Now everyone’s building robots from cartoon shows using recycled stuff. The last time we heard of one, it happened to be a 32-foot Transformer made from a scrapped truck who probably might busy be fighting of the Decepticons by now. This time around, it’s not all that tall, though absolutely unique and creative, a 10-foot tall Gundam robot made from runners. If you haven’t heard of runners before, these are those pieces of plastic that hold all the parts of your little Gundam together before you build them. This RX-78-2 Gundam isn’t full scale and certainly won’t walk around, though the effort and thought put into it is indeed impressive. The maker probably didn’t want to see his Gundam packaging go waste, so he just collected it all and came up with this marvelous piece. Taking around 250 man-hours of work, this recycled Gundam sure brings a smile on our faces!

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Vehicles that run o electricity do not have to be necessarily slow. They do have their adrenaline rushes too that make them go “zoom!” Take the battery powered vehicle a team from Ohio State University's Center for Auto Research brought to the Bonneville Salt Flats this week for example. The man at the wheel, Roger Schroer shot this vehicle through a previously set record of 245.5mph in an electric car by reaching speeds of up to 320mph. instead of the previous fuel-cell version that ran on hydrogen and reached speeds of 303mph, the new vehicle with a little aide from battery maker Venturi and A123 Systems lithium-ion batteries now goes a lot faster. The Buckeye Bullet 3 as it has been lovingly christened after the previous Buckeye Bullet 2; the vehicle is pulling up its sleeves and reading itself to break a whole load of more records.

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And then there are those times when we need to heed natures call, and a decent place to do so isn’t really in sight. So, we could probably use the Poosh, or maybe even the X-Runner by designer Noa Lerner. If you still haven’t realized what we’re talking about, get a hold of this… a mobile toilet! No running water? No problem! All you need is this barrel like contraption, into which you do your business and the trade it all in for some energy, which could be anything from cooking gas, warm showers or electricity. The barrel is nano-coated and can be used for an entire week without you needing to empty it. And no, a weeks poop isn’t going to stink like there’s no tomorrow.

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Oil rich countries in the Gulf currently haven’t paid much heed to the need for electric car use. Taken that oil resources there aren’t as scarce as countries around the globe, the Gulf countries haven’t felt the pinch yet. But then again, they could be a great place to market electric cars too, if the governments decide to help, thinks Nissan. The company currently is all set to bring out its electricity powered Leaf. A need for initial assistance in preliminary stages of the car’s release by the government is required however, not just in Gulf countries but just about everywhere. In countries like the United States, Japan and a few European countries, governments have supported the electric car market, which is why the cars will be successful over there.

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In far flung villages where power lines have never been heard of, electricity is an alien concept that the people there yet haven’t had the pleasure to use. And so, they use fuels like kerosene in small quantities to satisfy their daily energy needs. That’s where the e.quinox concept comes into play. This system by James Dyson is somewhat of a virtual grid. Battery Boxes developed work as energy carriers, by which people can access electricity. The 5Ah gel-based lead acid battery can power up LED lamps for up to 25-30 hours while people can also connect their cell phones, radios and other small devices. Once depleted, users can connect the drained out Battery Boxes to the Energy Kiosk where they are left to charge using solar panels, and pick up a fully charged one for a continued use.

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A catalyst is all it takes to boost oxygen production in fuel cells and will help us customize renewable energy power plants in future. Daniel Nocera, a scientist along with a bunch of his colleagues, hopes that each home will be a power station in itself, hence decreasing and completely abolishing the dependency on power stations in future. He hopes that these personalized systems will help power up homes, help with energy for heating, cooking, lighting and charging an electric car when hooked up to roof-based solar panels. Excess energy generated from the solar panels will then be diverted to electrolysers which in turn will break down water into oxygen and hydrogen, sending it to fuel cells to produce enough renewable energy for use at night. That’s where the catalyst comes to play, giving impetus to process of conversion of water to energy.

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Kristen Rule will soon be spreading her music around, on a pair of wheels and with a little help from the sun. The last time The Unconventional Cellist hit the road was on a 20 week music tour, when she hopped on a motorcycle with a solar trailer, all ready to play with her cello. This time though, with the release of her new album, this cellist will use a bicycle instead on tour. The bicycle will be powered by a solar powered electric assist trailer. The Mechanarchy Watt-Bot trailer packs a 30 watt solar photovoltaic panel along with two 12 volt batteries. The power generated by this system can help assist the bike and its rider for up to three long hours.

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All right, here’s something we seriously never thought of before and think it to be just great and innovative indeed. We’ve seen solar panels adorn the roofs of buildings around urban areas before, basking in the sun and powering up our lives. Well, how about having them integrated in our roads too! After all, roads are exposed to just as much sunlight as the roofs of our homes. Asphalt sure will be kicked out on its butt if this technology is realized in future and photovoltaics end up in roads. The US Federal Highways Administration currently is funding a research being done by electrical engineer Scott Brusaw who is figuring out ways to toughen up PV cells and use them in roads.

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Answering natures call isn’t that easy for people around the globe as it is for us. Not everyone in the world has a proper access to acceptable levels of sanitation. At times, in extreme poverty and far flung areas, people simply use the ground for reasons similar. So, designers YoonHee Kim, Hannie Yu, Eunjung Choi, Mark Whiting, and Prof. Sangmin Bae have come to their aide with this innovative solution to sanitation. The toilet seat, known as the Poosh is basically a portable toilet. The Poosh is a bucket mounted toilet and works great with low smell, and an easy to use toilet seat that fits most bucket sizes. When in use, it opens automatically and closes when you;re done. This helps reduce all that nasty smell and health risks too.

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Now rainwater harvesting seems to be a pretty good and green idea. But using a table to do the same seems just as out-worldly as fitting on solar panels and a wind turbine to your picnic table and bench. Simon Davies came up with this idea to design an outdoor table that’s capable of rainwater harvesting. Taken that you’d use this one in your garden, it makes perfect sense, with the table harvesting the rainwater and storing it for later gardening uses. The table is made from mixed polymers and the top surface channels the water. You can detach the table top from the lower tank too. And when needed, the water flows out from a tap at the bottom of the table.

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Charging up EVs quickly and swiftly is the need of the day, if people are to be expected to switch to electricity instead of gasoline anytime soon. Usually, electric vehicles take hours to charge up to their full capacity, instead of just the few minutes it takes to fill up a gasoline tank. Well, the largest taxi company in the city of Tokyo have come up with an innovative way to charge up an EV in just 59 seconds, and this sure has left everyone scratching their chins and wondering why they never thought of it before. The taxi company simply swaps a drained out battery for a replenished one! This could be the world’s largest AA battery, and could work best with fleet cars.

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The sunshine will be basked in the most in the Salt Lake City, Utah, at least when it comes to solar panels. And that’s because the city is to have the country’s largest rooftop solar array soon. The Salt Palace will play home to this 600,000-square-foot, 2.6 megawatt array soon. To be finished next year, this solar array will power up almost a quarter of the electricity needs of the Salt Palace. Costing $10 million, the system will be built by Bella Energy and will be owned by NexGen. Power will be sold from this system to the country by NexGen for the next 20 years at a predetermined rate.

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Ever wondered where all that waste food from your airplane and the airport lands up? Mostly landfills, though waste food from the Heathrow airport will now serve a much better purpose. Waste like coffee grinds, potato peelings, egg shells and chicken bones that usually are thrown away from kitchens that prepare and serve food to around 180,000 passengers at Heathrow everyday, collected from all the cafés and restaurants out there. All this will then be bundled up and sent to a recycling factory of Vertal in Mitcham, South London. After a 72 hour grueling process, all this waste is converted into a nutrient-rich fertilizer that will then be used on local farms.

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At first sight, you’d probably think this one came straight out of a Middle Eastern palace belonging to some century old Emperor. Think again. It barely ever found its place in a palace before. Instead, these marquetry boxes were made from old circuit boards. Designer Theo Kamecke based in New York came up with some of these jaw dropping beautiful pieces of art that under normal circumstances would usually be made using contrasting strips of fine wood veneer for the design. Instead of using wood, Theo used the circuit board’s metal to create patterns. Symmetrically designed, these boxes are a much better way to recycle circuit boards, preventing them from meeting their doom in landfills.

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The clothes we wear today and pull of racks while shopping will be very unlike the ones we have in future. Future clothing will be as green as ever and recyclable too! Take Cintas’ new recyclable uniforms. These are made out of recycled plastic bottles and eco-charcoal, derivatives of coconut shells and nano-bamboo particles. The clothes once used, can be sent back for recycling. Known as the Eco Polo, these unisex shirts are certified to bluesign standards and half its recycled polyester is made from the plastic bottles while the other half from eco-charcoal. The shirts dry quickly, need no ironing, are mildew-proof and can bare heat too.

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