Green Samsung E200Eco Cellphone is Made With Bioplastic

Samsung's E200 candybar cellphone is being relaunched in an environmentally-friendlier version at Samsung's Olympic sales event. The external case of the phone, in appropriate green color, is made of bioplastic (extracted from plant material like corn) instead of polycarbonate plastic, which reduces the CO2 burden of producing the phone. It's also packaged in an uncoated recycled paper box. "We strive to make more products as green as possible and to proactively set up and expand a phone recycling system" said the president of Samsung telecoms division, and with eco versions of both the W510 and the F267 coming out too, it looks like the company's trying to make a good first step. [Akihabaranews]

One Wash, One Cup of Water: Nearly Waterless Washing Machine Invented

British inventors have designed a washing machine that takes eco-friendliness to a new level: it uses just a single cup of water to wash a load of clothes. Instead of water the Xeros machine uses thousands of special plastic chips (about 44 pounds' worth) in each wash, and when that single cup of water is heated, these chips absorb the dirt—including tricky stuff like coffee and lipstick. The chips are removed when the wash ends, and can be reused up to 100 times. Though it's still in prototyping, the inventors are intending to commercialize their machine, and it may even hit the shops next year for a price similar to conventional machines. [Daily Mail]

Flower Power to Solar Power: Artificial Plant has Solar Cell Leaves

A Japanese science and engineering team have created this crazy artificial houseplant with high-efficiency organic thin-film solar cells as leaves. Developed by the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, it's got about 9 square inches of power-generating area, and each flexible leaf has a complex structure protected by a thin plastic layer. This makes them durable, and the team foresees uses as eco-friendly power generators embedded into buildings, clothes, leisure goods and toys. [Nikkei via Dvice]

IBM Boosts Solar Cell Efficiency Using Magnifying Trick

IBM's researchers have been busily beavering away trying to improve solar power technology, and they've just come up with a neat solution that uses a surprisingly simple technique: concentrator photovoltaics. In much the same way as kids use magnifying glasses to focus the sun on things to burn them (we all did that, didn't we?) the IBM boffins combined a large lens and a photovoltaic cell to focus a record-breaking 230 watts solar energy per square centimeter. That ends up producing about 70 watts of useful electric power, effectively creating a solar cell about five times more powerful than the cells commonly used in solar farms. More »