People in China are being encouraged to opt for vertical burial or cremation under new government funeral guidelines aimed at coping with land scarcity. It's hoped the guidance, issued by nine government departments, will promote environmentally friendly forms of burial that take up little or no lan
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A construction worker from Cary, Illinois has won $250,000 on a scratch-off lottery ticket. Daniel Raudebaugh, 69, has lived in Cary for 25 years and decided to purchase an Illinois Lottery Lucky Loot ticket while stopping to get gas while on his way home from work. He plans to use his winnings to p
Moray Council is to trial the use of drones to film planning sites to avoid sending a team of councillors and officials to remote areas. The local authority backed plans this week to trial the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) after councillors were shown a trial film shot from a remote-controlled air
The Chinese government has taken steps to forbid the construction of “bizarre” and “odd-shaped” buildings that are devoid of character or cultural heritage. A new directive has been issued to ban architecture that is “oversized, xenocentric, weird” and called for buildings that are “su
DONG Energy is progressing with plans to build the world’s first bioliquid plant for handling unsorted household waste in Cheshire. It will be the first plant to deploy enzymes to digest unsorted household waste to produce biogas for electricity generation.
A new research project aims to develop the world's first flying robots capable of autonomously assessing and manufacturing building structures to help areas suffering from natural disasters. The four year collaborative research project entitled ‘Aerial Additive Building Manufacturing: Distributed
The i360 tower in Brighton has been declared the thinnest building in the world. With a diameter of 12.7ft (3.9m), the city’s tallest building won a place in the Guinness World Records as the “most slender tower”.
China has launched its biggest search for aliens yet, which will uproot more than 9,000 people to build the world's largest telescope. Work on the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST) began in 2011 and is expected to finish in September.
A mass grave containing about 100 medieval skeletons has been discovered by archaeologists during renovations to the Aberdeen Art Gallery. At least 92 bodies dating to the 13th century have been discovered below the gallery, which is undergoing a £30 million transformation to create a world class c
A new water taxi service to take tourists up and down the River Tay is to get underway next year, after councillors approved a plan to build a series of pontoons along the river where the Venice-style vessels can pick up and drop off sightseers. The Scotsman has reported that Perth and Kinross Counc
A world full of underwater cities, super-tall skyscrapers and homes simply printed out on-demand thanks to 3D printing technology are just some of the ways we can look forward to in 100 years time, according to a new report. The SmartThings Future Living Report, which was commissioned by Samsung-own
Plans have been revealed to recreate a huge version of Dundee’s Royal Arch out of cardboard boxes. More than 50 years after it was unceremoniously dynamited to make way for the Tay Bridge, the tower will be rebuilt in less than 24 hours by a team of volunteers, created out of specially designed ca
The redevelopment of the iconic Edinburgh sports ground which hosted the world’s first international rugby match faces almost certain delay after members of a nearby sports club voted to assert their legal right to a strip of land just two feet wide. The Edinburgh Evening News has reported that th
A British designer has developed a concept that will allow people to download plans to print and build their own bespoke earth-friendly house over a few days. The inventor say the plans, named WikiHouse, will herald a digital building revolution, letting anyone design a high-performance, low-cost an
A former public toilet has been put up for sale in Orkney and has attracted interest from around the world, according to the local council. The toilet at Mayburn Court in Stromness is just 28ft by 9ft in size. The property was constructed circa.1960 and is single storey with mono pitch cement fibre