Inhabitat Week in Green: All the EVs at CES, and more!
All our favorites are here: the 2017 Chevy Bolt, an autonomous helicopter and Faraday Future's real-life Batmobile.
Want to see the future of transportation? Look to CES 2016, where innovators debuted the state of the art in high-tech mobility. Chevrolet kicked things off by launching the first electric car for the masses, the 2017 Bolt EV. It gets 200 miles per charge and will cost around $30,000. (Check out our interview with GM engineering chief Pam Fletcher here.) Meanwhile, the mysterious startup Faraday Future showcased an insane 1,000-horsepower electric vehicle that looks like a rocket ship and Ehang showcased an autonomous helicopter that can carry you up to 11,000 feet without a pilot. And a Chinese "hoverboard" company made the news when federal marshals raided their booth over copyright concerns.
CES is filled with thousands of gadgets, but we think the SCIO sensor is one of the coolest. This tiny handheld device allows you to determine the molecular makeup of virtually any object -- kind of like a Star Trek scanner. There's also a fair share of bizarre devices; one of the weirdest is the Babypod, a sound system that plays music for babies in utero. LG showcased an incredibly thin smart display that you can roll up like a newspaper. And we rounded up the six most exciting green tech developments from this year's show.
Mars has long captured the imagination of architects, but building materials are heavy and it's a long way to the red planet. Fortunately, researchers have devised a new method for making concrete out of martian soil, and Planetary Resources has found a way to 3D-print objects out of asteroid dust. Back here on earth, Gensler completed construction on the world's second tallest building, the spiraling Shanghai Tower, and it features sky gardens, rainwater collectors and wind turbines. Mark Zuckerberg is building the home of the future, complete with an artificial intelligence system straight out of Iron Man. And we featured several futuristic furnishings this week: a sculptural bench made out of mushrooms and a mind-bending coffee table inspired by the movie Inception.
