation to the next stage by having it fitted to a building for testing.

“I am currently a freelance designer but would love to work for James Dyson or a design team at a consultancy or company. My vision is to design products that actually benefit society in some way and get released on the market,” he said.

Dr Guy Bingham, DMU Senior Lecturer for the Faculty of Art and Design and programme leader for the Industrial design course within the University’s Faculty of Art and Design, said: “Tom's idea is truly an innovation in the area of energy micro-generation and the actual prototype is simply fantastic; I hope to see this go into production very soon. His work is a great example of what can be achieved from DMU’s design degrees.”

During his second year, Tom’s EarPill was shortlisted for the RNID’s national competition to redesign earplugs so that they were more attractive and ‘cool’ to wear in clubs and bars. He also spent a placement year with Vauxhall Motors Ltd in Ellesmere Port.

Think the trend of businesses making green office renovations is just a passing fad? Not according to the latest issue of EL Insights, which reports that the U.S. green building market value will balloon from $71.1 billion now to $173 billion by 2015. Commercial green building is expected to grow by 18.1% annually during the same time period from $35.6 billion to $81.8 billion. In this case, green building is defined as building with resource use and employee productivity in mind.

The explosive projected growth can be attributed both to a growing recognition of green building's potential cost-savings as well as incentives from the government (i.e. the multi-million dollar Sustainable Communities Challenge Planning Grant program and the Sustainable Communities Regional Planning Grant program). Green renovation will also comprise a significant portion of future green building, thanks in no small part to government projects like then Recovery through Retrofit initiative, which offers $80 billion energy and environmental retrofits for federal buildings.

The growth in green building will lead to a number of changes in the larger building market, according to EL Insights: Construction workers will increasingly seek out green training programs, companies will spend more cash on green building technology (GE is already doing with its ecomagination initiative), and homes touting green building features will do better on the real estate market. All of this will result in cost savings for building and home owners, who will reap the benefits of lower energy and heating bills.

So if you haven't been paying attention to the U.S. Green Building Council, now is the time to start--the non-profit offers virtually endless amounts of information on green building studies and LEED certification.

Earlier this week, we took another big step forward in the Obama Administration’s efforts to encourage more sustainable development as we announced $100 million for our new Sustainable Communities Regional Planning Grant program to encourage regions to integrate economic development, land use, and transportation investments – which will help to tie the quality and location of housing to broader opportunities such as access to good jobs, quality schools, and safe streets. 

For all the implications of “sprawl”—from job loss, economic decline and segregation, to obesity, asthma rates, to climate change and our dangerous dependence on foreign oil—all of them share by one fundamental problem: the mismatch between where we live and where we work. Whatever else we do to address these problems, America must find a way to connect housing to jobs.

 And Americans are demanding it.  Today, the average household spends more than half of its budget on housing and transportation.  They have become American families’ two single biggest expenses.

During the housing boom, real estate agents suggested to families that couldn’t afford to live near job centers that they could find a more affordable home by living farther away.  Lenders bought into the “Drive to Qualify” myth as well – giving easy credit to homebuyers without accounting for how much it might cost families to live in these areas or the risk they could pose to the market.

And then, an odd thing happened when these families moved in – they found themselves driving dozens of miles to work, to school, to the movies, to the grocery store, spending hours in traffic and spending nearly as much to fill their gas tank as they were to pay their mortgage...and in some places, more.  In addition to adding to families’ budgets and time, it is also contributing to increased carbon emissions and pollution.  

In all, in the last century, transportation costs as a share of household expenditures have increased by a thousand percent.

In February, HUD launched our new Office of Sustainable Housing and Communities – allowing us to work directly with communities to support innovative planning and practice at the local level and helping to coordinate our investments with other agencies at the federal level.

In particular, HUD formed a Sustainability Partnership with the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency.  When it comes to housing, environmental and transportation policy, the Federal government must speak with one voice. This is an example of how we’re changing the way we do business across the Administration – working not at cross purposes in our silos, but together, in common purpose
 
Of course, as critical as regional planning is, the hard work of implementing plans happens at the local level.

That’s why our $40 million Sustainable Communities Challenge Planning Grant program is targeted to cities and towns.  I announced this program earlier this week in conjunction with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in a joint grant program that includes up to $35 million for its “TIGER II” planning grant program. 

Where the Transportation program will fund planning activities that relate directly to a future transportation capital investment, HUD’s program will fund land-use related planning activities and affordable housing strategies that will be linked to that investment. This funding will make it possible for communities to hire staff with the expertise needed to remove barriers communities face to sustainable development. 

The goal of each of these efforts—at the regional level, at the community level and at the neighborhood level—is the same: to advance our shared priorities and values as Americans for the decades to come.

Priorities like jobs for the 21st century – located closer to where we live, so businesses spend less money moving goods and services and people can spend less time commuting and more time with family.

Values like healthier, more inclusive communities – with neighborhoods where kids can play outside and breathe clean air. 

Communities where opportunities for people of all ages, incomes, races and ethnicities are never determined by their zip code.

These are the kinds of communities we all want our children to grow up in. 

If, in this new century, we grow our communities and our economies out of this fundamental principle, then I have no doubt our America and our children’s America will be a strong, prosperous America infused with the same sense of purpose, opportunity and resolve that have always defined us.  

Shaun Donovan is the Secrecretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development

National Geographic's third annual Greendex Survey, measuring global consumer behaviors that can make the world a more environmentally sustainable place, was released today.

The 2010 Greendex examines green behaviors in 17 countries — with U.S. consumers again placing last (though improving), and India coming in #1. The international polling firm GlobeScan conducted the 17,000-person survey.

There is a clear message to business and government in the results this year: The survey shows the major obstacle to adopting green behavior in the 17 countries is the perception of ‘‘greenwashing’’ (identified by 44 percent of all respondents) — a more significant barrier to environmentally friendly behavior than the financial cost of making an effort (31 percent). Another notable barrier is the sense that individual efforts are not worthwhile when governments and industries fail to take action (identified by 40 percent).

You can take a condensed version of the survey, which will help in understanding the overall results and findings of the Greendex. Try it yourself and see how you fair in comparison to the countries that were polled. You also can examine the Greendex survey results by country, find tips on living a more environmentally friendly lifestyle and read the complete 100+ page report here.

UCLA students help high schoolers build skills, feel empowered and beautify community.

For a group of high school students in Inglewood, a community gardening project began with picking up debris: bags, bottle caps, a sprouting potato and crack pipes.

Launched by students under the leadership of D’Artagnan Scorza, a graduate student in education, the project aims to cultivate not only the city’s first community garden, but also a sense of civic engagement and empowerment.

Once a week, Scorza and two of his UCLA classmates, Lorna Apper, a graduate student in geography and Erick Sanchez de Leon, a UCLA alumnus, drive down to teach the students everything from soil composition and water drainage to shoveling basics.

Although the weekly sessions have only gone on for five weeks, the initial idea came a year earlier. Scorza’s students in his group, the Black Male Youth Academy at Morningside High School, decided they wanted to beautify their community, Scorza said.

Since then, Scorza reached out to the local government and the Inglewood Unified School District, which allowed the group to use the district’s unused property across the street from the school’s field.

“By and large, it’s already been a success, but we’re going to see a significant success when this place is full of vegetables, fruits, trees and flowers,” said Scorza, who served as a student representative for the UC Board of Regents until 2009.

The lot right now is a growing pile of gravel, an unused well and a few patches of weeds, but the students’ dreams are big. They want to see fruit trees, sunflowers, a gravel pathway and vegetables, and eventually a farmer’s market.

For a school where nearly 80 percent of the students receive free or reduced meals and fast food chains circle the campus, the chance to grow their own food has been empowering, said English teacher Rashondra Woods, who joins her students in the weeding and digging.

“(The class) can actually see that they have the opportunity to understand that an idea sparks action and they see the result. Hopefully, they’ll see by May and June the flowers and seeds blossoming,” she said.

Although Scorza, Sanchez de Leon and Apper have pointed the students to local resources, the project is run by the students.

One of the students is Kevin Crawford, a ninth-grader at Morningside High School, who appointed himself the seed collector. As the class saves seeds from beans or fruits they have eaten, he is in charge of counting and storing them.

“It might sound boring, but it’s kind of cool because I get to count seeds when I’m bored,” said Crawford, who is learning to start a garden for the first time. “Let’s just say, (gardening) is not as easy as they make it look on TV.”

Aside from over 150 seeds collected, much of the supplies have come from the students, friends, such as Apper’s mother and neighbors.

After a city council member, Ralph Franklin, saw the students working on their first day, he rushed back with shovels, gloves and a $200 check.

Neighbors have started noticing and helping, too. Sanchez de Leon and Apper have answered the questions of curious neighbors, who are now donating their trash for the garden’s compost.

The school’s assistant principal, Joyce Rushing, is excited to see the project coming together.

“The people in this community are hungry for fresh vegetables and fruits,” she said. “And I’m really happy to see the children involved in something that’s really positive for them.”

From the partnerships Scorza has fostered with the district, school board, local government and UCLA groups, the team hopes to involve more groups in the project to help design and implement new elements for their garden, like a solar panel water pump.

The students have applied for a $25,000 grant as a part of Pepsi’s Refresh Everything, a program that allows people to vote for a community project to win money from the corporation.

To promote their project, they have made YouTube videos of their progress and will soon be completing a painted sign.

But for now, the 30 students’ homework assignment is to take care of a pea. Each student took a cup filled with soil from the lot with a seed, which they will have to water everyday.

“(My parents) are going to trip out about (the peas in the house),” said Javier Ortega, a high school senior. “But they’re going to have to deal with that to support nature. If I don’t, who else is?”

What does your lifestyle consist of? Would you rather walk to the local grocery store or do you find yourself driving even though it’s a ten minute walk? Welcome to the life of Jeff Heie where he and his family transitioned into the minimalist, greener world of sourcing their energy locally. For the Heie family, a simple walk, or even a couple of trips to purchase fresh foods has become routine. After packing their belongings, of only necessary value, the Heie’s moved from their comfortable space in Arizona to a small town just outside Manchester, England.

According to Jefff, “Every place in the world has local sources of renewable energy, whether it [is] the sun, the wind, hydroelectric, geothermal or tidal power.” The Heie’s felt it essential to utilize these natural “sources” in order to provide a healthy planet for their children and future generations to come. Phasing out fossil fuel and using renewable energy translates to a happier and sustainable life. For them, renting a car once a month means they can get chores done or spend the weekend vacationing. Bicycling and walking, versus driving, means more family time, more exercise and conserving energy.

It is a cyclical process- from the way you use resources, use transportation, from the way you eat and interact with your community, it all affects the world we live in. Jeff highlights how the use of a “milk man” brings a certain familiarity to the neighborhood- a person who gives comfort to the elderly, the children and even raises issues as to how the milk is transported. The local milk man’s vehicle is electric- running on battery. It is astonishing that living locally can be more prosperous than living in a developed nation- a simpler way of living means “reducing carbon food print, prevents military complexes based on the need to protect our economic and political interests,  and it is better for our communities to be economically viable and locally self efficient.”

You recognize the nuances of life, meet people, actually offer a smile and exchange a “hello” when you become invested and connected to your community. Understandably, living day-to-day or trying to overcome the exhaustion of long work hours doesn’t afford most the time, or the ability to live unconventionally. We, meaning the U.S., are part of a system that is designed to make our lives more difficult. But if you think about it, if we mirrored the Heie family and put our efforts into living more collectively, we could share Mother Earth and call it our home.

JP Morgan Chase is the largest US financier of mountaintop removal coal mining, investing hundreds of millions of dollars into a real American tragedy.

Instead of bankrolling this brutal, toxic and irreversibly destructive practice of destroying mountains for climate-killing coal, Chase should put their money on the right side of history.

It’s time for Chase to stop making millions from destroying Appalachia’s mountains.

Please join us for a social media day of action. On Feb. 18, we’ll use our Facebook pages, Twitter accounts and blogs to hold JP Morgan Chase accountable for financing this despicable practice.

To raise awareness about the issue, folks are writing, tweeting, and doing whatever else they can today to raise awareness of the truth about coal.

Clean coal is a term that gets thrown around a lot, and it’s one that coal lobby groups like the American Coalition for Clean Coal Energy have (quite successfully) made the cornerstone of their marketing and PR campaigns.

Even President Obama has been talking about clean coal lately, touting it as part of the solution to our energy problem. Here’s the thing about coal, though: you can capture all the carbon you want when you’re burning the stuff. The CO2 emissions are just part of what makes coal a filthy energy option. The thing you don’t see so often in the news or hear politicians mention is the way that coal gets to the power plant that’s burning it.

There’s a facet of coal power that doesn’t get nearly the attention it deserves: mountaintop removal mining.

As our demand for energy grows, we need more and more coal to feed our habit, and that means mining more and more. We’ve gotten most of the easy coal out of the ground. In order to keep meeting our energy demands, mining companies are blowing the tops off of mountains. Yep. They set explosives and detonate mountaintops to get at the stuff.

The aftermath of mountaintop removal mining in the Appalachians.

We’re changing the landscape, literally, just to keep pulling coal out of the ground. The devastation isn’t even the end of what’s so awful about mountaintop removal mining. It disrupts the surrounding ecosystems, pollutes waterways, and displaces wildlife. Scientists across the U.S. have called for a ban on the practice.

The Sierra Club put together a really informative video, giving a first-hand look at mountaintop removal mining and its effects:

To see even more on the negative side effects of mountaintop removal mining, check out these videos that Zachary posted over on CleanTechnica.

We can’t let companies like JP Morgan Chase fly under the radar while financing such devastating practices! If you’re interested in spreading the word, I urge you to sign up today with the Rainforest Action Network to show your support. You can also share information on mountaintop removal mining and JP Morgan Chase’s involvement on your favorite social media sites – Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Digg. The more folks reading about dirty coal and JP Morgan Chase’s link to mountaintop removal mining, the better!