No moon base for NASA

It's looking unlikely that NASA will be building a base on the moon any time soon, following these comments reported by New Scientist.

It's not all bad news for wannabe atronauts, though. NASA have hinted that they will instead concentrate on sending people to Mars, or to an asteroid as it flies past the Earth. I've been doing some research on this for a new exhibition and I'm rather keen on the asteroid option. Where would you like to see astronauts heading off to in years to come?

Image: NASA

Houses for a hostile climate

New Scientist have an article at the moment about future houses which will be able to withstand the changing climate of the future. Most houses are very beautiful and some are already built, being lived in, and surviving numerous hurricanes. The house in this picture survived hurricane Ivan in 2004 and Katrina in 2005 while those around it were destroyed.

Check it out

Hemp houses - Zero Carbon Houses

Hemp, a plant from the cannabis family, could be used to build carbon-neutral homes of the future to help combat climate change and boost the rural economy, say researchers at the University of Bath.

The combination of hemp fibres bound together by a lime based adhesive creates a lightweight building material that could be used for the walls of houses.

The hemp plant stores carbon during its growth and this, combined with the low carbon footprint of lime and its very efficient insulating properties, gives the material a ‘better than zero carbon’ footprint.

The researchers at Bath will be looking into the properties of the hemp-lime material such as its strength, durability and energy efficiency to see if it could replace traditional building materials.

Using renewable crops to make building materials makes a lot of sense - it only takes an area the size of a rugby pitch four months to grow enough hemp to build a typical three bedroom house.

Check out the BBC for more information.

Image from the National Non-Food Crops Centre