Smart Cup A french press system makes a good cup of coffee. According to the Smart Cup people, it “places coffee grounds in direct contact with hot water and that offers a larger surface area for extraction. They are then pressed with mesh, not filtered with paper. Coffee brewed with a French Press captures more of the coffee’s subtle flavors and essential oils.” And now, you can have the convenience of taking the cup, lid, plunger and mesh screen and throwing the whole thing away after a single use. That’s progress!… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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What a Waste: Now You Can Throw Your Coffeemaker Out With Your Cup

Image: FiberCell These Organic Cells Could Theoretically Surpass 15% Efficiency Organic solar cells are promising, but up to now, their low efficiency (sub-10%) has meant that they are not quite cost-effective in most applications. But this might change thanks to a breakthrough by FiberCell, a spinoff company that was created by Wake Forest University researchers. How did they make organic solar cells more efficient? They figured out how to have the cells capture more light by stamping optical fibers onto the polymer substrate that forms the foundation of the cell. These fibers, which they call ‘light pipe… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Breakthrough: ‘Light Pipes’ Increase the Performance of Organic Solar Cells by More than 100%

Image: Chip.de In the interest of minimizing e-waste, it is important that potential customers understand the limitations as well as the advantages of new electronic gadgets. And since the Apple iPad is being welcomed with open arms as the go-anywhere companion for all e-purposes, it naturally struck us as interesting to learn that the iPad failed German electronics consumer review mag Chip ‘s beer garden test. Beer garden test?… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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iPad Fails Beer Garden Test

Image via Fujitsu Electronic paper, or e-paper, is the technology behind devices like the Kindle, which can display information electronically while looking to the eye like paper. It uses less electricity, since it only needs power when the display changes, and it is easier on the eyes since it doesn’t use backlighting. We were excited about the advancements in color e-paper technology for e-readers as they moved i… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Fujitsu Offers Faster, More Colorful E-paper – Too Little Too Late for Gadgeteers?

Image credit: Autoblog Green We already know that maintaining proper tire pressure means better gas mileage , and while some may have scoffed, I much preferred Obama’s enthusiasm for tire gauges than his ridiculously ill-timed expansion of offshore drilli… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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"Talking Tires" By 2013?

Darvaz: The Door to Hell, a drilling project gone wrong – collapsed natural gas dome burning 35 years in Uzbekistan. Image credit: English Russia blog People have a hard time accepting the fact that oil and gas deep in the earth is of biotic origin: pressure-stored plant material from the Carboniferous. So much so that there are crackpot alternate theories about extraterrestrial origin. And, of course, there’s always ‘ God put it there for us .’ (Too scary for them, perhaps, to accept a constantly-changing planet, of colliding plates floating ov… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Has British Petroleum Opened Another Door To Carboniferous Hell?

For the people of Uganda, living on $2 a day is a reality. Purchasing a new computer probably doesn’t fit in to that reality. In fact, there are a mere 10 installed computers per 1,000 people in Uganda. Knowing that, charities have popped up…

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Uganda Flooded With E-Waste ‘Clones’

Instructions make repairs easy! screen grab via iFixIt Repair culture has been on the rise the last few years but many people draw the line at electronics, preferring to hire someone else to do the repairs, or simply replace the device. But iFixit wants to change that, empowering DIYers to get geeky and help shrink the rapidly growing pile o… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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iFixit Launches Global Repair Community – Never Throw Out a Gadget Again!

Photo via AlanGraham999 In the rumor mill when the iPad was still under development was that it would use OLED technology for the touch screen . The murmurs stayed squarely in the rumor category, since no OLED manufacturer was really capable of churning out the number of screens that would be demanded by consumers. However, the rumors are back that Apple is looking at making the next generation of iPads with OLED technology. … Read the full story on TreeHugger

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From the Rumor Mill, Apple Looking At OLED for Next Gen iPads

Photo credit Cascadia Research Collective A young 37-foot whale stranded on the shore in West Seattle, and it had a summary of what we’re doing to our oceans held within its stomach. As photographer Chris Jordan documented in birds’ guts , our marine animals are filling up not on nutritious sea life, but the junk we toss out that makes its way into the oceans. Fifty gallons of contents were examined from this near-adult male gray wh… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Washed Up Whale Found with Gallons of Our Garbage In Its Gut