Commuting in a car here in the United States just plain sucks. Not only does it suck the fun out of your waking hours, it sucks the good air right out of the atmosphere (or releases bad air… whatever, semantics, and that doesn’t work as well for my lead).
Matra Manufacturing and Services may have an answer to your Commuter Sucking Blues. (Which is far different than the Toe Sucking Blues). Matra MS, formerly a motor sports design leader with their hands in Formula 1 and Le Mans, has come out with a line of Light Electric Vehicles consisting of high-performance electric bicycles and quadricyles, available in Europe this spring for around $5,000 USD.
We should all be so practical as the Citroën C-Cactus. We should all look upon ourselves with such a discerning eye.
We should all cut out those things we don’t really need. This new ecological car, equipped with a diesel hybrid drivetrain, has gotten rid of all the parts that don’t contribute to the running, safety or comfort of the automobile parts like the dashboard, among other things. Why? Because who really needs a dashboard? I don’t. I need some of the stuff on it, but I can do without the board itself. And so can you. Or at least that’s what Citroën is betting on.
In order to “trim the fat,” Citroën’s engineers have grouped several functions into single parts. Instead of a dashboard, all the important buttons you used to find there, including the onboard computer, are now attached to the steering wheel and the central console. And believe me, ditching your dashboard doesn’t mean you have to go skimpy on style. ‘Cause really, how stylish is the most stylish of dashboards? Not nearly as stylish as the sleek and cool Citroën C-Cactus.
America and the world are finally waking up to the massive trashing of the oceans. About a year ago, we posted our first story on the problem and since that time, it has been picked up everywhere. First on Oprah and now on Good Morning America. Lets hope all this exposure will mean something. We know we can see the actual surge of traffic to gliving.com, as the shows are seen in each new country.
Good Morning America:The world’s largest trash dump doesn’t sit on some barren field outside an urban center. It resides thousands of miles from any land in the Pacific Ocean.
Bottle caps, soap bottles, laundry baskets and shards of plastic are just a few things that float in the ocean’s vastness. Known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, the “dump” is composed mainly of plastic, which isn’t biodegradable.
Instead, the plastic breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces in the patch that extends thousands of miles, from California’s coast to China. Charles Moore, who discovered the trash heap by accident in 1997 when he was sailing the Pacific, collects samples of the growing garbage bin. Some of his samples have contained six times more plastic than plankton.
“It is like a minestrone and … a lot of the vegetables are plastic,” said Moore, who stages regular trips to the garbage patch for research.
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch stretches from the coast of California to Japan, and it’s estimated to be twice the size of Texas. “This is the most shocking thing I have seen,” Oprah says. Where did this trash come from? Marine biologists estimate that about 80 percent of the litter is from land, either dumped directly into waterways or blown into rivers and streams from states as far away as Iowa.
Like his grandfather, undersea explorer Jacques Cousteau, Fabien Cousteau has devoted his life to exploring and protecting the world’s oceans and sea life.
Many of those affected by the enormous garbage swirl—like sea birds, turtles and beluga whales—can’t speak for themselves. “They get caught in these nets, or they swallow some of these bottle caps,” Fabien says. “Killer whales, which are kind of our mirror, our canary in the coal mine, so to speak, are ingesting all sorts of things that are affecting their health.”
“For the endless joy of mobility on our earth”. Sounds like the gift of a god or something, right? Like, the great hero Honda, having outrun the titan Lexus, hath brought the joy of mobility back to his people of Oildepentia, thus restoring to the world the great boon of the Sun God, Alternativus Energus Maximus.
Well, it’s not that. It’s the theme of the booth sponsored by Honda at the 40th Tokyo Motor Show, held last month in Japan. At the show, Honda unveiled two concept cars onto the world’s automotive stage. The first was the Honda CR-Z, which is basically a hybrid replacement for the widely popular but sadly defunct CRX, the second was the new fuel cell vehicle Puyo.
Both models, as fits their theme, are fun to drive and “G” friendly.
Here’s something you may not know about plastic: every piece of it ever produced, since it came on the scene in the 1950s, is still with us today. And it isn’t going anywhere.
Plastic is a non-biodegradable substance. No organisms, no bio-engineered bacteria are coming to the rescue to break down the molecular make-up of any of the plastic we create. It’s here to stay. And a great deal of it is floating around a Texas-sized whirlpool called the Northern Pacific Gyre, which has become infamously known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
A research vessel called the ORV Alguita, led by Captain Charles Moore, has been analyzing this gyre. Their latest research, which concluded in late February, entailed using what they call a Manta Trawler. The trawler is basically a fine net with a tail to make it look like a manta ray, with which they trawl across the gyre and collect samples. The samples are then analyzed to discover how the plastic accumulation is disrupting the ecosystem.
According to leading scientists, our world has made minced meat of most of its former tenants. Fossil records indicate mass catastrophic climate change has occurred on Earth five previous times throughout her many revolving days of existence. Climate change that looks a lot like the end of the world. Or at least the end of our world.
Now, some scientists are predicting we are moving aggressively towards Climatic Revolution Number Six. (And no, it’s not on the Beatles White Album.)
That’s right. We’re not just gonna die. We’re going to be consumed. Burned up. Used as fuel for the great space machine.
Relax; it’s not the end of the world. The world will go on turning. It’s the tenants who get forcibly evicted. Extinction style.
Is it just me or when you hear the words “Three Mile Island” you think of a nuclear disaster? Though that label may be technically correct, the truth is not one person died at Three Mile Island. Not one person was even injured.
I may have only been 5, but I am usually a somewhat more astute historian, as I thought Three Mile Island was some sort of nuclear holocaust. I thought there were at least some people who melted. To say that someone’s publicity team didn’t do a very good job of spinning that story is perhaps an understatement. If I’m your average consumer, and you add Chernobyl into the marketing mix, you’ve got yourself one very wary nuclear public. Continue Reading / See Additional Photos
Just incase you missed the massive in-depth up to the second coverage of the G8, we thought we would do a recap. Yes, we know it happened in July, but it seems like no one really noticed, so here it is again.
I suppose we have to look at this year’s G8 summit as somewhat of a success. However porous the language may be, however ineffectual cutting current emissions levels 50% by 2050 ultimately will be, and even though that figure could not be agreed upon by the emerging economies of the world, at least it’s a step in the right direction. At least we have the dirty little secret about carbon polluting out into the worldwide open. Right? Continue Reading / See Additional Photos
Volvo’s latest-greatest environmentally safest green machine is the C30 Efficiency Diesel hatchback. And guess what? It’s aptly named. To the tune of 52.26 miles per gallon kind of efficient. We’re talking hybrid-efficient. Like the opposite of the DMV kind of efficient.
What makes the Efficient so efficient is that they’re really not doing anything new. Volvo is merely squeezing every bit of energy out of what they’ve got, with a few modifications. They tweaked the engine by using low-friction transmission oil and better engine management software, used higher gearing on the 3rd, 4th and 5th gears, switched to low rolling resistance tires with aero-optimized rims, shaved some inches here and added some smoother ones there. And voila! 52.26 miles per gallon with a regular old diesel engine. And you still get that safe feeling only a Volvo or a blankie can give.
G / Design It’s amazing how easy it is to now go completely leather free, with amazing leather like fabrics by Joseph Noble. They make a range of fabrics with feel better than leather and last longer
G / Food The Ultimate Sausage and Pepper Pizza – RAW It’s Rawfully Tempting!
G / Food Chocolate Fruit and Almond Bark – D E C A D E N T and H E A L T H Y! Sooo Rawfully Tempting!
G / Food The edible cups are made entirely out of agar agar (a gelatin substitute).
G / Design a solar-powered collapsible lamp lights up when unfolded.
G / Food The Ultimate Sausage & Pepper Pizza by Rawfully Tempting
G / Food Creamy Mocha Mousse Cake
G / Video A visual poem by Tanya Davis. How To Be Alone
G / Food Killer Chocolate Fudge Mousse & Banana Parfait.
This is one DECADENT dessert and not for the feint of heart.
G / Style Well, this o so stylish hat called Double Crown O’Thorns, is definitely a bold look, especially if you wear the entire black head to toe suggestive accompanying outfit.
