Scientists have developed “living plastics” that can be programmed to break themselves down when triggered. Many plastic items are made for one-time use, but the materials can remain in the environment for years. Researchers are exploring a different approach: living plastics, materials built with microbes that can be activated to break down the polymer when [...]Most homeowners think a grass lawn is the easiest way to keep a yard looking neat. In reality, maintaining that picture-perfect sea of green relies on constant mowing, watering, fertilizing, and upkeep. Traditional lawns can become especially costly in hotter, drier climates, where keeping grass alive requires even more time and resources.
Fortunately, homeowners are beginning to realize there is another option: the no-mow lawn. Instead of relying on thirsty grass, these landscapes use low-maintenance plants that stay attractive with far less work. As heat waves, droughts, and biodiversity loss intensify around the world, more people are rethinking the traditional lawn and replacing it with sustainable alternatives.
This growing interest in no-mow alternatives comes from the environmental costs of maintaining traditional grass lawns. Although lawns may appear harmless, they require enormous amounts of water, chemicals, and fuel to keep them green and uniform.
Outdoor landscaping accounts for a significant share of residential water use in the United States. In dry regions, lawns require constant irrigation, placing pressure on local water supplies during droughts and heat waves. Even regions that are not normally arid can experience droughts, forcing homeowners to use more water to keep their grass alive. Across the country, billions of gallons of water are used each day for landscape irrigation alone.
Moreover, traditional lawns depend heavily on fertilizers and pesticides to keep them looking uniform and weed-free. Excess chemicals from over-application wash into rivers and lakes through storm runoff and harm local ecosystems. Gas-powered lawn mowers add another environmental cost because they release carbon emissions and air pollutants every time homeowners use them. Perhaps the most overlooked environmental cost involves biodiversity. Traditional lawns create uniform landscapes that support very few pollinators, birds, or native plants.
No-mow lawns come in a variety of textures and styles, so the definition can vary depending on the landscape. Essentially, a no-mow lawn is a landscape designed to grow slowly or remain naturally short, reducing the need for frequent mowing and upkeep. These lawns often use drought-tolerant and native grasses, ground covers, or other low-maintenance plants that require less water and fertilizer.
Although a no-mow lawn may sound like the perfect solution, it does not mean zero maintenance. Certain varieties still require occasional trimming or seasonal care to remain healthy and attractive. However, not every no-mow option works well in every environment. Homeowners must choose plants that match their climate, soil conditions, and the amount of sunlight their yard receives.
Clover lawns are one of the most popular types of no-mow lawns. They are typically white clover, red clover, or micro clover, each of which grows low to the ground. Because clover naturally stays short, homeowners rarely need to mow it to keep it tidy.
Clover also offers several environmental benefits. As a legume, it naturally fixes nitrogen in the soil, which reduces the need for fertilizer. It also stays green longer during dry weather and requires less water than many grass varieties. Clover flowers attract bees and other pollinators, helping support local ecosystems and biodiversity.
However, clover lawns do have some drawbacks. While pollinators are beneficial, the increase in bees may be a concern for families with bee allergies. They are also less durable than traditional grass and may not hold up well under heavy foot traffic or frequent outdoor activity.
Meadow or wildflower lawns replace traditional grass with a mix of native grasses and flowering plants. Unlike conventional lawns, these landscapes are designed to mimic natural ecosystems and require far less mowing once they become established.
One of the greatest benefits of meadow lawns is their support for biodiversity. Native flowers and grasses provide food and shelter for pollinators, insects, and birds. These lawns also contribute to “rewilding,” a landscaping approach that restores natural habitats and encourages urban biodiversity by bringing native plant and animal life back into developed spaces. Because meadow lawns grow more naturally, homeowners may only need to mow them once or twice a year, if at all.
However, meadow lawns can present challenges. Their wilder appearance may seem untidy to some homeowners or violate certain homeowners’ association (HOA) rules. Also, meadow lawns change with the seasons, so they may not remain consistently green or colorful year-round.
Creeping ground covers are a somewhat unconventional alternative to traditional grass lawns. Common examples include creeping thyme, sedum, Irish moss, and Corsican mint. Unlike turf grass, these plants spread horizontally rather than growing upward, allowing them to stay naturally short with very little mowing or trimming. Many ground covers also produce small flowers or pleasant fragrances, making them attractive additions to outdoor spaces.
Creeping ground covers work well in small yards, decorative spaces, or garden pathways where appearance matters more than durability. Because these plants add texture and color variation, they are often paired with stone walkways, gravel, or other landscaping features to create a more natural, visually appealing design.
Keep in mind that creeping ground covers are not perfect replacements for traditional turf grass. Some varieties cannot tolerate heavy foot traffic and may become damaged if children or pets regularly play on them. They look best when incorporated with other design elements, such as stone paths or garden borders, rather than used as a large standalone lawn replacement.
Some homeowners want the environmental benefits of a no-mow lawn without giving up the traditional appearance of grass. For these homeowners, slow-growing grasses offer a practical middle ground.
Popular options include buffalo grass, fine fescues, and specially designed slow-grow turf blends. These grasses grow more slowly than conventional turf varieties and provide several environmental advantages. While technically these grasses are not zero-mowing, they require less maintenance. Because they grow more slowly, homeowners may need to mow them only a few times each season. Their traditional appearance also makes them a popular choice in neighborhoods with strict HOA rules.
As our definition of the ideal lawn changes, more homeowners will likely embrace no-mow alternatives. Homeowners no longer define the perfect yard by neatly trimmed grass alone but by landscapes that conserve water, support biodiversity, and adapt to changing climates. The yard of the future may focus less on controlling nature and more on working with it.
The post 4 lawn options for people who hate mowing appeared first on Popular Science.
Want to spend less on energy? You’re not alone. Summer’s approach means air conditioning season is almost here, just in time for a global energy crisis.
Naturally, we’re all looking for ways to lower our energy bills. There’s a lot of great advice out there, from ditching incandescent lights to getting a heat pump. But there’s also some energy-saving advice that is useless—and a few tips that actually waste energy. Here are a few common myths about energy conservation, debunked with actual science.
If there are rooms in your house you don’t regularly use—a guest bedroom, say, or an occasionally used rec room—you might wonder whether it’s worth heating or cooling it year-round. What if you closed the vents in those rooms, just to save a little money? There’s a certain intuitive logic to this. Heating and cooling costs money, so why bother leaving the vents open in rooms you’re not using?
But HVAC systems don’t work that way. Research suggests that closing vents will probably end up costing you more money. Here’s how.
A 2003 study by I.S. Walker at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory tested this in a lab environment, simulating various California households and climates. Researchers found that closing vents actually increases energy usage.
“The reduction in building thermal loads due to conditioning only a part of the house was offset by increased duct system losses,” the study concluded, stating this was “mostly due to increased duct leakage.”
Put simply: Closing vents doesn’t save energy, because doing so pushes heated or cooled air into your walls instead of your rooms. HVAC systems use pressure to force air through vents, and the system is typically calibrated for the number of vents in your home. Closing one of those vents means there’s more pressure. Because no home HVAC system is free from leaks, that increased pressure means air ends up being pushed through those leaks into your attic or walls instead of any of your rooms.
This doesn’t mean you can’t ever close your vents—you might do so for comfort reasons, for example. It just means that closing vents isn’t a good way to save money on energy.
If it’s hot out you should turn on the fans, right? Not exactly. It turns out fans are only useful if there are people in the room; leaving them on in an empty room is pointless.
Why is that? Because fans don’t cool rooms, only people. You can experiment with this at home if you have a thermometer. Turn on the fan and see if the temperature goes down (it won’t), then also note if the room feels cooler (it will). The reason behind this is the windchill effect.
Air moving across your body speeds up heat transfer from your skin to the air, which we experience as cooling. Anyone who lives in a climate with cold winters is used to hearing both the actual physical temperature and what the temperature feels like given the windchill effect. The wind doesn’t change the physical temperature, which you can measure with a thermometer, but the human experience of it.
The exact same force is at work inside when you turn on a fan, and it can lead to real energy savings. According to the US Department of Energy, turning on a ceiling fan during the summer “allows you to raise the thermostat setting by about 4 degrees Fahrenheit without reducing comfort.” A 2013 study by researchers from the University of California in Berkeley goes further, suggesting people can feel comfortable in a room 6 degrees higher with a fan than without it.
Either way, turning on a fan could allow you to avoid turning on the air conditioning in some conditions, which obviously saves energy. Even with AC on, though, a fan could allow you to set the thermostat a little bit higher. Just remember: There is no point to leaving a fan on if you’re not in the room.
Here’s a trick people try sometimes: turning the thermostat up past what you actually want in order to speed things along. The problem is that HVAC systems don’t work that way. That’s according to Trane, a leading manufacturer of HVAC systems. “When you set your thermostat to a specific temperature, such as 70 degrees, your HVAC system will operate at the same rate to reach that temperature, regardless of whether you initially set it higher or lower,” the company wrote in a blog post. “Setting it higher won’t make your home heat up any faster; it will only cause your system to overshoot the desired temperature, resulting in unnecessary energy consumption.”
BC Hydro, a Canadian energy utility, agrees, writing that “the science is that rooms don’t heat up any faster when you crank the temperature up to 24 degrees Celsius instead of 21 degrees”. With very few exceptions, HVAC systems adjust the temperature at a pretty consistent rate. The best policy is setting the temperature you want and waiting.
There is an idea that you shouldn’t turn off the lights every time you leave a room, because doing so takes up more energy than simply leaving them on. It’s not true.
Many energy-saving myths have their origin in now-obsolete technology. This is one of those. Fluorescent lighting, the light-saber shaped tubes of light once common in office buildings and schools, wear down more quickly if they’re constantly being turned on and off. The same is true of compact fluorescent bulbs, or CFLs, which were a common energy-saving tool in the 2000s. For this reason, according to the US Department of Energy, you should only turn off fluorescent lights if you’re going to be out of the room for 15 minutes or more.
This advice isn’t really relevant in the 2020s, though, because fluorescent lighting is a rarity now. Most modern lighting is LED-based, and “the operating life of a LED is unaffected by turning it on and off,” according to the Department of Energy.
So, unless you’ve got some really old lighting, go ahead and turn the lights off every time you leave a room. You’ll use a little bit less energy and it won’t damage your bulb at all.
The post Fans don’t cool rooms and 3 other myths about home energy conservation appeared first on Popular Science.
There are over 283 million cars cruising the United States, and over 90 percent of them are still guzzling gas. Apart from the obvious environmental problems, fuel prices also continue to skyrocket thanks to the ongoing war in Iran. The average price for gas is currently around 33 percent higher than it was before the crisis, and there is little sign that those numbers are going down anytime soon.
The strain is forcing many drives to reconsider how they get around—and they’re getting creative with it. In Georgia, a 30-year-old handyman is showing everyone how to properly adapt to uncertain times. According to a recent Reuters profile, Mali Hightower has retrofitted a discarded, bright pink Power Wheels Barbie Dream Camper with a two-gallon, one-piston engine for his shorter commuting needs.
“I drive this when I can,” Hightower said on May 19.
To get it going, a driver simply pulls the rip cord that’s attached to the former power washer engine. At less than four-feet-tall, the Dream Camper may not be the most comfortable ride for a full-grown adult,but it’s definitely cheaper. Hightower likely still prefers driving his 1996 Mercedes-Benz convertible, but with a full tank costing him around $90 right now, he’s more than willing to use his Power Wheels alternative for errands like grocery runs.
While somewhat surreal to see at a gas pump, the DIY solution underscores a more important issue: the need for more people to divest from fossil fuel rides in favor of public transportation and electric vehicles (EVs). Unfortunately, that’s easier said than done for many people. The U.S. is dramatically underfunded when it comes to options like commuter bus routes and trains, while EVs are still out of many people’s price ranges. The Dream Barbie Camper may be one-of-a-kind right now, but there’s a good chance that similar, intentionally constructed alternatives are on the way. At least those will be able to comfortably fit the driver.
The post Handyman adapts Barbie Dream Camper to handle soaring gas prices appeared first on Popular Science.
Over 20 million tons of polystyrene plastic are produced annually, yet only a small fraction is recycled worldwide. Current recycling methods consume large amounts of energy and often rely on harsh and toxic chemicals to break the strong molecular chains that make up polystyrene. One possible solution is the use of sulfur, which is an inexpensive byproduct formed when refining crude oil. Its unique chemical structure allows it to break up strong chemical chains in long plastic molecules. Despite its abundance, sulfur has very limited applications, and converting it into more usable forms tends to require a lot of heat, rendering it unused for long periods of time.
Researchers at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics hypothesized that sulfur could help break down polystyrene waste to form more valuable chemicals. To power this reaction, they converted sunlight into heat energy through a process called photothermal conversion. They used this heat to transform polystyrene and sulfur into valuable chemicals like 2,4-diphenylthiophene, or chemical D, and 1,3,5-triphenylbenzene, or chemical T, which are used to make semiconductors and chemical sensors.
To test this, the team mixed ground polystyrene and sulfur at a molar ratio of 1:0.5 in a glass test tube. They sealed the tube with a balloon and secured it onto an iron stand. Then, they focused sunlight onto the bottom of the tube using a curved mirror. As the mixture heated up, the yellow-white solids gradually melted and transformed into a reddish-black liquid after 2 minutes. After heating, the researchers removed the mirror and allowed the system to cool before collecting the gaseous products from the balloon and dissolving the remaining solids for further purification and analysis.
The researchers then adjusted the reaction conditions to understand what factors influenced their results. They tested the reaction without sulfur, varied the sulfur ratios from 0.2 to 0.8, and replaced elemental sulfur with other sulfur-containing compounds. They also explored adding known photothermal agents, specifically metal oxide additives, to the mixture.
To compare the difference between sunlight and artificial light, the researchers repeated the experiment indoors using a 100 Watt LED bulb and monitored temperature changes with a thermal camera. They also ran a control experiment using only polystyrene to check how sulfur affected the yield under LED light. They also tested exposure times from 1 to 6 minutes in 1-minute increments to determine how long it took to achieve the highest yields under LED. The researchers used these tests to identify which conditions were necessary for the reaction to occur and how different factors influenced its outcome.
They found that without sulfur or with alternative sulfur-containing compounds, the reaction did not produce chemical D or T under sunlight. In contrast, reactions that included sulfur successfully produced these target products, with the highest yields of 34% for D and 16% for T at a sulfur ratio of 0.5. When they added metal oxides, the chemical yields decreased to 22% and 12%, respectively, suggesting that these additives interfered with the desired reactions. In addition, when the researchers switched from sunlight to LED, the reaction yields dropped to 26% for D and 13% for T.
Next, they examined how reaction time influenced product formation. They found that yields increased gradually before reaching the maximum at 4 minutes and leveling off. They also noted that mixtures containing sulfur heated up from room temperature to 320°C (608°F), while the control setup only showed a slight temperature increase. The researchers interpreted these results as confirmation of sulfur’s dual role as a reactant and a light-to-heat converter that enables the conversion of polystyrene to useful chemicals.
Taking it a step further, the researchers tested their method on real-world polystyrene wastes, including food packaging, cup lids, and foamed plastics. They successfully produced chemicals D and T from these materials, demonstrating that their process works beyond laboratory samples.
The team concluded that their study presents a simple, fast, and solvent-free approach to converting 2 abundant waste materials into valuable chemicals using sunlight. By combining polystyrene waste and excess sulfur, the researchers offer a new pathway for sustainable polymer upcycling that uses clean energy and is broadly applicable to everyday plastics.
The post Upcycling polystyrene with sunlight and sulfur appeared first on Sciworthy.
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