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What would you do with thousands of tons of leftover nutshells? It's a question that Turkey — the world's third-biggest producer of pistachios, behind Iran and the United States — has been asking itself for years.

Usually discarded pistachio shells end up in landfills, but nut-loving Turks think they've found a far better solution by turning it into biogas, an alternative fuel produced by the breakdown of organic matter.

Now Turkey wants to use pistachio shells to power its first eco-city, which will require fermenting tons of the green waste in so-called digesters, and then using the resulting gases — mostly methane — to generate heat.

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A rendering of Turkey's first "eco-city," will be founded between Gaziantep and Kilis province on Turkey's border with Syria in the country's southern Gaziantep region. Anadolu Agency/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

A rendering of Turkey's first "eco-city," will be founded between Gaziantep and Kilis province on Turkey's border with Syria in the country's southern Gaziantep region.

Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

The idea is not as odd as it sounds. For starters, the green city will be built in what's arguably the best possible location: Gaziantep Province. This southern region near the Syrian border is the heart of Turkey's pistachio production, yielding more than half of the country's nuts.

"When you plan such environment-friendly systems, you take a look at the natural resources you have. So we thought the ecological city could be heated by burning pistachio shells," explains Seda Muftuoglu Gulec, the municipality's expert on green architecture. "If the region was abundant in wind power, we would use wind energy."

This peculiar source of energy is renewable and cheap because Turkey has plenty of shells to go around, so much so that it exported 6,800 tons of pistachios last year — 500 tons shy of the weight of the Eiffel Tower — according to the Southeast Anatolia Exporters Union.

Experts say turning pistachios into biogas, while untested, is not only technically feasible but also extremely convenient. Burgeap, the French environmental engineering company that first proposed the idea to the government, claims that nutshells are the most efficient source of alternative energy in the region and could satisfy up to 60 percent of the city's heating needs.

The planned 7,900-acre, nut-fueled city will be six miles from the province's capital city, Gaziantep, and is expected to become home to 200,000 people.

This is Turkey's first attempt at building an eco-city, and it will be the only one in the world that's heated by pistachios — although in Australia macadamia nutshells are already being turned into biomass. Meanwhile, in Monterrey, Mexico, the methane generated from decaying garbage is being converted into electricity to illuminate city lights.

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Green cities being built in other countries are based on other renewable sources. In China, for example, Tianjin Eco-city will be finished by 2020, with most of its energy coming from solar panels. In India, Narendra Modi wants to build Dholera, a "smart city" twice the size of Mumbai that would be powered by various renewable energies, including wind. But skeptics doubt these idealistic projects will ever be fully realized, insisting that the plans are too expensive and detached from local reality.

For now, Gaziantep's municipality is waiting for the results of exhaustive feasibility reports. Gulec says it's too soon to estimate how much it will cost, but if the project gets greenlighted, construction of the new city will start in the next two years.

A pilot scheme will start with a 135-acre piece of land and, if successful, expand into an entire city during the next following two decades. If the project bears fruit, it might inspire other agricultural regions to look at how to convert what they typically consider waste into fuel for the future.

biogas

food waste

Turkey

This is Capitol Hill's version of the The Hunger Games.

The freshman office lottery is part spectacle, part luck and a ruthless, fast-moving process where incoming members try all sorts of tricks hoping to get exactly what they want.

The lottery determines whether rookie lawmakers get a working space with a nice view or one jammed on a high floor that's more like a glorified broom closet.

For a politician, it's one of the few times when measuring the drapes is OK.

On Wednesday, new members were called to the front of a room in alphabetical order to draw a numbered disc from a closed wooden box. The newly elected lawmaker who drew No. 1 would have first choice of offices. No one wanted No. 57.

"Okay, so when I call your name, please come up," the House's superintendent, Bill Weidemeyer, told lawmakers. "Draw a button out of the box here. You can't see in there, but we don't have any spiders or snakes at the bottom of the box."

First up was Rep.-elect Pete Aguilar, R-Calif., who did a good-luck dance. No. 13.

Next was Rick Allen, R-Ga. No dancing there. No. 50.

Barbara Comstock, R-Va., was one of the first lawmakers to arrive Wednesday morning. She'd been seated at the front of the room, waiting for Weidemeyer to reach the letter "C."

She pulled out a disc. It didn't look good.

"Ms. Comstock drew No. 57," he announced.

Dead last. Comstock took her seat as her classmates applauded and offered their faux condolences.

Farther down the alphabet was Rep.-elect Gwen Graham, D-Fla.

New members tried out any number of rituals. Lucky dances, blowing on their hands. One member even had an aide's wife do the honors.

But Graham had a secret weapon.

Paul Woodward, the husband of Graham's campaign manager, did a backflip straight down the center of the aisle.

"It's easy for him. Are you kidding? He backflips like we walk. It's a natural thing," she told reporters later who wanted to see Woodward flip again and again.

The ploy seemed to play off. Graham drew No. 6, allowing her the choice of plum offices.

"I do not care. I know probably you hear that from a lot of members. But I don't care," Graham claimed.

This explanation was typical of the incoming lawmakers, who seemed wary of seeming too joyous over securing a cozy piece of taxpayer-funded real estate.

Those who get stuck with bad numbers know where they're likely going. The dreaded top floor of the Cannon House Office Building. It's tough to get to. Some of the elevators don't even go that high. Saying they are close quarters is an understatement. One staffer even called it Congressional "Siberia."

For Comstock, there was little point in checking out potential digs. She'll be stuck with the leftovers.

"You know I had actually talked to Congressman Robert Hurt who pulled the last number in 2010 so we were laughing about it before saying, 'Well, hey, you've done fine, so we'll be happy with whatever we get,' " she said.

This is Capitol Hill's version of the The Hunger Games.

The freshman office lottery is part spectacle, part luck and a ruthless, fast-moving process where incoming members try all sorts of tricks hoping to get exactly what they want.

The lottery determines whether rookie lawmakers get a working space with a nice view or one jammed on a high floor that's more like a glorified broom closet.

For a politician, it's one of the few times when measuring the drapes is OK.

On Wednesday, new members were called to the front of a room in alphabetical order to draw a numbered disc from a closed wooden box. The newly elected lawmaker who drew No. 1 would have first choice of offices. No one wanted No. 57.

"Okay, so when I call your name, please come up," the House's superintendent, Bill Weidemeyer, told lawmakers. "Draw a button out of the box here. You can't see in there, but we don't have any spiders or snakes at the bottom of the box."

First up was Rep.-elect Pete Aguilar, R-Calif., who did a good-luck dance. No. 13.

Next was Rick Allen, R-Ga. No dancing there. No. 50.

Barbara Comstock, R-Va., was one of the first lawmakers to arrive Wednesday morning. She'd been seated at the front of the room, waiting for Weidemeyer to reach the letter "C."

She pulled out a disc. It didn't look good.

"Ms. Comstock drew No. 57," he announced.

Dead last. Comstock took her seat as her classmates applauded and offered their faux condolences.

Farther down the alphabet was Rep.-elect Gwen Graham, D-Fla.

New members tried out any number of rituals. Lucky dances, blowing on their hands. One member even had an aide's wife do the honors.

But Graham had a secret weapon.

Paul Woodward, the husband of Graham's campaign manager, did a backflip straight down the center of the aisle.

"It's easy for him. Are you kidding? He backflips like we walk. It's a natural thing," she told reporters later who wanted to see Woodward flip again and again.

The ploy seemed to play off. Graham drew No. 6, allowing her the choice of plum offices.

"I do not care. I know probably you hear that from a lot of members. But I don't care," Graham claimed.

This explanation was typical of the incoming lawmakers, who seemed wary of seeming too joyous over securing a cozy piece of taxpayer-funded real estate.

Those who get stuck with bad numbers know where they're likely going. The dreaded top floor of the Cannon House Office Building. It's tough to get to. Some of the elevators don't even go that high. Saying they are close quarters is an understatement. One staffer even called it Congressional "Siberia."

For Comstock, there was little point in checking out potential digs. She'll be stuck with the leftovers.

"You know I had actually talked to Congressman Robert Hurt who pulled the last number in 2010 so we were laughing about it before saying, 'Well, hey, you've done fine, so we'll be happy with whatever we get,' " she said.

A new term may have been coined today on Capitol Hill: "gaggle bombing."

Ahead of President Obama's executive action on immigration, Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, was a hot interview Wednesday afternoon. He has been known to say inflammatory things on the topic of immigration. And there was this awkward interaction with young immigration activists earlier this year at an event in his district.

Reporters gathered around King, just off the House floor, to get his thoughts on the president's expected action (he thinks it is likely unconstitutional and that the House should pass a resolution condemning it before possibly trying to pull funding from any programs Obama would create). This clump of reporters is called a scrum or a gaggle.

So what happened next can only be described as a "gaggle bombing." Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., walked up while a reporter was asking a question, put her arms around King and said: "Don't believe a thing he says. He's totally for amnesty. In fact, he called up the president and said 'Barack, please, please, would you do the executive amnesty? I've been beggin' ya.'"

Laughing, King kept the joke going: "And I would let anybody come into this country that wanted to come in, provided we could deport a liberal for each one," said King, tongue fully in cheek.