Made by Nokero the rain-proof light bulb is about the size of a standard incandescent bulb and contains a replaceable, rechargeable battery that can be charged during the day to provide light at night. Nokero says the N100 is designed for the 1.6 billion people who live without electricity and rely instead upon lanterns that burn fossil fuels. Full story here.

Seeds embedded in the recycled card will grow up to 100 trees. See more here.

Architect Arthur Dyson is working with construction management students at Fresno State to create an unprecedented “Eco-Village” of tiny homes for homeless folks. If successful, it seems like Dyson’s Eco-Village could provide a model for future communities elsewhere. Students get valuable experience in sustainability and construction, while landfill material gets reused and folks in need get a cozy shelter from the elements. Read more here.

Developed by Swedish architect Anders Wilhelmson who told the New York Times “Not only is it sanitary, they can reuse this to grow crops.” Once used, the bag can be knotted and buried, and a layer of urea crystals breaks down the waste into fertilizer, killing off disease-producing pathogens found in feces.

In the developing world, an estimated 2.6 billion people, or about 40 percent of the earth’s population, do not have access to a toilet, according to United Nations figures. It is a public health crisis: open defecation can contaminate drinking water, and an estimated 1.5 million children worldwide die yearly from diarrhea, largely because of poor sanitation and hygiene.

Wilhelmson plans to sell the bags for two or three cents each

Nokia has unveiled the first pedal-powered phone battery charger. According to the Financial Times cyclists will be able to plug their handsets into a charger mounted on their handlebars and connected to a dynamo that harnesses electricity from the wheels. It would take two-and-a- half hours for a cyclist riding at 15km an hour to fully charge a battery, the Finnish group said. It is hardly the kind of technological breakthrough that is likely to worry Apple, as Nokia struggles to find an answer to the US group’s iPhone in the crucial smartphone market. But the bicycle charger highlights efforts by Nokia to shore up its dominant position at the lower end of the market in the developing world, amid rising competition from cut-price Chinese handsets.

Punk band Anti-Flag and useless.org released a limited edition tee shirt for Earth Day. The shirts are unwanted shirts that were gathering dust in Anti-Flag’s warehouse, that have now been repurposed with a new message. All proceeds fund a water and sanitation project in Sierra Leone.

See more details here.

Mind maps are a good way of visualizing solutions to challenging problems.

Reap what you sow. Or, in this case, is it sow what you reap…? Whatever, it’s a good idea to have business cards that do more than clog up your wallet.

A couple of years ago, Seth Frader-Thompson was driving a Prius. Priuses have little screens on the dashboard that tell you what gas mileage you’re getting, in real time, as you drive. It crossed Frader-Thompson’s mind that houses should have something similar. So he built the EnergyHub Dashboard, a little device, with a screen, that can talk wirelessly to your furnace and your various appliances and let you know exactly how much electricity (or gas) each one is using and how much it’s costing you. It can also turn appliances on and off and raise or lower the temperature in your house so you can rein in the real power hogs. EnergyHub is currently partnering with utilities for trials and will be available direct to consumers in early 2010.