#chemicals-for-life

#chemicals-for-life

Composting allows food scraps to be recycled into organic material for gardening, keeping waste out of landfills. However, not all tea bags are compostable.

Aquaponics systems utilize one gallon of water to produce a kilogram of leafy greens, compared to over 30 gallons in traditional farming, showcasing remarkable efficiency.

"We didn't know what we had," Michele Stansfield, co-founder and CEO of Cauldron Ferm, told TechCrunch. But eventually, Stansfield realized they had more than initially thought.

Most water filter pitchers are made of BPA-free plastic. But as new research shows that bottled-water drinkers ingest tens of thousands of excess microplastic particles, wellness lovers have begun to look askance at water filters that are themselves made of plastic.

The body of the robotic fingers is built from polyglycerol sebacate, a synthetic elastomer made from glycerol and sebacic acid. Glycerol is a byproduct of biodiesel production while sebacic acid is derived from castor oil, and both of them are plant-based. Polyglycerol sebacate is safe since it is already used in medical implants because the body can absorb it without a toxic response.

Now, researchers have created an artificial-intelligence system that vastly simplifies and accelerates the process of chemical synthesis. The system, which is called MOSAIC and is described in a study published in Nature on 19 January, recommended conditions that researchers were able to use to generate 35 compounds with the potential to become products like pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals or cosmetics without needing to do any further trawling or tweaking.

Crude oil is a complex mixture of hydrocarbons - molecules made mainly of carbon and hydrogen. Refineries and chemical plants separate and transform these molecules into smaller chemical building blocks known as petrochemicals. Some of the most important petrochemical building blocks include chemicals such as ethylene, propylene and benzene.

This corn-based construction material was made by Manufactura, a Mexican sustainable materials company, and it imagines a second life for waste from the most widely produced grain in the world. The project started as an invitation by chef Jorge Armando, the founder of catering brand Taco Kween Berlin, to find ways he could reintegrate waste generated by his taqueria into architecture. A team led by designer Dinorah Schulte created corncretl during a residency last year in Massa Lombarda, Italy.

Never place batteries of any type in your curbside recycling bin. Batteries can damage recycling equipment and, if lithium batteries are mixed in, cause fires. Always use designated battery collection programs.

They write, 'through clever processing changes, this material is now stronger, more beautiful, and available in higher volumes at a lower price point.' The design remains the same with the frosted look, and this time, it can carry loads better but still lasts only as long as it's needed. After use, the bags can be placed in home compost or industrial compost systems, where they break down into healthy soil.

Europe's supermarket shelves are packed with brands billing their plastic packaging as sustainable, but often only a fraction of the materials are truly recovered from waste, with the rest made from petroleum. Brands using plastic packaging from Kraft's Heinz Beanz to Mondelez's Philadelphia use materials made by the plastic manufacturing arm of the oil company Saudi Aramco. The Saudi state-owned holding opposes production cuts under the UN plastic treaty and is the world's largest corporate greenhouse-gas emitter (over 70m tonnes up to 2023).

Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries are found in many devices we use every day, like smartphones, laptops, tablets, wireless earbuds, power tools, e-bikes, and electric vehicles. By 2023, there were more than 40 million electric vehicles on the road worldwide, and billions of portable electronics used Li-ion cells. These batteries are valuable for recycling, but they can be dangerous if not disposed of correctly.