Name Name
titledescript
Based in Brooklyn, Nightwood is a home decor shop specializing in its own brand of reconstructed furniture and textiles. Owner-designers Myriah Scruggs and Nadia Yaron salvage woods and fabrics and reincarnate them as beautifully rustic, original pieces. Last week, the Nightwood pop-up shop at a downtown Brooklyn condo development. If you're in the area, be sure to swing by. For more......read more
Pentagon way-out research arm DARPA and Predator dronemaker General Atomics are teaming up to turn algae into jet fuel. The Defense Department announced the $20 million deal earlier in the week. The idea is to "demonstrate and ultimately commercialize the affordable production" of an algae-based surrogate for JP-8 jet fuel by 2010. The work is going to be spread all over the country,......read more
If a new scientific report is any indication, tobacco's beaten down public image stands to improve in coming years. Biotech scientists from Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia believe that genetically modified tobacco leaf could be an efficient, non-food crop biofuel, making the golden leaf the latest in the series of possible biofuels being put forth as clean solutions to the......read more
Looks like Scottish scientists have given whiskey lovers another good reason to enjoy a few fingers of scotch. Last week, researchers at Edinburgh Napier University unveiled a new biofuel made from byproducts of the whiskey distillation process. The biofuel, they say, can power regular vehicles without any special engine adaptations. There is a cruel irony associated with most biofuels -- while......read more
How's this for meta? The City of Toronto has launched the first of a fleet of waste collection trucks to be fueled by, well, collected waste. The garbage-eating truck will join Toronto's existing Green Fleet, created as part of a government effort to reduce the city's fuel consumption and protect air quality and health. The newly unveiled vehicle contains a Cummins Westport ISL G......read more
With the failure of the climate bill — and the grim prospects of pushing a new one through anytime soon — it's clear that Congress doesn't view clean energy as a priority. Good thing the military isn't paying attention. In a new NYT op-ed, Thomas Friedman discusses the push to wean the Navy and Marine Corps off of fossil fuels and onto renewable power. Headed by Ray Mabus,......read more
Thomson Airways will begin weekly flights from England to Spain on July 28th. But these flights will not be using any ordinary jet fuel. The planes will be powered by a 50/50 blend of jet fuel and HEFA fuel, which is made from used cooking oil. Thomson managing director Chris Browne said, "As sustainable biofuels become more commercially viable, Thomson Airways plans to expand its use of......read more
Founded by a husband-and-wife team in Los Angeles, Further makes soaps, lotions and candles from locally sourced, depleted vegetable oils that are refined into biofuel. The used oils are collected from restaurants (like Mario Batali's Mozza group) then processed to provide fuel for the Further car fleet and glycerin for their products -- which are stocked in the bathrooms of the......read more
There is something strange and perverse about the fact that a well endowed national defense budget means good things for the environment. It seems like some of the biggest developments in clean tech over the past few years have come from military research labs. In the latest bit of news, the U.S. Navy announced that its research arm has come up with a way to convert seawater into jet fuel. The......read more
Solazyme, the South San Francisco-based biofuel startup, has signed a deal to deliver large quantities of algal oil to Unilever. Under the agreement, announced this week, the Dutch consumer products giant will buy at least 10,000 metric tons (about three million gallons) of Solazyme's renewable, algae-derived oil. The deal represents a major milestone for Solazyme, which was co-founded ten years......read more
