I Just Came Across Molly Costello’s Art, And It’s So Incredibly Solarpunk! It’s So Gorgeous And

Plastic-eating mushrooms are the new superheroes in combating the growing waste crisis

A new report from Kew Gardens suggests that mushrooms can break down plastic in just weeks. Learn about this study and the many environmental benefits of fungi.

~ the pondering muse🌙

I know I’ve written about this a lot in the past month but this article has some new tidbits about mushroom’s beneficial effects on soil remediation. Apparently, not only can mushrooms break down plastics, radioactivity, generate electricity, and a plethora of other things. But it can also remove pesticides, dyes, remnants of explosives in the soil, and act as a stimulant for biofuel conversion! Pretty interesting stuff isn’t it?

Basil, How To Grow More Than You Can Eat - Gardening at 58 North

~~~

Things I learned today #6

You can buy a single basil plant for around $5 or less, and take cuttings forever. Basil is an amazing plant and can be used for a lot of things! Including pesto, which you can make at home with a morter and pestal! (https://youtu.be/6-dOZezSwwM)

For every ‘dystopian/post-apocalyptic story that has people still surviving from scavenging and canned foods and no farms, no mentions of building a community nor an attempt at rebuilding a society 10+ years after THE END’ owe me $5.

I’ve been thinking about places to live, in the desert and in generally hotter climate, and the idea of underground houses seemed like a good one. For now, here is a stairwell leading down to such a house, complete with tiny greenhouse. It has translucent solar panels as glass, which still let the red light through that plants need most.

This startup is turning plastic waste into affordable housing

The company called Eco Domum, or Eco Home, is based in Puebla, Mexico. Founder Carlos Daniel González collects, sorts and melts down non-toxic plastics into a liquid, according to Unreasonable. That sludge is then put into a hydraulic press, which forms the plastic into hardened panels. It takes two tons of plastic to make one house. At scale, González’s plastic houses could be just what Mexico needs.

Follow @the-future-now​

izabella’s greenhouse + her solar panels

when the capitalists die out either thru global warming or revolution will we be able to start homegrown internet

Yacouba Sawadogo is an exceptional man – he single-handedly managed to solve a crisis that many scientists and development organizations could not. The simple old farmer’s re-forestation and soil conservation techniques are so effective they’ve helped turn the tide in the fight against the desertification of the harsh lands in northern Burkina Faso.

Over-farming, over-grazing and over population have, over the years, resulted in heavy soil erosion and drying in this landlocked West African nation. Although national and international researchers tried to fix the grave situation, it really didn’t really make much of a difference. Until Yacouba decided to take matters into his own hands in 1980.

Yacouba’s methods were so odd that his fellow farmers ridiculed him. But when his techniques successfully regenerated the forest, they were forced to sit up and take notice. Yacouba revived an ancient African farming practice called ‘zai’, which led to forest growth and increased soil quality.

(Fact Source) Follow Ultrafacts for more facts

Printed Solar Bio-Batteries

Led by biotechnologist Marin Sawa, a group of researchers at Imperial College London have devised a way to print solar cells onto paper. They use an inkjet printer to place a conductive layer of carbon nanotubes and a layer of living cyanobacteria to create devices which can capture and store solar energy.

In their proof-of-concept experiment, the cyanobacteria survived the printing process and were able to produce energy from photosynthesis. The trial panel was palm sized and gave enough energy to power a small LED light. Even better, being little more than paper, carbon, and bacteria, the bio-cells are fully biodegradable.

The work is part of an emerging field of science called microbial biophotovoltaics (presumably related to the biovoltaics I’ve mentioned here before) which uses algae and cyanobacteria to generate energy. The energy generated may be small, but it’s also cheap and easy to manufacture, and the microbes can continue generating electricity after dark, using compounds made during daylight.

The bio-batteries aren’t intended to replace standard photovoltaics for large scale energy production. Instead, they can provide an inexpensive and renewable source of energy for specific uses, such as air quality monitors and healthcare applications.

“Imagine a paper-based, disposable environmental sensor disguised as wallpaper, which could monitor air quality in the home. When it has done its job it could be removed and left to biodegrade in the garden without any impact on the environment.” – Marin Sawa

Sawa et al (2017) – open access