Izhar Gafni got the idea for his environmentally friendly cardboard bicycle four years ago, while visiting California.

"I saw a car outside a bicycle shop that had a sort of a canoe. It was a wood frame with a cardboard cover. That's where it started," he explains in this video.

When he approached three Israeli engineers with his idea, they said it would be impossible. "I just sat down and looked at everything and said, 'Okay, we can do it. We're Israelis; we know to do things that are impossible all our life.' ... I just started, go ahead and did it."

Nearly 95 percent of the bicycle is constructed of cardboard costing about $9. Gafni and his pals have built six prototypes. They hope to find a corporate sponsor to help them distribute the bikes, perhaps to poor children in Africa.