Aug 5, 2009

If you plan on walking through the desert with a cell phone anytime soon, you might want to check in with Sanyo before you leave.

Its new Eneloop Portable Solar panels can charge portable ...

Originally posted at Crave

Aug 5, 2009

A new U.S. government study on Tuesday adds to a growing list of experts concluding that climate legislation moving through Congress would have only a modest impact on consumers, adding a bit more than $100 to household costs in 2020.

Under the climate legislation passed by the House of Representatives in June, electricity, heating oil and other bills for average families will rise $114 in 2020 and $288 in 2030, according to the Energy Information Administration, the country’s top energy forecaster.

The bill requires energy companies to help consumers lower costs during the early years of the program which would “mute the impact of higher energy prices for households until at least 2025,” said Kay Smith, an EIA economist.

Regulating greenhouse gases with a market mechanism, such as the cap and trade program outlined in the bill, is one of President Barack Obama’s top goals.

Democratic leaders hope the bill, which would place a cost on polluting greenhouse gases in the United States like carbon dioxide for the first time, will come to a vote by the full Senate in October. That would come before a U.N. meeting in Copenhagen in December in which nearly 200 countries hope to form a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol on global warming.

The EIA estimate was in line with earlier projections from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office which said average families would pay about $175 extra annually by 2020, and the Environmental Protection Agency, which said families would pay at most an extra $1 per day.

Article continues: http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE5736PY20090804?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

Aug 5, 2009

Do you sweat like a hog, making your mouse totally slippery and near-unusable? Well the Mouseblisters are designed to stop that from happening while also making your mouse look really ugly.

The little stick-on nubbins soak up all your sweat, keeping your mouse from becoming a slippery little puck. They also increase its size if you have big hands, and apparently help reduce RSI. But really, they just make your mouse look stupid. As long as you're OK with that, go nuts.

Mouseblisters via Gizmodo

Aug 5, 2009

The United States could save about $600 billion in energy costs by 2020 if it hiked annual efficiency spending about five-fold, business consultants McKinsey and Co said in a report on Wednesday.

Governments, businesses and the general public would have to boost annual spending on existing energy-saving measures, like insulating walls and more efficient appliances, from about $10 billion annually to $50 billion per year. The upfront costs would pay off by saving $1.2 trillion by 2020, according to the report called “Unlocking Energy Efficiency in the U.S. Economy.”

The report, which did not look at energy used in transportation, said the savings would cut energy used for heating and to generate power about 23 percent.

It would cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by about 1.1 gigatons annually — or the equivalent of taking the entire fleet of U.S. vehicles off the road, the report said.

Article continues

Aug 5, 2009

The kelp, known as wakame (pronounced wa-KA-me), is on a list of “100 of the World’s Worst Invasive Alien Species,” compiled by the Invasive Species Specialist Group. Since her discovery in May, Dr. Zabin and colleagues have pulled up nearly 140 pounds of kelp attached to pilings and boats in the San Francisco Marina alone.

Every year the damage wrought by aquatic invaders in the United States and the cost of controlling them is estimated at $9 billion, according to a 2003 study by a Cornell University professor, David Pimentel, whose research is considered the most comprehensive. The bill for controlling two closely-related invasive mussels — the zebra and the quagga — in the Great Lakes alone is $30 million annually, says the United States Federal Aquatic Nuisance Species Task Force.

Many scientists say that San Francisco Bay has more than 250 nonnative species, like European green crab, Asian zooplankton and other creatures and plants that outcompete native species for food, space and sunlight.

Article continues

Aug 5, 2009

Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest in June was four times more devastating than the month before, further depleting what is seen as one of the biggest buffers against global warming

, official data revealed Tuesday.

Satellite imagery analyzed by Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research showed 578 square kilometers (223 square miles) of Amazon woodland was burned or cut down.

That was more than four times the devastation recorded in May, and roughly equivalent to the size of Switzerland’s Lake Geneva, or half the area of California’s biggest city of Los Angeles.

Most of the destruction was concentrated in the Brazilian states of Para and Mato Grosso. Ranchers and farmers regularly encroach on the vast zone.

Article continues

Aug 5, 2009

You've heard about the old lady who lived in a shoe, but now you yourself can live in a computer mouse. That's because the MercuryHouseOne, a project by multinational firm Architecture and Vision, is shaped just like everyone's favorite input device.

Despite its name, the MercuryHouseOne is actually more akin to a living room than a house. It's designed to be easily transportable with an interior that's a snap to rearrange for different uses and a shell made out of Carrara marble. If you happen to be in or around Venice this September, you could even check it out for yourself.

See more of the MercuryHouseOne in the gallery below.

Aug 5, 2009

The Watergate is a design by Michael Tatschl, Sascha Mikel and Martin Schnabl that would replace turnstiles with a different solution when it comes to keeping people out: water jets. While it doesn't present a serious physical barrier, it does allow for both the handicapped and people lugging around bags and bikes to pass through easily. All others? They get drenched.

Still, it seems like I could just walk on through whatever the Watergate is trying to protect if I thought ahead and wore my swimsuit. Then again, it'd be easy for officers to spot the drenched man in the crowd and stop me. I'd still sue for the gate killing my cellphone, though. Hurrah for frivolous lawsuits.

They should really just make this thing spit acid.

Via Yanko Design