Veer is a quarterly magazine focused on good innovative sustainable design. Sustainable design is currently seen as an important part of measures to reduce environmental impact and improve the resource efficiency of today’s products, services and infrastructures, of which, eighty per cent is determined at design stage. But reaching a level of sustainability in the way we live our lives – where the earth’s resources can sustain human activity without irreversible environmental damage – requires a complete rethink. And design has a major role to play in the creation and implementation of this shift.

Veer will have a different  theme running through each edition ‘water’ will be the theme of the Launch edition, also featuring the most innovative projects, ideas and solutions across all design dimensions, including architecture, Product, landscape, urban planning, graphic design, industrial design and fashion. Furthering a broader understanding of design and creativity, Veer will explore how design can influence different sectors to create a more sustainable future – from envisaging what a sustainable future could look like, how to live more sustainable life to offering innovations, products, insight and accessible examples.

Veer is about changing the way we think and live, veering off into another direction to make sustainable design as inspiring and accessible as possible.

We will also work closely with charity’s and £1.00 of the £4.50 cover price will be donated to the editions selected charity.

Earlier this month saw the first trial consumers taking their new Smart Fortwo Electric Drives onto the road. As part of the largest electric drive trial to have ever been undertaken in the UK the 100 cars will be tested by 60 residents in London and the South East and 40 residents in the West Midlands. The trial is being funded by the Government’s Technology Strategy Board(TSB).

The Fortwo ED was released in 2008 with previous market trials having been undertaken on a smaller scale over the last two years and full production is due to begin in 2012. The video shows some of the initial reactions from the trial consumers.

From the 19th to the 27th of this month is Team Green Britain Bike Week, to celebrate we’re highlighting five great bikes, one for each day for a green commute to work.

Ragleigh Urban Pioneer - This Nottingham company has been making bikes for 120 years. This new model is available in men’s and women’s versions, both come with 18 speed Shimano Gearing and are available for around £180

Globe Haul - This unique brand, an offshoot of Specialized bikes, produces beautifully designed bikes for ‘urban cyclists, commuters, city dwellers, the progressively minded and the eco-conscious’. The Haul is their cargo model with an integrated rack designed to carry 100 pounds of cargo, the Haul 1 is available for around £550.

TATO commuter bicycle - This small Swiss company have designed their first bike to conveniently carry a briefcase or satchel in their ‘Central Storage System for Bicycles’. The commuter bike is available directly from their website for just under £1000.

Dahon Tournado - Emerging out of Los Angelos, California Dahon are the largest producers of folding bikes and their Tournado is one of the most popular large wheel folders around. The Tournado is available for about £1800, but stocks are limited and sell out fast.

Brompton M series - Made in the UK Brompton folding bikes have been the top of the line for the 15 years that they have been in production. The M series is the classic line with models starting at £655, the M6R (pictured) has a 6 speed gear system and is available for £815.

Masdar city, in the United Arab Emirates, will have a population of around 50,000 when it is finished being built at a cost of £10bn to £20bn. The project has been designed by British architects Foster and Partners. While construction of the city is just beginning, Masdar, with two European energy companies Total and Abengoa Solar, is now building Shams 1, the largest solar power plant in the world which will power the city. Before the city is complete, the energy will be sold onto the national grid.

Costing the Earth exlpores Masdar City on BBC iplayer

Bionic Yarn, a textile firm based in New York, has been producing high quality, innovative textiles from recycled bottle for two years. When this came to the attention of Pharrell Williams he decided to invest with co-ownership in the company. He is now using his wide reaching involvement in the music and fashion industries to attempt to widen the market for the material. Pharrell is looking to use the material in his own clothing lines and a collaboration with fashion label Moncler is set for debut in the fall.

Pharrell discusses Bionic Yarn

According to Worn Again’s website, the UK alone throws away 1.8 million tonnes of clothing and textiles a year. Their mission is to help companies to reduce this waste, transforming decommissioned uniforms and other fabrics into fashionable and ecofriendly products for everyday wear. They call this process upcycling and the products they produce are sold to generate income for Anti-Apathy, a sustainable lifestyle charity. Worn Again’s current range, Bon Voyage, is made, in the UK, from materials from former Eurostar uniforms and retired Virgin hot air balloons.

Upcycling process

Last week we highlighted Vincent Callubaut’s ambitious concept for fuelling airships from micro-organism biofuels. This week we feature another ambitious energy fuel solution, this time for space travel. Japanese Space Yacht IKAROS (a cleverly devised, if slightly fate tempting acronym for Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun) is scheduled to launch this friday at 6:30 Japan local time, from Tanegashima Island, on its mission round the sun. The power for the craft comes from a large solar sail which will deploy a few weeks into its mission, employing solar photons as a propulsion source, as well as collecting solar power through the thin film of solar cells incorporated into the sails.

This is the first ever mission for a spacecraft of this kind and only the first of JAXA’s two planned missions this decade, the second, planned for late in the 2010s, hopes to send another craft out as far as Jupiter and the Trojan asteroids. JAXA claims that their research ‘will lead to lower cost in the solar cells market’, making solar energy in all sectors a more viable option.

IKAROS will piggyback on the launch of the larger weather satalite AKATSUKI, the launch will be broadcast live on JAXA’s website here.

In a recent project, Belgian firm Vincent Callubaut, highlights the effects that an impending fuel crisis would have on an unprepared flight industry. Their concept aircraft designs, which completely readdress notions of flight, would consist of a floating base, where a farm of seaweeds would convert carbon waste into dihydrogen which would provide the biofuel for the flying vertical airship, taking off and landing from this base.

Biohydrogen Airship

Ecotricity, the first, and leading provider of green energy in the UK, received planning permission last week for an ambitious new zero carbon headquarters in Stroud, Gloucestershire. They are now in the process of obtaining the site on which a derelict DSS building has been a local eyesore for over ten years. Led by local architects David Austin Associates, the plans for the new 300 occupant office building include ‘rainwater harvesting, induced convection ventilation, passive and active solar heating and even living walls.’

Ecotricity Zero-Carbon HQ

Zerocarbonista Ecotricity blog

Here’s the new video from March’s Ecobuild 2010 in London. The annual conference on sustainable construction drew a record 41,000 visitors this year, and next year moves to the bigger venue of London’s ExCeL exhibition and conference centre.