georgesworkshop blog describing green diy projects designed and built by the author George Plhak

Japan's railways are the finest in the world. Other countries can copy its formula.

Scientists say we have reached an ‘irreversible tipping point’ that will see fossil fuels phased out

Here's the case for lifting Washington state's 1% lid on property tax levy hikes while at the same time implementing a homestead protection for primary residences and a renter's tax credit to shift the burden away from working families.

Effective carbon pricing is a critical tool to incentivize decarbonization and guide meaningful climate policy. But how we calculate the price of carbon matters, and there’s no global consensus on the process.

Big news in Renton last week reminded me that my hometown is good and getting better.

People might think of city life as necessarily “hard.” But the creative director at a Copenhagen-based urban design firm begs to differ. There are a few simple principles that can “soften” our city, drawing us closer together and radically improving our quality of life.

Literally translating to “within the station”, Ekinaka refers to the colourful, sometimes labyrinthian shopping complexes within train station areas that have become increasingly popular across Japan.

A renewable energy source that runs day and night, powered by salt and fresh water.

Joseph Lawler in The New Atlantis:

According to Maximo, its Version 3.0 robots now enable crews to install solar panels at rates previously impossible by human teams alone. Workers using the robots have...

AES' Maximo, the AI solar robot, automates installation. Accelerate clean energy projects, enhancing safety and speed for a net zero future.

Maximo and Max IQ are first-of-their-kind advanced robotics and AI software solutions that enhance solar installation speed, efficiency, and safety.

A shipping container in Fort Davis is at the center of a new experiment in bringing telehealth to an aging rural population.Perched in the Davis Mountains

(Español aquí.) I’ve just spent a week in Medellín, Colombia, which has one of Latin America’s more famous public transport networks.  In this post, I want to dig past much of the praise heaped on the city — most of it well deserved — and explore some of the challenges that follow from its successes.  […]

(Leer en español.) If you look for a map of Bogotá’s TransMilenio network, you’ll find something like this: Note that north is to the left on most standard Bogotá maps. This is not, of course, a map of the whole network. It barely even begins to explain what the buses do. In fact, what the […]

Tilling helps farmers control weeds and boost soil fertility. But it also degrades a field's ability to hold water and carbon.

Housing crises aren’t failures of politics or planning; they’re failures of incentives. But the lessons of “reverse game theory” can help.

China has gone through staggering economic growth and urbanization in the past few decades, and Starbucks has been along for the ride.

Small towns not only engender local and national patriotism, but they also create the conditions for the arts to flourish.

From the beginning of its own story, the landscape called Yellowstone has been a place.

Utilitarian public baths and pools once filled the world’s cities, but now new expensive spas are taking their place. Has even bathing become a luxury?

Thermal energy storage is pretty great, as phase-change energy storage is very consistent with its energy output over time, unlike chemical batteries. You also get your pick from a wide range of ma…

Farmers are turning to a new source of income via the concept of agrivoltaics, where solar power and agriculture combine to optimize land use.

It started as a go-for-broke experiment, but it wound up saving an ecosystem.

A deposit return scheme for used drinks bottles and cans in Romania has ‘made the impossible possible’

Way, way back in the days when men wore beards and wide-lapelled suits in exotic colors, only NASA had access to photovoltaics and ‘solar’ meant solar thermal. In those days of appropri…

In Canada, Cargo Has Priority Over Humans—But that Doesn't Have to Be the Case

Cows are draining the Colorado River.