Environment

Brewery is Also a Power Plant

- Adam Clare

Here at Things Are Good we tend to like beer and we’re always happy to see the brewing process become more environmentally friendly. A smart inventor in the USA has found a way to convert a naturally occurring element of the brewing process and converts it into natural gas!

The brewery is Magic Hat and their motto is “Saving the earth, one beer at a time” – I can’t wait to try their beer.

The MIT-trained mechanical engineer has invented a patented device that turns brewery waste into natural gas that’s used to fuel the brewing process.

The anaerobic methane digester, installed last year at Magic Hat Brewing Co. in Vermont, extracts energy from the spent hops, barley and yeast left over from the brewing process — and it processes the plant’s wastewater. That saves the brewer on waste disposal and natural gas purchasing
The 42-foot tall structure, which cost about $4 million to build, sits in the back parking lot of Magic Hat’s brewery, where it came online last summer.

Fitch, 37, is CEO of PurposeEnergy, Inc., of Waltham, Mass., a renewable energy startup company whose lone product is the biphase orbicular bioreactor, which is 50 feet in diameter, holds 490,000 gallons of slurry and produces 200 cubic feet of biogas per minute.

Brewers big and small have wrestled with waste issues since the dawn of beer-making. In recent years, they’ve turned to recycling — both as a cost-saver and for environmental reasons.

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Thanks Greg!

Sustainable Haircuts

- Adam Clare

Sustainability is great and even local and small business can benefit from shifting the attitude to a more planet-friendly one. In Toronto a hair salon has started a bunch of sustainability practices at the benefits are grand!

Over the last 17 years or so, Phillips has turned the place into something of an eco-hub, reducing the business’s electricity consumption by more than 50 percent and purging their hair and beauty product of what he considers to be environmentally harmful and personally toxic ingredients. A member of the Windshare Cooperative (co-owners of the Exhibition Place Wind Turbine with Toronto Hydro Energy Services) and the Toronto Environmental Alliance, Phillips has earned several awards for his efforts, including most recently, a Green Circle Award for Environmental Stewardship at the Mirror Awards honouring Canadian hairdressers, stylists, salons and spas. In an industry known for excess, glitzy surfaces and throw-away ideas, Phillips has tried to create a green heart at its core.

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5 Easy Ways to Recycle Electronics

- Adam Clare 3 Comments

In the 21st century we tend to use a lot of electronics and to save the planet we should dispose of electronics properly. Lucky for us, LifeHacker has made a list of easy ways to recycle electronics.

Many towns, cities, counties, and states have their own e-cycling programs that offer convenient drop-off locations for old computers, big monitors, and other electronics. The EPA suggests a cluster of search sites for helping you find a local ecycling program, including EcoSquid and the Consumer Electronics Association’s MyGreenElectronics. And beyond the picks you see below, the EPA has a grid list of consumer-friendly e-cycling programs from stores and manufacturers.

Read more at LifeHacker.

Oysters to the Rescue

- Adam Clare

Some people eat them while others use them to make the world a better place. I like using them to clean up pollutants and the like, be warned though oysters are not as plentiful as they were.

Hopefully after this talk you’ll be pro-oyster and spreading the word on how great they are at cleaning the environment! Let’s save the oysters to save our planet.

Architect Kate Orff sees the oyster as an agent of urban change. Bundled into beds and sunk into city rivers, oysters slurp up pollution and make legendarily dirty waters clean — thus driving even more innovation in “oyster-tecture.” Orff shares her vision for an urban landscape that links nature and humanity for mutual benefit.

11 Predictions for Green Buildings in 2011

- Adam Clare

Here is one person’s take on predictions for green buildings in 2011, and I like it. The list is pretty focused on the USA but has relevance throughout the world, check it out to see what types of new and proposed buildings to expect this year.

9. District Scale: Living Blocks
Resource allotment and direct collaboration with the private and public stakeholders will continue to provide opportunities for district scale “living blocks.” Taking a page from our European counterparts, block-scale solutions have enjoyed a large amount of attention in 2010. 2011 should represent the year when these practices get put into action in cities like Portland and Denver. The Living City Block and the Alliance for a Sustainable Colorado are working to advance a model that we be implemented throughout the U.S.

10. Mainstream Green
Green building will learn to move away from an elite culture and adopt the language and practices which will deliver a more accessible industry. The mainstreaming of green building is a tough practice given that you are dealing with topics connected to professions like architecture and engineering where acronyms and obscure scientific terms grow like weeds. As it becomes more and more important to provide relevant products and services to the mainstream user, the industry must consider how it names and markets products and services. A bioswale landscape feature does not naturally engage the community it is located in until the public starts to think of it as a beautiful “rain garden” in the neighborhood. Positioning our technology, products, and services in a way that engages the people, business communities and municipalities that they serve will decide who stays in a market that is quickly filling up with competition.

Read the complete list here.

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