The Sustainable Cities Blog

Posted by Michael Brady, contributing writer

Solar Ivy, courtesy of inhabita

"Solar Ivy (or SMIT Grow) is a spectacular system of thin, fluttering solar panels that generate energy by sparkling in the sunlight. The wind and solar power generating photovoltaic leaves can be easily integrated on the side of a building to produce energy. The concept, designed by Brooklyn based SMIT (Sustainably Minded Interactive Technology), consists of a layer of thin-film material on top of polyethylene with a piezoelectric generator attached to each leaf. When the sun is shining or the wind is blowing, energy is being generated via Solar Ivy.”

Read the the rest of the inhabitat blog here

Posted by Thor Ritz, Contributing Writer

Photo by Lucas Foglia, courtesy of New York Magazine

New York Magazine's Summer Guide is featuring a great piece on a successful rooftop farming venture in Greenpoint:

Rooftop Farms got started in December 2008, with Chris and Lisa Goode, who run Goode Green, a green-roof business, with their partner, Amy Trachtman. They approached Gina Argento, who owns several Greenpoint warehouses, with the idea of farming her rooftops. In the meantime, the Goodes had met Ben Flanner, a former E*Trade marketer turned would-be farmer, who’d heard of Goode Green and was keen on starting an urban-farm business; Flanner brought in Annie Novak, who works at the New York Botanical Garden, for her hands-on planting expertise.

After a building engineer signed off on the weight-bearing limit this past March, the Goodes hauled over 200,000 pounds of soil up to the roof. “It’s a special rooftop mix,” explains Flanner, with compost already mixed in. “An expanded shale is 50 percent of the volume. Feel how light that is.” The roof has sixteen four-foot-wide beds irrigated by rain (a particular boon to the city, Goode points out, since it takes stress off New York’s overtaxed sewer system

Check out the full article here.

Posted by Michael Brady, contributing writer

 The ruins of Palenque.

"Hal Whitehead of Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and Pete Richerson of the University of California, Davis, believe excessive conformity can prevent the adaptability and innovation needed to survive during periods of rapid environmental change. In fact, they think conformity may have contributed to the demise of the Mayan civilization in southern Mexico on the eighth and ninth centuries, and the Norse settlements in Greenland 1,000 years ago.”

Read the full Plexus Institute blog here

Posted by Thor Ritz, Contributing Writer

This weekend I trekked up to Bushwick to check out the nieghborhood's newest fixture: The Putting Lot.  This nine-holed interactive installation has garnered considerable attention in the local art media, and rightfully so.  In addition to making brilliant use of a previously abandoned space, the course is made almost entirely from recycled materials.

Some of the holes are better appreciated for their aesthetic qualities than their playability (Hole #7 looks fascinating but good luck sending your ball through it in fewer than 6 strokes!), but the course as a whole is loads of fun to play across. I especially liked the ramps and water hazards of Hole #3 (the blue and purple amoeba seen toward the bottom of the above image).

If you still aren't interested enough to pay The Putting Lot a visit (or if you won't be passing through NYC this summer) check out this quick little video of the installation process:

The Putting Lot from Lakshmi Sundaram on Vimeo.

Posted by Michael Brady, contributing writer

The House is expected to vote on the American Clean Energy and Security Act either today or tomorrow. The grist provides an informative summary of where The House appears to stand on the issue currently.

Regular citizens can help pass the bill by following former Vice President Al Gore's easy instructions here.