8 green Valentine gifts that won’t put you in the red
A year has passed since I penned a sampler of how Valentine’s Day goes down in the Middle East. Tempus fugit, baby, that treacly holiday is back in Jordan with a vengeance and I’m seeing red.
Pushing on for the sodium ion battery, in Nature
One of the most pressing problems of modern society is how to convert and store energy. Lithium ion batteries have been the main energy storage medium for mobile applications for the past 20 years. But there are significant drawbacks for using lithium ion batteries.
The mailman is a drone in this Middle East country [video]
Some countries like Canada are trying to say goodbye to human-delivered postal mail forever. But a new initiative from the United Arab Emirates puts a little 21st Century technology into the old mail carrier.
No “Balls” allowed in Iran’s female soccer league
Here in the Middle East, the mash-up between religious beliefs and human rights can be breathtakingly surreal. Take, as example, baffling contradictions within modern Iranian culture that rigidly restricts gender co-mingling, yet supports gender transitioning.
5 ways to eat iron-rich nettles
Why would anyone want to eat plants that sting? And iron rich raw nettles do sting. But nettles – best foraged in fall or spring depending on where you live. They are a tasty, nutrient-dense food. People have been eating them since antiquity, and probably since pre-history. Their easily-metabolized iron rich content is so high […]
Menasol Dubai answers key financing questions for Middle East CSP solar projects
Key investors in renewable energy for the Middle East and North Africa regions will be on hand to discuss the criteria for securing project financing. They will present the case studies of the Shams 1, a 100MW plant in Abu Dhabi and the Noor 1, a 160MW (being constructed in Morocco).
Wind-powered Tumbleweed robot rolls back encroaching deserts
Desertification has gobbled up huge swaths of the Middle East and North Africa, a fact that Jerusalem-based industrial designer Shlomi Mir knows all too well. So he designed Tumbleweed Desert – a rolling robot capable of spending many solitary years in the desert gathering data aimed at slowing encroaching deserts.
Danish zoo kills healthy giraffe to avoid inbreeding [video]
In the latest tragedy for animal rights, and it happened in Europe, a Danish zoo has reportedly shot and killed a perfectly healthy giraffe which was given to the lions as food. The reason why Marius the giraffe was shot and killed:
Nitrates and the dark side of intensive organic agriculture
Public awareness of healthy food products that are free of chemical additives, along with a worldwide demand to reduce industrial pollution, has led in recent years, to the development of organic farming. It is commonly presumed that organic agriculture causes only minimal environmental pollution.
Broken trees from epic storm sprout public art at Jordan University
If a tree falls in the woods, it will be immortalized as amazingly clever artwork if Fu’ad Khasawneh is anywhere nearby. The Assistant Dean and his colleagues at the University of Jordan transformed the detritus of a powerful winter storm into a remarkable display of public art.
Syrian conflict and broken roads opens new business channels for cycling
A Facebook campaign called “She Wants a Bicycle Now” led by Syrian college students is getting young people on bikes in impressive numbers.
Morocco’s Berbers take on Africa’s richest silver mine – and the king
Africa’s largest silver mine has been operating in the Atlas mountains since 1969, but the Berber people living in the surrounding villages remain among the most poverty-stricken people in Morocco. Now Movement on the Road ’96 are living in an “occupation” camp to protest a silver mine’s water use and pollution.
Beirut bike messengers deliver groceries and parcels by cycling
I did the best part of my growing up in Toronto, a cold and somewhat bike-crazed city. It’s there where I met a champion bike courier from Berlin and had my first long-distance love affair when he moved back to Germany. Joern, god bless his heart, used to deliver love letters by international courier!
An electric bike getaway “car” used by Israeli bomber
In an attempt to settle a business dispute, an Acre-based man from Israel placed a bomb on his enemy’s car and fled the scene using an electric bike.
SodaStream stock rises as Scarlett Johansson’s banned ad sizzles (video)
Israel’s do-it-yourself (and environmentally friendly) soft drink maker SodaStream may go down in the record books as having created the most provocative Super Bowl commercial that never aired on TV, but it’s having a hell of an afterlife on YouTube, racking up over 11 million views since its Monday release.