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Pepsi Goes Greener, Takes UK Factories Off Water Grid

As the world turns to alternative fuels and renewable energy technologies, big corporations seem to be getting greener quarter after quarter. So, it’s no shock to learn that PepsiCo has been quietly working at their own green goals in part by reducing their water usage by 45% between 2000 and 2008. In fact, PepsiCo plans to take their UK chip factories completely off the water grid by harvesting water from their own potatoes.

The potatoes the company uses now are about 80% water and PepsiCo uses close to 350,000 tons of potatoes every year. In addition to harvesting the water from their potatoes, the company has been testing a new irrigation device that measures the moisture in the soil and compares that to the weather forcast to conserve water usage during growing. Finally, PepsiCo will be moving to new varieties of potatoes that require less water.

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Toyota Announces $50 Million Investment in Tesla

Well, it looks like Toyota and Tesla have just teamed up to bring in the future of electric cars. After making a $50 million investment in Tesla, the joint company will use an auto-assembly line they’ve purchased in California to pump out the vehicles.

The collaboration will include the production of the vehicles, parts, and engineering support. The news of the partnership was leaked by Governor Schwarzeneggar while he was visiting Google’s headquarters. Tesla had originally been in talks to take over an old NASA manufacturing facility. Check out more on the story over at Tree Hugger.

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last update: May 17, 2012

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University Saves Ink by Switching Fonts

In the future, we’ll just bump our documents to each others’ personal data devices, but for now we still use printers to send memos, for direct mail campaigns, and for turning in school papers. This results in a couple of problems financially and environmentally. For one, printer ink is expensive, often times costing as much or more than the printer itself. Then there’s the wasteful use of paper which of course leads to the depletion of natural resources through production and of course, deforestation.

Well now, the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay has discovered some simple font changes that can lead to a drastic reduction in ink consumption.

The university found that switching from the most commonly used Arial to Century Gothic would reduce ink use by roughly 30 percent. With printer ink costs at around $10,000 per gallon for black ink, that 30% can really add up, especially for the University of Wisconsin which made the switch for their email system and expect to save anywhere between $5,000 to $10,000 per year from that simple change alone.

But what if you really love Arial? Well, no fear, if you’re an Arial junkie but want to do your part to save the environment, ecofont may be the solution for you. Ecofont.com says their software ” ‘shoots’ holes into the letters that you have typed!” They also claim that their version of Arial can save users about 25% by reducing ink demands.



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Bicycle Sharing in Denver with B-Share

How great would it be if you could grab a bike for the day, ride around town and then just simply return the bike? A new service by B-Share is exactly that. Best part is you’ll be reducing the amount of time spent driving and as a result lowering your own carbon footprint in the process.

The Denver based company just launched this past Earth Day, April 22nd, with 40 B-Share kiosks spread out around the Denver metro area. They plan to have 50 installed by the end of June and will then continue their expansion in other cities throughout the nation (vote for your city here).

The program is very simple:
Sign-in: Sign up online or purchase a 24-hour membership at a B-station
Select: Choose a bike from any B-station
Ride: Grab your bike and go
Return: Park your B-cycle at any B-station

You can pick up and return your B-cycle at any of the various locations. Users can sign up for 7-day ($20), 30-day ($30) or annual memberships ($65) online. Users can also purchase a $5 24-hour membership at the B-cycle station with a credit card. They offer discounts for students and seniors as well.

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Verizon Plans To Lower Its Carbon Footprint

Hello Earth? Can you hear me now? Verizon Wireless has taken it upon themselves to lower the impact they have on the environment. They have put together a whole host of energy saving initiatives and recycling guidelines in their recent sustainability program, all in an effort to lower the companies global carbon footprint.

They have already reduced CO2 emissions by more than 793 million pounds, and improved their rate of emissions per million dollars in revenue to 60.2 metric tons of CO2 in 2009, from 64.4 metric tons in 2008. By conducting virtual meetings they have already saved 91 million kilowatt hours and prevented more than 114 million pounds of CO2 from unneeded travel. By reducing engine idling they have saved 1.7 million gallons of fuel in 2009 alone.

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Sustainable Plastic Made From Algae

To most people, algae is just green nastiness that shows up in damp or warm places, but increasingly, algae is being used to create sustainable solutions for energy and now, plastics. With so much focus on environmentally friendly products (solar powered devices, hybrid automobiles, etc.) it is easy to see how plastics derived from algae can really take our green revolution to the next level.

The same thing happened with paper products not too long ago when demand for recycled goods rose. Using recycled paper in packaging and shipping became a no-brainer. Well, imagine buying a hybrid car that isn’t just good for the environment when it comes to fuel efficiency, but also when it comes to construction…

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GE Introduces New Energy Smart LED Bulb

Expected to be available later 2010 or early 2011 is a new Energy Smart LED light bulb from General Electric. They claim that the new light bulb will be 77% more energy efficient yet put out the same light output as a regular 40W incandescent bulb, all while lasting up to 25 times as long (an estimated 25,000 hours).

Current LED light bulbs produce around 350 lumens or less or light whereas the new bulbs will not only consume less but also produce upwards of 450 lumens. The company has filed multiple patents and hopes it will meet the Energy Star qualified LED omnidirectional light bulb requirements. As an added bonus they contain no mercury and will be RoHS compliant

John Strainic, global product general manager of GE Lighting, said: ”This is a bulb that can virtually light your kid’s bedroom desk lamp from birth through high school graduation. Consumers have been reluctant to move away from less efficient incandescent bulbs because they love the light quality. This new GE Energy Smart LED bulb will address that lighting preference head-on and give consumers yet another option to light their homes and businesses.”

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Clean Technologies That Will Change The World

Recently the Mother Nature Network put together an very nice list of clean tech innovations that could change the world. From nanotube power brought to you by the minds at MIT that could provide the same energy output as a lithium-ion battery but at 1/100th the size to vertical farming from companies like Valcent that produces near prefect crops all in less area and using less water.

Check out the entire post here but other innovations include:

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