Miscellaneous
What can we learn from the world’s happiest countries?
The third World Happiness Report was released yesterday by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network for the United Nations. New Zealand is the only newcomer in the top 10 happiest countries, joining Canada and Australia as the only non-European contestants in this lucky cluster. What they Read More...
Audi captures CO2 from the air to produce green diesel
While renewables are beginning to make a dent into the carbon intensity of the power sector thanks to the plummeting price of technology, the automobile industry has been exploring green fuels so as to lower its dependency on fossil fuels. Audi has been pushing the envelope, exploring ways to Read More...
Cyclists in NYC have tripled over the past 10 years
Is the Big Apple on its way to becoming even more delicious, as in more livable and less polluted? The latest numbers released by the NYC Department of Transportation tells a most encouraging story: cyclists are taking over the streets (relatively speaking.) Already, expectations are high that the Read More...
Seed bank devoted to cultivated biodiversity in dry areas saved from destruction in Syria
Wars destroy lives, communities, cultural artifacts, historical heritage and biodiversity. For the second time in less than a century, individuals committed to preserving cultivated biodiversity have displayed heroic courage to save a seed bank from the ravages of war. The International Center Read More...
Cuba’s artists soon to get their place in the sun
Cuba has been teeming with artists since its cash-starved government encouraged art in the late 1980s as a way to bring in foreign currency. The 53-year-long US trade embargo on Cuba has done little to promote strong relationships between the American and the Cuban art communities and markets. And Read More...
Vienna's boutique hotel offers view over refugees’ lives
The plight of thousands of people drowning in the Mediterranean in a desperate attempt to find asylum in Europe is currently on everybody’s mind. While the European Union is struggling to find the delicate balance between providing humanitarian aid to populations fleeing hell while not appearing Read More...
US judge briefly extends human rights to chimpanzees
The cause of animal rights may be moving forward. Activists were given a historic victory yesterday when a judge at the New York Supreme Court of Justice briefly decreed that chimpanzees held at Stony Brook University for research purposes are covered by a writ of habeas corpus, effectively Read More...
Pee-power toilet to improve safety for women in disaster areas
Oxfam’s technology challenge to the University of the West of England in Bristol is about to pay off. The global aid agency has been looking for a technology to turn pee into power in order to light toilets and bathrooms in refugee camps and other places, in order to improve safety for women. Read More...
Bald eagle returns to New York City after a 100-year absence
Rebounding wildlife makes for uplifting news, these days, especially when species that were on the verge of extinction are at stake. The most awaited new-born in New York City these days is a bald eagle offspring. The first active nest to be spotted locally in a century is located in Staten Read More...
Holding Dow Chemical accountable to its 2025 Sustainability Goals
It is easily tempting to dismiss corporate sustainability goals out of hand as greenwashing. And with good reason, if history is to teach us anything. The fact is that businesses yield tremendous resources and power to impact our world, for better and for worse. When Dow Chemical spells out Read More...