Archive for the 'Environment' Category

Natalie Jeremijenko’s Feral Robot Dog project – which just about everyone at Vestal worked on except me – continues to be a popular item in the design world. Currently on display at New York’s Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum, the dogs are hacked toy robots used to gather information on toxic substances in a media-friendly way. Also, they are really cute.

Look over our portfolio page, then go support the only Smithsonian museum focused on design! It’s the National Design Triennial – if you miss it now, you’ll have to wait until 2009.

Link to Vestal Portfolio

Link to Current Exhibitions at Cooper-Hewett.

Popularity: 11% [?]

Even as the price of a gallon of gasoline reaches a national average of $3.11, few summer travelers plan on adjusting their trips because of the cost at the pump. AAA is predicting 32 million Americans will hit the road for Memorial Day – an increase of 1.7% from 2006 – despite gasoline being 16% more expensive than a year ago.

If crude prices have fallen in recent weeks – as they have – then why is gas so expensive? Why aren’t there riots in the streets about this? Well, simply, people have accepted the slow unstoppable creep of gasoline prices as inevitable and are finding other ways to save money, from lower-end hotels to cheaper meals.

Environmentalists have a long-held belief that if gasoline were suddenly three (or six or ten) dollars a gallon, American consumers would rise up in some sort of transit rebellion. The truth is, people hate paying at the pump but see few other options to Big Oil. Until most Americans have access to alternatives, they face little choice.

A good first step, perhaps, is to divert the many, many taxes on gasoline from road maintenance to public transportation. The longer we continue to invest in a flawed system, the longer we will have to accept muttering under our breath at the pump.

Link via CNNMoney

Popularity: 7% [?]

I came across this interesting BBC article on the current fragility of Rome’s ancient monuments. While the article’s main focus is on how many of the monuments do not have the funds to sufficiently be repaired, it also had this interesting by-line:

One of the big problems is global warming. The climate is changing. From time to time the city is deluged with water from freak rainstorms. Water that seeps into the caverns further erodes the foundations of the [Palatine] hill. [Vestal Note- Ironically, a large part of downtown Rome was originally marshes before the Romans built a massive sewer system to drain the area]

The article fails to mention that the cause of global warming, pollution, has also been slowly eroding the monuments over the past century, turning many columns from white to a charcoal black. Due to a city-wide facelift for the Jubilee celebrations in 2000, most of the facades across the city are again a pristine white, but these cleaning techniques are sometimes as harmful as the pollution itself. However, if you need to remind yourself of the harm global warming is doing not just to our future, but also to our past, drop by the Palazzo dei Conservatori in Rome. Inside you’ll find the original famous Marcus Aurelius statue (pictured above),which was the centerpiece of Michaelangelo’s design of the Campidoglio. However, over the past century, the statue became so corroded by acid rain, it had to be moved indoors.

Link to BBC Article

Popularity: 7% [?]

Somewhere between a happening and fan fiction, World Without Oil is an alternate reality ‘game’ where users simulate living online during a global petroleum price shock. ‘Players’ produce movies, blog posts, and other media about the (fictional) world they live in with the goal of producing some sort of “larger truth” about how individuals could adapt to a frightening new world.

It’s hard to say whether the ‘game’ contrivance makes World Without Oil more or less effective in planning for an oil-less society down the road. Do people really need such a heavy-handed framework to rally around environmental issues or is it just easier to understand? Does framing something as a game, as fictional, make the reality of the problem seem less important?

World Without Oil raises many questions, both about its form and its function. Give them credit for being bold and different; two qualities we will all need as the planet moves forward.

Link to World Without Oil

Popularity: 7% [?]

As part of the 50th San Francisco International Film Festival, the GreenWorld contest challenges filmmakers to make a meaningful statement about the future of the environment in under two minutes. A daunting enough challenge in itself, each movie also had to withstand public scrutiny online as part of the “audience voting” section of the contest to determine the finalists.

Some of the movies are a little didactic; I suppose that’s sort of the point. I liked how surreal some of them were, adding a bit of the bizarre into what could easily turn into an Al Gore PowerPoint lecture.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Keep on biodiesel truckin’ Al.

Link to contest at Jumpcut

Popularity: 6% [?]

Circle the date: on May 20, enviro/architecture blog (and Vestal client) Inhabitat is having a “star-studded” panel discussion on the subject of recycling and reclamation in design as part of New York Design Week.

Featuring three eco-conscious designers and the editor-in-chief of Dwell magazine, the event will take place at the HauteGreen exhibition near Union Square. Inhabitat’s own Jill Fehrenbacher and Emily Pilloton will moderate.

Link via Inhabitat

Popularity: 7% [?]

Every day it becomes more apparent that Steve Jobs is simply not a man to rest on his laurels, as the famously active head of Apple Inc. unveils the newest idea that will – undoubtedly – change the world forever. His latest thought concerns the very nature of his products, the often toxic substances that go into them, and how he can make it all better.

Responding to criticism that Apple’s electronics contain massive amounts of various terrible chemicals (lead, cadmium, decabromodiphenyl ether) Steve Jobs goes through each complaint, giving his side of the story and outlining the steps Apple has taken to eliminate, or at least reduce, the toxicity of its products.

While carbon emissions are another matter, it’s hard to argue with reducing the amount of arsenic or mercury in the typical computer. Hopefully the rest of the industry, like usual, will follow his lead.

Link to Apple.com

Popularity: 7% [?]

So this is how it will end: not with a bang, but with a lack of buzzing. America’s honeybees are dying off in record numbers, with almost a quarter of the domestic hives falling victim to the mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder, and no one can say why. The Disorder causes entire hives to simply disappear, leaving only queens and larvae to die.

Bees are responsible for pollinating almost a third of all consumable plants, both by man and livestock, and a total collapse of the bee industry would severely limit America’s ability to feed itself. The USDA, part of a multinational group fighting the disorder, has gone so far as to declare CCD “the biggest general threat to our food supply.”

While American hives have fought die-offs before, the scale of this latest disease reminds us how tenuous our modern environment actually is. In this complicated world, the humble honeybee can be more important than all the latest technological advances put together.

Link via CNN

Popularity: 4% [?]

Web hosting company DreamHost, employee-owned and fun-loving, went carbon neutral last week, bringing over 400,000 domains with it into a new, greener world. Good for them! Every business, from the corner store to the virtual economy, can participate in reducing CO2 emissions, recycling waste, and just generally making the planet a better place.

Now, there have been more than a few discussions here about carbon offsets, whether they do anything but make us feel self-satisfied. DreamHost’s blog, after announcing their change, became another battleground, as dozens of users argued about the existence of global climate change and the efficacy of carbon neutrality. Responses were surprisingly negative, but such is the Internet.

My favorite quote: “Free market economy FTW! ”

Link to DreamHost Blog

Popularity: 5% [?]

Vestal’s own Mike Lin is featured today on Worldchanging with a very thoughtful and forceful argument for designers to change their ways before it’s too late. In short: sustainability is dead, so it’s time for a totally new way to look at the way we live.

Heavy stuff. Remember, design is a method of action. Keep on thinking, Mr. Lin

Link to Worldchanging

Popularity: 5% [?]