For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Jason Sahler, and for the last year and half I have been behind the scenes of Inhabitat making sure it runs as smoothly as possible. Now the time has come for me to say farewell and I wanted to thank Jill, the Inhabitat team and YOU, the readers who make Inhabitat the awesome website that it is today. It has been a truly remarkable experience and I have learned so much from Jill on green design and how to run a website, as well as the passion that the design community has for smart, sustainable design. I will not forget all this and will bring everything I have learned with me as I move onto my next adventure, SustainaBrew.

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Its never to early to get your kids thinking about where their food comes from, and you can do just that with these cute and cuddly soft food toys from our favorite organic textile company, Looolo. Whether playing with “organic” hamburgers, PB&J sandwiches, or bagels and lox, these soft toys will give your kids a chance to learn about eating sustainably while playing restaurateur!

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Scientists at Genomatica Inc. recently announced that they have developed strains of bacteria that are able to produce plastic without the use of oil or natural gas. The sustainable process utilizes little more than sugar and water to produce butanediol (BDO), which can be manufactured into everything from plastics and fibers to pharmaceuticals. Genomatica estimates that within a year the energy-efficient process will cost less than current hydrocarbon-based processes – a revolutionary development since close to 3 billion pounds of BDO manufactured each year.

The Solar Stik™ is a small-scale energy generator that is capable of providing clean, green energy wherever it is needed most. The versatile system takes advantage of both solar and wind turbine technology and is quick to set up, making it perfect for applications ranging from boating and recreation to providing emergency relief and humanitarian aid.

Ah, science – constantly trying to make the world a better place. Although air quality may not be first and foremost on your mind when there are bombs going off, you’ll be glad to know that scientists are striving for “greener explosives“. Failing to see the inherent irony in an “environmentally friendly” unit of destruction, scientists have gone and developed safer explosives by adding “unique green solvents” and improving the quality and purity of their materials. The resulting explosions may be more stable and precise, but can we really call them “green“?

Ahh, the art of camouflage. As technology becomes ever more ubiquitous in our lives we have begun to try and hide it, and blend it in with our surroundings (perhaps you have seen those cell towers that pose as trees). Well now the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Mitsubishi Corp and Tokki Corp have developed an organic thin film solar cell that takes the shape of a common leaf.

CO2 levels in 2000

Whereas standard maps offer an approachable means of visualizing the world, Worldmapper’s striking cartograms work the other way, de-stabilizing the earth as we know it while focusing upon some of the planet’s most vital topics. From population density to oil consumption and CO2 levels, these radically redefined maps incorporate data and figures to create a shifting series of unfamiliar landscapes that form excellent visual metaphors of their content.

As students return to campuses across the country for the start of another semester, colleges are starting to showcase some serious strides in sustainability. Some are investing in wind power and other alternative energies to help lower their carbon footprint, while others are endeavoring to green their facilities. Penn State is leading the charge with its gorgeous LEED Gold Stuckeman School of Architecture.

It’s been an exciting month as we’ve seen green transportation records set on the ground and in the sky, so naturally we are taking the next step and bringing you to the sea with the Earthrace, a 78 ft tri-hull “wavepiercer”. The biodiesel boat recently completed a carbon-neutral tour of the globe in an incredible 60 days and 23 hours, besting the previous world record by 14 days!

Nine years ago on March 20th 1999, Bob Schumacher set the wind powered land-speed record in a boat called the Iron Duck, “sailing” at blistering pace of 116.7 mph. Now, since records are meant to be broken, two men are vying to beat that world record. Eco-entrepreneur Dale Vince of Ecotricity and engineer Richard Jenkins are setting up on the salt flats at Lake LeFroy in Western Australia, hoping to catch the right breeze and make history in their sleek wind-powered vehicle, the Greenbird.

We often cover alternative cars and other vehicles for Transportation Tuesday, and while they are making advances for their respective industries, they still require some type of fuel and are resource intensive in their production, which brings their sustainability into question. So when we can feature a truly sustainable transportation alternative, we jump at the chance. Enter the Dry Leaf skateboard by Lets Evo, a sweet eco-ride that is almost entirely constructed from sustainable materials and socially responsible labor practices.

Earlier this summer we introduced you to Freegreen and their efforts to bring green prefab design to the masses. Recently Lloyd Alter from treehugger conducted an excellent interview with David Wax from Freegreen and architect Greg La Vardera whose smart modern home designs can be found on Houseplans.com. Lloyd looks at the issues facing consumers who decided to go the prefab route, exploring the different approaches to design taken by David and Greg. The interview elicits some great responses from each participant, and sums up what their respective design paths mean for consumers. Head on over to treehugger to check it out!

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One of the many barriers that impedes us from living a greener life at home is the lack of any simple and reliable way to gauge how much energy we are consuming. We can turn off our lights and computers, but we are still kept in the dark as to our true levels of our consumption. As price and demand for energy continue to climb, it becomes that much more important to have access to vital information about our energy use, which is exactly what the EnergyHub hopes to provide.

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When it comes to striking good looks and serious sex appeal, many eco-friendly cars end up short. Not so with Ronn Motor’s first production vehicle, the Scorpion. Featuring streamlined curves backed by a hydrogen fuel injection system, this powerhouse convertible boasts an emission-free top speed of over 200 mph!

Carbon sequestration has been a hot topic lately, with various methods being proposed to help cut down on the amount of greenhouse gases spewed into our skies. Many past solutions have focused on capturing CO2 and simply storing it away – an out-of-sight, out-of-mind answer to a much more difficult question. Now California-based Calera has found an constructive use for waste carbon – transform it into usable concrete!

Wandering through the Australian Hills north of Melbourne, it would be easy to miss this deceptively simple, yet elegant house nestled into the surrounding countryside. But once you have reached this beautiful abode designed by Sean Godsell it’s hard to forget it. These hills are not just the home of this dynamic dwelling, but they act to protect it from the often harsh Australian weather and provide shade from the blazing sun.

Design can change the world for the better, but our wide reaching imprint on Mother Nature doesn’t always yield the best results. Case in point: the decline of bees. More specifically that commercially raised bumblebees are affecting the wild bee population. For years, researchers have been linking a decline in bees to everything from pesticides to genetically modified crops, and now the news is pointing to the bees themselves – the ones that humans “create” in greenhouses.

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As actions to combat climate change have heated up, many coal plants have finally begun to cool down. (And its about time!) Whether from the realization that coal is a leading cause of greenhouse gas emissions such as CO2 (as well as dirty and destructive in their extraction and processing of the coal itself) or just from the fear that regulation may cause undo financial hardships, many coal plants have been put on the back burner or nixed all together. Our compadres over at Earth2tech have put together a great interactive google map which shows the locations of coal plants that have fallen to the wayside, documenting the demise of these obsolete, smog belching beasts and presenting the info in powerful graphic form.

2005’s Solar Decathlon blew us away, but we were particularly fascinated by a stunning Solar House from Cornell University. This team brought a beautiful zero-energy home to the mall in Washington, D.C., and had just launched ZeroEnergy Design, a home design firm focused on zero-energy design. Continuing their momentum as green home design gurus, two of the Cornell Solar Decathlon team members have just launched a new endeavor aimed at bringing custom green design to the masses through an innovative business model called FreeGreen. Started by David Wax and his partner Ben Uyeda, FreeGreen is making green home designs free to everyone!

As spring pushes forward and lazy, summer nights begin to envelop us, many people will daydream of the great outdoors and when they will be able to camp in tents and hike again. For those who prefer a little more accommodations and accoutrements, the Clara Cabin from hiveMODULAR is a perfect solution. You get all the comforts of cabin life – a bed, reprieve from the bugs, and weather – while still being able to connect to the surrounding nature. Designed and built by hiveMODULAR partner Bryan Meyer and his wife, Anne Ryan, this little woodland getaway is a great example of how versatility makes small spaces livable.

One of the biggest tenets of living a sustainable life is doing more with less, and as we grapple with reducing our carbon footprints we have to take a closer look at how we equip the world we live in. These beautiful recycled paper baskets from award-winning artist Leonor Mendoza are definitely a step in the lighter footstep direction. Made from recycled paper and cotton woven together, these colorful and multifaceted mats sport corner buttons allowing them to go from a colorful placemat to functional basket in seconds.

Optimizing passive solar gain and using untreated local wood, this sustainable home on Lake Laka in Poland was designed by architect Piotr Kuczia. The south side soaks up the sun reducing the amount of active heating, while the north side opens up to vistas of the lake. Many of the materials were locally sourced, reducing the amount of unnecessary transport required for construction, hence the moniker CO2 saver. But there are many other ways that this home saves on CO2.

We have seen mobile media players go green by utilizing the wind, the sun and our own muscles, what about when we use those gadgets in our home? Vers Audio has taken on the task to provide our homes with a more sustainable sound, with a more sustainable design. Vers Audio’s Vers 2x uses a sustainably harvested cherry wood veneer, providing your mp3 players with a sleek green home.