[Please do no contact the news team of Inspir’Action! We’re not owners nor reseller of Brikawood. See contact details below.] … More
The Plastic Road project in the Netherlands gives new life to plastic waste, while, at the same time, avoiding millions … More
Good news, on the environment, is scarce. For the first time, a group of English and American scientists succeeded in … More
Good news, on the environment, is scarce. For the first time, a group of English and American scientists succeeded in … More
[Please do no contact the news team of Inspir’Action! We’re not owners nor reseller of Brikawood. See contact details below.] … More
The Plastic Road project in the Netherlands gives new life to plastic waste, while, at the same time, avoiding millions … More
Good news, on the environment, is scarce. For the first time, a group of English and American scientists succeeded in … More
[Please do no contact the news team of Inspir’Action! We’re not owners nor reseller of Brikawood. See contact details below.] … More
This is a project of shared and sustainable management of agricultural and natural areas on the outskirts of urban centres. … More
The bottles of Head & Shoulders or Pantene will use more recycled plastic by the end of 2018 in Europe. … More
In collaboration with Parley for the Oceans, an organization that brings together scientists, artists and citizens around projects to clean … More
This is the road of the future. Photovoltaic and smart, it can capture solar energy and produce electricity directly. This … More
At the beginning of the previous century, around 1925, consumers were buying food at the grocery’s store or butcher’s with their own containers. We are currently witnessing a return to these practices with Montreal’s zero-waste grocery stores. (Article inspired from Le Devoir, published on November 7, 2016)
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There is neither aroma nor artificial additives in this Texan coffee. The cups are recycled or composted as well as the coffee beans and food waste are distributed to local farmers … More than just serving coffee, Blacksmith pays an undivided attention to the triple bottom-line; profit, people and planet. Read more
Many persons hesitate to install a garden in their backyard in order to grow their own food at home. However, with the Smart Garden Plantui’s cultivation techniques, they no more have any excuses. This innovative project has been designed by Plantui Oy, a start-up based in Turku, Finland. Read more
In the United Kingdom, 7 million coffee cups are being thrown away a day. Even when they are disposed in recycling bins, less than 1% of these cups are recycled. Chef-turned-waste-activist Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall from environment charity Hubbub decided to take the bull by the horns and launched the #1MoreShot campaign in Manchester. Read more
It all started with the petition “Stop food waste” in Hauts de Seine in France. Gathering hundreds of thousands of signatures, it grew into a striking lobby at breakneck speed. And today, this national movement has given France the ultimate international recognizance as being the first country to ban food waste by strengthening its legal framework.
Annually, each French household throws an average of 20 to 30 kg of food, according to the report entitled “The fight against food waste: proposals for public policy” submitted by Guillaume Garot, deputy PS of Mayenne and former minister of Agro Industry and Food Security. What was pinpointed is the fact that a third of these products was never even unpacked. The new law against food waste, adopted in February 2016, came to slow down this trend.
Voted unanimously, the new legislation aims at reducing food waste in supermarkets. The latter can therefore no longer throw food or make products unfit for consumption. Bleaching unsold food and garbage bins was, in fact, a common practice adopted by supermarkets to prevent homeless people or other individuals from taking away these food products.
Under these new laws, supermarkets that extend over 400m2 are required to donate edible unsold food to charities with which they will have to sign a formal agreement. The large supermarkets have a year ahead of them to review their system, counting from the date of the enactment of the law.
They now find themselves bounded to exercise better management of food supply and to review how consumers are informed about commodities, especially those which are going to be expired soon
So that it is respected as it should be, the law also makes provision for sanctions against distributors of foodstuffs who will continue to deliberately destroy edible food. In cases where these items are not edible for humans, it is proposed that the products can be recovered and converted into animal feed or into compost.
This legislation will also ensure that “10 million French eat to their heart’s content,” according to Arash Derambarsh, Municipal Councillor of Republicans of Courbevoie (Hauts-de-Seine) who launched the petition “Stop food waste.” He sought the support of President Francois Hollande and his approach has proved fruitful. The petition was presented and acclaimed at the Parliament; the law itself has been promulgated on 11 February 2016.
This new legal framework is a big step in the fight against food waste. It furthermore announces the setting up of a structure targeting the integration a well-defined program on food waste in the curriculum of the country. The objective behind is to push children to learn, from an early age, to become environmentally responsible. It also aims at encouraging companies to include measures taken against food waste in their social and environmental performance.
While the Rio Olympics and Paralympic Games have just ended, all eyes are now turning to Japan. The land of the rising sun, who will host the next Summer Games in 2020, is already working hard to organize this great sports festival. Among the many practical challenges, is that of the manufacture of gold, silver and bronze medals that victorious athletes will proudly wear after the events. A challenge that may seem trivial but which is no less capital.
Her hands are those of a fairy. Her heart- full of compassion for her people. And what makes the stunning strength of Nargis Latif is sheer benevolence. The Karachi-born lady leads an army of rag pickers in the country who help her gather inorganic waste and convert it into houses for the poor in Pakistan.
Every single day, Karachi the largest city of Pakistan, throws up 12,000 tons of garbage. Nargis Latif does not aim at stopping this. Full of wisdom, the grey-haired lady knows better. Conscious that the garbage mostly produced by big industries in the country is part of an inevitable chain of a well-anchored structure, she instead aims at converting the trash into profitable business to help the needy.
Having founded the social organization Gul Bahao which means “flow the flowers” in her language, she and her team of garbage pickers hunt for garbage in every crook. She equally collects unused and rejected material from industries. Deeply motivated to lift the needy people of Pakistan from poverty, she has been striving hard relentlessly over years:
I have always wanted to innovate and create something useful for humanity itself
Nargis Latif constantly has to overcome many obstacles. There are times when she has to borrow money. And there are times the fighter-spirited woman also has to beg for money that she uses to transform garbage into recycled houses, water tanks, furniture, fodder for livestock or even compost. There were other times when she admits even having stolen in view of enhancing the lives of her people.
The most famous of her inventions is the recycled house known as Chandi Ghar that was created in the wake of a horrendous earthquake destroying the lives of thousands of people in Pakistan. The Chandi Ghars were used as shelters. Today, Nargis Latif has built over 150 of these recycled houses across Pakistan. Most are the homes of poor nomads in the Tharparkar district.
Apart from her extreme sense of generosity and benevolence, Nargis Latif also has an ecological soul. The woman has witnessed how the industrialization of Pakistan has been creating a negative impact on the environment due to pollution. Burning garbage is a common practice in the country and with her idea to recycle it, the lady furthermore wishes to diminish pollution.
Nargis Latif and her team have equally been collecting other types of waste to create compost. Out of this compost she created “Gardens in the Air” which are two scaffoldings carrying a wide array of plants. She has moreover been putting other organic waste such as vegetable and fruit peels, to profit by converting them into animal feed in a hygienic and clean manner.
The far-sighted lady similarly nurtures the desire to enhance the life of housewives in Pakistan. She sees that the latter can easily use the compost and animal feed which are economically viable products to plant their own food crops, sell the excess, and breed cattle for meat and milk in an era where prices of food products are shooting up.
Nargis Latif is similarly trying to engage citizens to become ecoresponsible. She has set up stalls at markets where individuals may sell their dry trash. She is also urging city residents to sell their wet garbage to producers of agricultural products. Nargis Latif is correspondingly closely participating with environmental projects aiming at imparting responsibility in children in regards to the ecological welfare of the country. Today, the milestones being achieved by Nargis Latif are gaining worldwide recognizance.
In Montreal, Quebec, volunteers are working towards edible streets. Now, residents can consume fruits and vegetables freely that grow almost in front of their doors. Read more
It is stored underneath our steps. Naturally generated and stored within the Earth itself, geothermal energy is an extremely precious resource. The department of Val de Marnes in the region of Ile de France in France has pioneered by capitalizing on it. Today, geothermal energy is providing heat at a cheaper rate to more than 150,000 homes in the area.
Source: www.punjtanenergy.com/
Non-polluting, renewable, reliable and equally sustainable, geothermal energy is proving to be amazingly advantageous. In Ile de France, drawn from the very bowels of Mother Earth, this clean energy is generating 1,373,000 MWh which is being utilized to heat up these homes. It has replaced fuel for heating, which would amount to 130,000 tons for the same task.
If Val de Marnes has gone ahead with this project it is because the Paris Basin which constitutes of the lowlands around Paris and is composed of sedimentary rocks prides itself in ideal geological conditions to support geothermal energy.
It is naturally present in the rocks and fluids underneath the crust of the Earth. Since in itself it is free and available immediately without the need to burn any fossil fuel for its extraction, it is furthermore inexpensive.
Unlike solar or wind energy, it is available 365 days a year…without exception
Even if it is found under our feet, the energy of the Earth is not necessarily exploitable everywhere. Other regions in France equally have the potential for the exploitation of geothermal energy but the geological structures are more complex for easy extraction.
For the region of Ile de France, it is synonymous to a gem- a wondrous asset waiting to be put to use. It is indeed the first renewable energy being taken advantage of in the region.
This energy has been subject to multiple experiments in terms of technical issues before it became an economically attractive heating mode, despite a highly competitive environment, thanks to technical improvements. Ile de France subsequently decided to diversify its resources in terms of energy to provide heat to houses and public buildings. It is extracted from 2,000m from within the Earth.
Today, the department has 36 operational plants with the majority located in Val de Marnes. It amounts to 40% of geothermal energy produced in the whole of France. Its network within the region is expanding like wildfire and it is expected that by 2025, more than 200,000 households will be able to rely on this type of energy.
Geothermal energy is already being utilized in over 20 countries with the United States being the leading producer. The largest cluster of geothermal power plants are located in The Geysers in California. Many American cities have a comprehensive network of pipes under roads and sidewalks with geothermal hot water flowing to melt the snow during winter.
Apart from heating homes and offices, geothermal water from deeper in the Earth are also used for growing plants in greenhouses, like in Auvergne, France. Iceland, for example, uses geothermal heat from underground reservoirs to generate electricity which is not only used to heat buildings but to ensure a cooling system as well.
“The imagination, give it the least license, dives deeper and soars higher than Nature goes”, rightly wrote the American essayist Henry David Thoreau.
Sergio Gamberini, the CEO of Italy’s Ocean Reef company, is the incarnation of this saying, having propelled imagination beyond limits to create Nemo’s Garden.
Who could imagine that one day we would be growing food crops under water? Sergio Gamberini, an Italian, did. Owner of two diving companies in Italy and California respectively, had the crazy idea to grow plants in the ocean while he was enjoying his holidays in Noli Bay, Italy.
And today, underwater cultivation is already regarded as a sustainable way to meet future food demands, especially in regions regularly stricken by droughts or where land is scarce.
The idea to try underwater cultivation sprouted in Sergio’s Gamberini’s mind as he wished diving to become a more interactive activity. His initial project was to anchor a type of flexible balloon containing a vase inside with a live plant, to the sea bed. To his amazement, the plant did not die and thrived.
The next step was to use the same method with seeds which sprouted in less than 36 hours. That was an incredible revelation to the Italian and urged the latter to carry out bigger projects. Today, as one takes the plunge in blue waters of Noli Bay, he is welcomed by not only bubbles of air, but a cluster of imposing spheres as well at about 10 metres below sea level.
This is Nemo’s Garden. The site, spreading over 15m2, is presently home to seven biospheres about the size of an average room each.
Inside each bubble, about 60 plants are growing, sustained by hydroponics and gravity-fed watering systems. A variety of 26 different types of plants have been thriving in these magical bubbles.
Basil, garlic, radishes, beans, cabbages and strawberries are some examples just to name a few.
Qualified divers tend to the produce that do not have the same requirements as those grown in soil. Sergio Gamberini, on his side, is of view that:
The sea is auto-sustainable, a free charger and warmer
At Noli Bay which is located in the Mediterranean, the water temperature does not fluctuate much, offering stability to the plants in terms of heat.
The sea water acts as a filter on its own, cutting off all unnecessary frequencies of light penetrating the ocean. Consequently, plants grown underwater are healthier and of highest quality. Flavours, smells and taste are more intense than those of plants grown on land.
The biospheres are the ideal greenhouses as no parasite can actually reach there. So, the need for pesticides or other chemical products does not even arise.
Natural evaporation turns into fresh water inside the spheres and systematically irrigates the plants. Experiments carried out have furthermore demonstrated that these plants grow faster than their counterparts on Earth.
Sergio Gamberini has been working with agricultural experts to improve the designs and lifespan of the spheres which have been patented.
His company holds a permit from the Government to operate for five months yearly, that is from May to September. The Italian is more than ready to scale up production.
