New Look!

We have a new site design!

This new design is to help people read the content that they are most interested in. Some highlights:

Two new categories Transportation and Body & Mind
RSS feeds for each individual category

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Harder Bio-Plastics

When I was a kid, I used to make believe that Christmas was everyday. Going to the mall was especially joyfull since the majority of wares come pre-packaged. It didn’t take much imagination for me to believe I was in Santa’s factory surrounded by strangly wrapped Christmas presents. Now I’m grown up and I realize packaging is not a fun 1/4 second between me and a new toy, but a terrible waste that costs the Earth, especially when it comes to fast food containers and plastic bags.

Alternatives currently exist to plastic bags, but what about packaging? The company NatureWorks has developed a hard plastic made from corn thats suitable for many common packaging applications. Bio-plastics degrade by industrial processes and are ideally suited to large events where collection is assured. Perphaps future versions can be suitable for your backyard composter. The kid side of me is just hoping I can get my Christmas gifts in Organically grown, locally producted plastic packaging so I wont have to feel guilty when I grow up.

Too True

Good science cannot long persist in an atmosphere of intimidation. Political figures ought to be reviewing their public statements to make sure they are consistent with the best available science; scientists should not be reviewing their statements to make sure they are consistent with the current political orthodoxy. – House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY)

WHO Paves Way for Medicines for the Poor

The World Health Organization is actually going to try to make drugs more affordable for the majority of the world.

“The resolution approved by the Assembly, the supreme decision-making body of the World Health Organisation (WHO), urges the 192 member states to make the manufacturing of pharmaceuticals a strategic sector, thus committing themselves to making R&D of medicines consistent with public interest needs a priority.

This was the response of health ministers at last week’s meeting in Geneva to the concerns of developing countries and humanitarian non-governmental organisations, which criticised the tendency of transnational pharmaceutical companies to concentrate their R&D efforts on diseases prevalent in affluent countries. “