Indian Railways has traveled many miles of tracks since its introduction in 1853. However, anyone who has traveled on Indian trains is fully aware that the facilities on board are lacking in more ways than one. Unhygienic toilets reeking of human excreta have left many a traveler with an unpleasant experience, and have been an environmental burden as well. But things are starting to change for the better. Indian rails will soon boast eco-friendly toilets, thanks to an initiative from the Honorable Minister of Railways Laloo Prasad Yadav.

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A new green complex from world renowned architecture firm Foster + Partners will be adding more than a dash of green to the Singapore skyline. As sustainability becomes an essential ingredient to development in this island nation, the UK-based firm is leaving no stone unturned to make good use of alternative energy sources in this 150,000 square meter mixed-use project. As the winning design from an international competition, Singapore’s new eco-complex from Foster + Partners is pushing the green envelope from top to bottom in this sophisticated downtown design.

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We’ve seen a whole slew of gigantic, volcano shaped, city-in-a-building towers, each promising to be the largest building in the world. First it was the wacky X-Seed design for Tokyo, and then even Norman Foster got into the game with his proposal for the massive ‘Crystal Island’ development in Moscow. Well now, architect Eugene Tsui is taking the gigantic volcano tower concept to a whole new eco level, by taking design inspiration from the natural world. His new design for the Ultima Tower – a 2-mile high Mt Doom-esque structure - borrows design principles from trees and other living ystem to reduce its energy footprint. We are always intrigued by architecture that uses biomimicry – the borrowing of principles from nature’s designs - and Tsui’s concept for this towering, ultra-dense urban development has certainly captured our attention with its thought-provoking design.

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If there’s one thing we can depend on it’s the rising and falling of the tides. Up until very recently, tidal power has been a severely underutilized renewable energy source, but this won’t be the case much longer with the announcement of the world’s largest tidal power project in South Korea. A collaboration between Lunar Energy and Korean Midland Power Co (KOMIPO), and would create a colossal 300-turbine field in the Wando Hoenggan Water Way off the South Korean coast by 2015, providing 300MW of renewable energy, enough to power 200,000 homes!

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India is well-known for delicious food, and the kitchen is considered to be a sacred place in any Indian home. And now India has something else to be proud of: the world’s largest solar kitchen. The system has been installed as a collaboration between the Academy for a Better World and Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University, with technology from Solare-Brücke, Germany. With 84 receivers and cooking at 650 degrees, the system can produce up to 38,500 meals a day when the sun is at its peak!

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We love our LEDs for lamps and Christmas lights, but there’s a global application for LEDs that could bring inexpensive and efficient light to the 75% of Africa that lacks dependable access to clean, safe electrical lighting. (In Sub-Saharan Africa over 500 million people presently lack modern energy, and rural electricity access rates is only 2%.) A $13 million World Bank Group Initiative called Lighting Africa was launched in September 2007 to develop and distribute a highly efficient and rugged LED light bulb for the electricity-deprived in Africa.

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San Francisco is already one of the greenest cities in the US, but check out this wild new concept from IwamotoScott Architects to completely remake the city into an ecotopia by 2108.

The design, which is as visually stunning as it is thought-provoking, recently won the History Channel’s City of the Future competition. It’s a full-scale urban system that combines the most innovative green technologies with San Francisco’s unique microclimate and geologic conditions, to produce a compelling vision for the future. Hydro-Net, as the project is known, will bring the lovely city-by-the-bay (which many Inhabitants call home) squarely into the 22nd Century with algae-harvesting towers, geothermal energy ‘mushrooms’, and fog catchers which distill fresh water from San Francisco’s infamous fog.

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The lucky sunny state of Arizona is about to become home to the world’s largest Solar Plant! Thanks to a just-announced contract between Abengoa Solar and Arizona Public Service Company (APS), the enormous solar plant called Solana will power up to 70,000 homes, and will be the first example in the country of a major utility getting the majority of its energy from solar. The 1900 acre plant will be completed by 2011 – IF AND ONLY IF Congress renews the clean energy tax credit that’s set to expire at the end of 2008.

This could be a momentous environmental energy venture for the US, so now is the time to get political — we should not let this amazingly positive opportunity slip through the cracks!

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Instead of doing the old-fashioned solar power thing, and capturing the sun’s rays as they hit the Earth’s surface, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and Osaka University Institute of Laser Engineering is bolding going where no space station has ever gone before - in terms of solar power. Pioneering scientists at Jaxa have found a way to harness solar power even closer to the source- from outer space! The Space Solar Power System (SSPS) technology would capture solar rays in space and transport the energy to be used here on the ground. A single unit placed in space would generate enough energy to power 500,000 homes!

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What do you get when you combine the innovation of MagLev technology with solar power, hydrogen fuel, and a futuristic aesthetic? The Interstate Traveler Hydrogen Super Highway, or the Traveler- a ground-breaking solar powered, hydrogen-fueled, zero emission mass transit system that would carry everything from people to cars in sustainable style and carbon neutral function. The construction is set to begin this year, and would connect Ann Arbor and Detroit.

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Ocean waves are already being used as a source of renewable energy, but could differences in water temperatures in the sea be our next source of green power? A decade old idea to generate renewable electricity for the globe with offshore, floating ‘Energy Islands’ could soon become a reality. The concept - creating artificial islands to collect wind, wave and solar power in the tropics - is based on the work of Jacques-Arsène d’Arsonval, a 19th-century French physicist, who envisioned the idea of using the sea as a giant solar-energy collector.

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Norman Foster’s Masdar City is poised to become world’s most sustainable, zero-waste, car-free, carbon neutral city. The model for the city was formally unveiled on 21st January at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi. We’ve talked about the grand scheme before, but the official debut deserves some new attention, given its viewing and support from everyone from General Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi to the Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company and even President George W. Bush. The construction would start the next month, and the city is likely to open in late 2009.

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Just when you thought green towers couldn’t get any greener (or more towering), there’s a new kid on the block. The Aquarius Tower, a 500-foot tall condominium to be built in Atlanta, is the latest to join the burgeoning ranks of iconic green hi-rises. The building is designed around the four elements of life: sun (solar panels), water (reclamation systems), air (wind turbines) and earth (a minimal footprint).

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Amidst the increasing buzz around green cars, and innovative green car designs gaining grounds, Taiwan is ready with the prototype of a solar powered car that could hit the markets soon. The car was featured at the World Solar Challenge 2007, weighs a mere 250 kg and can reach speeds of 70 km/hr. All this with no emissions, powered by the sun!

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What would you call a skyscraper that works like a tree, makes oxygen, distills water, produces energy, and changes with the seasons? Perhaps it’s time to propose a new word: treescraper! Biomimicry - the art of drawing inspiration from nature’s designs - is a strategy often found in green architecture, and here’s a tree-inspired super structure that exemplifies healthy and high-tech design for the future. Designed by William McDonough, the green architect par excellence, who built the first solar-powered house in Ireland in 1977 and was entitled “Hero of the Planet” in 1999 by the Time magazine, this latest proposal for the Tower of tomorrow was commissioned by Fortune Magazine. McDonough’s proposal focuses on the possibilities of today, for a future context, integrating green and arboreally-inspired systems in a super efficient, forward-thinking architectural marvel.

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