It may not stop Fido from tracking in mud on his paws, but this doghouse can reduce your best friend’s carbon footprint while providing different levels of entertainment (plus bonus treat storage drawers).

Topped with a green roof (accessed by a sod-covered ramp), the house features a built-in water fountain that can be used both to irrigate the upper lawn and quench a pup’s thirst. A solar-powered fan also provides indoor cooling for hot dogs.

That green roof ramps down to connect to a lawn below, tying it in functionally and aesthetically to the surrounding yard. All in all, the place combines the aesthetic of a traditional dog abode, a cozy cabin and a modern house.

On the side of the home, a hidden drawer opens to reveal food, toys and other rewards for good dogs, making use of the space under the ramp (much like under-stair storage in a normal house).

Best of all: this sustainable dog house was auctioned off to a good home by Carmel Canine Cottages, its proceeds going to benefit the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA). Meanwhile, no one is stopping dedicated pet owners from building their own!

With stylistic nods to classic rounded Airstream trailers, this next-generation mobile pod dwelling is powered by solar and wind energy and provides drinkable water by recycling and filtering the rain.

Designed by Nice Architects, the Ecocapsule shelter is intended to accommodate two people, providing basic necessities and bonus amenities including a fold-out bed, living and dining space, cozy kitchenette, working shower and flush toilet.

A 750-watt wind turbine attaches to the exterior and the roof is clad in a series of built-in solar cells providing multiple means of generating energy for the home. Power can be stored in an onboard battery with close to a 10,000 watt-hour capacity.

The entire structure is road-worthy as well: just under 15 feet long, 8 feet wide and 8 feet tall and weighing a bit over 3,000 pounds. It can be fit into a standard-sized shipping container or towed behind a vehicle. Currently in a prototype phase, the company plans to put these units on the market within the next year.

Its makers envision a great variety of potential uses: “Ecocapsule is a portable house offering an unmatched dwelling experience. With its immense off-grid life span, worldwide portability and flexibility it is suitable for a wide range of applications: from an independent research station or a tourist lodge to an emergency housing or a humanitarian-action unit.”

The first generation of Soylent is a powdered food substitute for all your nutritional needs, the second will be a premixed beverage boasting the addition of algae, but the ultimate target is fully-grown, ultra-efficient food equivalent. An eco-friendly paradigm shift, this would allow vast amounts of healthy calories to be created in very small spaces, a single small factory space supplying enough for to sustain the entire city of Los Angeles.

In just a few years, Soylent went from an experimental substance to the household name in food replacement, but its creator’s endgame is far more ambitious than the current niche product might suggest. Soylent 1.0 remains relatively cost-intensive to produce and expensive to consume – it provides simplicity, but only for those who can afford it. Soylent 2.0 will begin targeting broader markets and introduce algae-grown components, but a future version (3.0, perhaps) could truly revolutionize food production and distribution.

Imagine using just water, sunlight, air and a single algae superorganism to generate the complex nutrients (including carbohydrates, proteins and lipids) needed to sustain life, with applications in rich and poor countries (or in space). Then consider having this substance available on tap, piped right into your home like water or power. Alternatively, you might buy your own household bioreactor, churning out Soylent 3.0 directly in your kitchen on demand. Rob Rhinehart’s vision takes various forms, but it comes down to the same thing: an alternative to conventional food and potential solution to unsustainable agricultural practices, available to all those who wish to take part.

Not everyone will want to subsist partially (let alone entirely) on Soylent, now or ever, but that is also not the point – it can always be used in conjunction with other meals by those so inclined or deployed to places otherwise without sufficient food for subsistence. Meanwhile, for the next round (from Motherboard), “The algae [called AlgaWise] in Soylent 2.0 is grown by the biotech company Solazyme, in a facility owned by the Archer Daniels Midland, the food processing giant. The oil is then pressed out much like olive oil. It’s amazingly efficient. Entire tanks can be filled in days.” Solazyme calls the stuff AlgaWise.”

More from Rhinehart on current and next steps: “In the interest of building a sustainable business to fund our research we’ve been focused primarily on product improvements and new products, like the launch today, but I’ve also worked on setting up infrastructure including lab building and recruiting and drawn up a roadmap for reaching the goal of cell synthesis, starting with protein. This process has two modules: one strain engineering to develop and optimize the organism that produces, the other bioreactor engineering to make an ideal growth environment for the strain(s).”

Turning agricultural waste and fungal mycelium into construction materials, this do-it-yourself kit lets you grow your own compostable bio-plastic objects, from packaging furniture to surf boards and architectural building blocks.

Providing a natural alternative to synthetic options, Ecovative’s Mushroom Materials line competes on cost with petroleum-based equivalents and can be shaped in all kinds of ways using custom and reusable molds.

Their latest creation is this home Grow It Yourself kit – they will ship you the organic components (a mixture of crop waste, like corn husks and stalks, and the vegetative part of mushroom fungus). Upon receipt, you can wait and leave things in a dry dormant state, or add water and fit the mixture into a mold to build whatever you want – nature and time take care of the rest.

So far, Mushroom Materials have been used to make everything from award-winning architectural creations (using blocks made out of organic matter) to biodegradable surf boards, flower pots, lamps and other everyday objects.

From Evocative: “We grow materials made from agricultural byproducts and mushroom mycelium. Mycelium is a natural, self-assembling glue, digesting crop waste to produce cost-competitive and environmentally responsible materials that perform. Our large-scale grow factories are truly revolutionary. We harness the power of nature – the cleanest technology on Earth, eliminating the pollution generated across the petroleum-based plastics supply chain.”

Shaping both living spaces and modular work studios, a set of shipping containers were combined with a series of green building strategies to make this a place the ultimate home for a versatile creative with professional spatial needs.

Eight used cargo containers provided a starting point for the design by architect Maria José Trejos in Costa Rica (photos by Sergio Pucci, enclosing rooms around the periphery of the plan and leaving a central day-lit void for photography, gatherings and natural cross-ventilation.

The staggered containers create porches, patios and decks on the upper levels while framing social spaces, including a kitchen and dining room, on the main floor.

As the architect describes it, “The house dresses and undresses according to what you want to use it for, be it a living room, an audiovisual space, a photographic or advertising studio.”

A reflective roof and rain harvesting techniques help keep the building cool and create graywater reserves, while the central open volume has raised windows for cross-ventilation purposes. Natural light and cooling help reduce energy consumption and associated costs.