But ice cream isn’t exactly easy on the environment, even if you only eat soy ice cream, like me.

It takes a lot of electricity to power the huge web of refrigeration required to produce and transport the frozen treat.

That’s why Unilever, maker of Ben & Jerry’s, hopes to invent ice cream that doesn’t require refrigeration.

So, just how much nuclear fissile will it take? It sounds very science-fiction! But it might not be. Unilever is rumored to be developing “ambient” ice cream, which can be shipped and sold at room temperature.

Customers freeze it at home. Obviously, slashing all this refrigeration will reduce energy costs and lower carbon footprints, but will it taste good?

Plus, how the heck do you market warm ice cream! Okay then, time for a little experiment. Would you buy so-called “ambient” ice cream?

Via Environmental Capital.

Their poop! In the Netherlands, a pig farm with 2,700 pigs uses their crap to produce electricity that feeds power into the Dutch national grid.

Like cats and dogs, pigs can be house broken. So these porkers poop through slats on the floor and the slurry of muck is channeled to a bunch of mixing tanks.

Once in the tanks, the poop is mixed with low-quality grain and carrot juice—to increase methane output—then bacteria breaks down the waste in a digester tank and finally the gas is sucked up into a generator to produce electricity.

This system reduces emissions, shrinks carbon footprints and may help cattle farms—known contributors to global warming—possibly become carbon neutral.

Via the Associated Press.

It could happen. Those bricks are made using cow dung. Believe it or not, poop bricks are 20% lighter and 20% stronger than clay bricks.

There are ecological advantages too. Digging up clay scars the land and mining equipment and machines release carbon emissions.

And as ironic as it may sound, crap bricks are actually cleaner and putting the dung to better use may help improve public hygiene in developing countries. In parts of Indonesia where cow dung from farming is abundant, rural communities may people to develop partnerships with local communities in need of building materials.

Experts call the bricks a feasible solution for rapidly emerging areas in Indonesia and other nations.

Via TreeHugger.

Coal-burning is a major source of pollution and greenhouse gases, specifically carbon dioxide and mercury, which threatens wildlife, like bald eagles and penguins. This makes coal a prime target for environmental groups.

Greenpeace, which exists in 40 countries worldwide, doesn’t like coal. In fact, just last month activists dumped 4 tons of coal in front of a Sheraton hotel in Warsaw, Poland to protest against carbon emissions. And that wasn’t the first time they’ve done it.

Previous coal drops include the home of Vice-President Dick Cheney, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Downing Street offices, the Philippines Environment Ministry and Nuon’s headquarters in Amsterdam.

So, word to the wise, don’t tick off Greenpeace! Otherwise you’ll be knee-deep in dirty black stuff.

Via The News.