IKEA Israel’s Blue-Yellow buildings also have a green policy IKEA’s blue and yellow store motifs have become familiar to households all over the world, including the Middle East with stores in Israel, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. IKEA’s Israel stores have been serving the public since 2001, and have introduced environmental policies into both […]
This lovely prefabricated LoftCube home is perched on a pretty piece of land just north of Beirut in Lebanon
Translated from a poster in Jordan: “Smoking for a long period of time affects marital relations.” I’m not “blowing smoke” when I rave about Amman. No need, because Amman generates enough smoke on its own. This city rivals onions in making eyes water. Blame diesel fuel. Trucks, cars, buses blast chewy plumes of black exhaust. […]
Every year in Namibia, 86,000 Cape Fur Seal pups are butchered to death and only one man has the contract to turn their fur into so-called fashionable apparel. We had pictures of what’s going on but Google banned the page for it being too graphic. The Turkish and Australian based company Hatem Yavuz named after […]
The world’s most expensive bottle is encrusted in Swarovski crystals and costs a mere $2,600. Earlier today we poked a little fun at Dubai Mall’s conspicuous consumption, leaving us with a tinge of guilt. After all, shouldn’t we feel compassion for our Emirate neighbors whose oil-wealth has veiled the absurdity of their white gold Mercedes, […]
A new pedestrian bridge nearly 1 km long will link the glitzy Dubai Mall to the nearby metro stop – finally! I swear Robert Ferry and Elizabeth Monoian from the Land Art Generator Initiative are magicians, because everything they touch turns to gold. (If you haven’t already downloaded their free field guide to the 60 […]
This amazing moat bridge parts waters in the Netherlands like Moses and the Red Sea! Thanks to theological scholarship (or in my case, thanks to MGM and Charlton Heston) everyone knows how Moses split the Red Sea. Architects have now imitated that miracle with a sunken eco-bridge that allows safe pedestrian passage through far less-daunting waters. Four […]
Sweat and Sahara sand had forced my eyes closed so that, even as I stood in front of one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, I saw nothing. My eyelids were a back-lit sandy-orange in the sun’s glare. I pried them open and squinted up at the shapes the pharaohs and their slaves had […]
Cook stinging nettles and wild mallows that you forage.
There are more land mines in Afghanistan than there are people, so Massoud Hassani turned a childhood toy into an extraordinary wind-powered bamboo mine sweeper that destroys and tracks them.
Urban farming in Egypt has soared. Read about Schaduf – a soilless solution taking root in Maadi. Two Egyptian brothers have received enough donations to set up three rooftop farms in Maadi – a once wealthy suburb of Cairo. Due for full installation by April, these won’t be any old farms. Sherif and Tarek Hosny […]
Bnei Barak, one of Israel’s most dense cities, is about to get its first large municipal park. With 165,000 people living within a 7000 dunam area, Bnei Barak is one of Israel’s densest cities. And its residents don’t have a green zone to call their own. Ruth Mozes, an architect in charge of Bnei Barak’s […]
As the political conflict rages on, drought-hit farmers in Syria struggle on and the aid trickling in to help is severely inadequate In March 2011, the political situation in Syria began to unravel. Syrians took to the streets in places like Homs and Hama in an uprising against president Bashar al-Assad, who responded with mortar […]
Why does Israel so lag Arab neighbors like Morocco and Egypt in its renewable energy production? I do not understand how the nation that invented CSP solar thermal - the solar energy that now powers much of the worlds gigantic utility-scale solar plants - can be just now announcing some tiny 35 MW solar project as its "largest ever!" - and Spain's Solaer group that is supposedly to build it; doesn't even have a website - when Morocco is building its first 500 MW plant with international energy giant Siemens. Can anyone tell me what's going on? I have never lived in the Middle East region, unlike the rest of the local bloggers here at GreenProphet - perhaps I'm missing something that is rather obvious to the rest of you. In the US, only our fossil states are as backward in renewable energy development.
Urban gardens don’t have to be restricted to rooftops alone – they can flourish on balconies, where everyone can see them. There’s a bit of a paradox within the guidelines for environmentally friendly living. It is widely agreed upon that dense urban living is better for the environment, but it is also true that it […]