Here's what happens to your recyclables

Check out a photo gallery from Davis street transfer station, on the journey from trash bin to recovery.

Recyclables take a world tour

What happens to your plastic bottles or old TV once you get rid of them? There's a good chance they end on the other side of the globe.

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The minicomputer lives on in Massachusetts

Twenty years ago, the minicomputer cluster along Route 128, the beltway round Boston, rivaled Silicon Valley as symbol of entrepreneurship, innovation and cutting-edge computer technology. Today most firms like DEC, Prime, Apollo, Wang and data General has disappeared. But the heritage from the minicomputer era still makes its mark on the local economy and some of the product lines continue to sell for billions of dollars.

Read the "Ongoing story of the Route 128 minicomputer cluster" here

Ericsson shares fall on lukewarm outlook

World's largest telecom equipment maker beats earnings estimates, but investors flee on expectations of a sales slowdown.
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SolarCity provides sun power for San Franciscans below grid price

With new city solar incentives, households in San Francisco can get solar power for less than the cost of electricity from the grid, leasing panels from installation start-up Solarcity.

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Improving solar efficiency by coating cells

Australian start-up claims it can improve solar cell power output by 3
percent to 4 percent through its glass-coating technology.

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AllVoices blends traditional media, citizen journalism

Citizen media start-up AllVoices, a global community that lets users contribute news and commentary by cell phone or online, moves from beta to the public newsroom on Thursday.

"My goal is to create the first true people's media company, where 6 billion people on the planet can share their news from wherever they are," said Amra Tareen, founder of San Francisco-based AllVoices.

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Cheap international calls with new iPhone app

Truphone's free iPhone app offers international rate calls for 6 cents
per minute to landlines and 30 cents to mobile phones, using WiFi hot
spots.

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With oil price spike, recycled rubber gets funding

Naples, Fla.-based rubber recycler Lehigh Technologies has finished a series E round of funding, squeezing out another $34.5 million and adding Index Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers to its list of investors.

The company started producing rubber powder out of recycled tires a year ago. Lehigh's process involves freezing old tires with liquid nitrogen, then putting the frozen tires through a mill in high velocity, turning the rubber into a fine powder. That powder can be used in paints, shoes, plastics, carpets, and tires.

Through this process, Lehigh says it can make rubber powder for half the price of synthetic rubber.

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From the Global 500-list

Virtual personal assistants make life easier

Too busy to book airline tickets, order takeout food, or call your parents? For $19 per month, virtual personal assistants from AskSunday.com will run 10 such errands for you.

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Japanese Shell subsidiary plans one of world's largest solar-panel plant

Royal Dutch Shell subsidiary Showa Shell Sekiyu, Japan's fifth-largest oil refiner, plans to invest 100 billion yen, or about $938 million, in a solar-panel megaplant.

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India reveals its first climate change plan

Sun-drenched country pushes for solar power, a soaring industry there.

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