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THE WORLD'S GREATEST GREEN INVENTIONS
The Independent
September 4, 2006
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1359779.ece
We all want the latest cars, the grooviest clothes and the
shiniest gadgets.
But what of the price to the planet? Is it possible to go
shopping with a
clear conscience? Can environmentally sound products still be
objects of
desire? The cutting-edge environmental website treehugger.com
thinks so.
Here, its editor, Michael Richard, shows Josh Sims how a new
breed of
inventors is coming up with the goods -- and they don't cost the
earth.
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THE ECO KETTLE
It is estimated that, on average, we boil twice the volume of
water needed
every time we use our kettles. With a 3kW kettle that's the same
as wasting
the energy of around 50 light bulbs. And standard kettles are
often highly
inefficient -- a stove-top kettle, for instance, requires energy
to heat the
handle and shell in addition to the water. But British designer
Brian
Hartley's Eco Kettle solves these problems at a stroke. You fill
it up, and
then use the measuring button to release the exact amount of
water you
require -- from a single cup to a full jug -- into a separate
chamber for
boiling. It is also insulated to keep the water hot. The result
is an energy
saving of up to 30 per cent.
http://www.ecokettle.com
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GREEN ROOFS
Cities may be losing their green spaces to development, but all
is not lost.
Look up to the roofs of buildings, especially office blocks, and
there,
where once there was dead space, you could now find a "sky
garden"
(Barclays' HQ in Canary Wharf, London, has one). They could be
used as
community spaces, chill-out areas for hassled workers, or even
to grow food.
But there are other advantages for the bottom line, too: they
reduce run-off
in periods of heavy rain, and they cut back on the heat that
gets trapped in
built-up areas, thus reducing the need for air conditioning.
They could even
improve air quality in congested cities.
http://www.greenroofs.com
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FRICTIONLESS WIND TURBINES
The problem with wind turbines? Often, it's just not windy
enough to get
them turning. It's not really the lack of wind that is the
problem, but the
friction in the turbines themselves. Chinese scientists may have
cracked
this problem with the first "magnetic levitation" (or MagLev)
wind turbines,
which replace ball-bearings with the technology used in advanced
monorails,
making a frictionless turbine that can generate electricity from
winds as
low as 1.5m per second. They're ideal for low wind areas, such
as mountain
regions and small islands. The MagLev wind turbines could also
use the
airflow caused by passing cars to generate roadside lighting.
.............
SOLAR-POWERED CELLPHONES
Germany's Fraunhofer Institute, an alliance of 50 technology
research
organisations, is looking at how to integrate solar cells into
mobile
phones, allowing them to be powered continuously on just two
hours of
sunlight a day. The big manufacturers are interested, as the
more software
that's packed into mobiles, the bigger batteries they need.
http://www.fraunhofer.de
.............
ICE ENERGY
Air conditioning can be a huge drain on electricity supplies.
Enter Ice
Energy's Ice Bear, which integrates with a standard AC unit. The
water in
the Ice Bear is frozen overnight when temperatures are lower and
electricity, in many countries, is cheaper, and the ice then
cools the AC
unit's refridgerant during the day. This results in a 30 per
cent saving in
energy use. An AC unit should last 15 years, by which time the
Ice Bear will
have paid for itself several times.
http://www.ice-energy.com
.............
GREENER AIRCRAFT
Conventional airliners are heavy, thirsty, noisy and polluting,
despite
aeronautical designers' best efforts. But in the future we may
be travelling
in a flying wing or batwing (in which the entire fuselage
becomes the means
of lift) -- an idea first suggested by Frederick Handley Page
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handley-Page> in 1961. Made of
plastic and
with areas of the surface punctured with tiny holes to reduce
drag, the
wings would be much lighter and so more fuel efficient, and the
engines
would be mounted on top to deflect noise away from the ground.
And they
would be flown differently, too: in formation perhaps, which
would reduce
fuel consumption, and at different altitudes to prevent the
formation of
polluting condensation trails. The result could bring aircraft
emissions
below today's levels by 2025, despite an expected doubling in
the amount of
passenger air traffic. Both Boeing and Airbus are already
working on
flying-wing projects.
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DESIGNER CARAFES
It's ironic that in our bid to become healthier by drinking more
water, our
conviction that only bottled water will do is causing
increasingly precious
plastics to be thrown away (oil being an essential component in
plastic's
manufacture). Fashion designer Pierre Cardin may have the
solution. He has
just distributed 30,000 of his Eau de Paris designer carafes for
free in a
bid to convince Parisians that the local tap water is just as
healthy. The
idea is that many people buy bottled water in response to
marketing, so
getting them to drink tap water requires a similar strategy.
It's a simple
idea that, if it spread around the world, could keep millions of
plastic
bottles out of landfills.
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THE SUPER-POWERED ELECTRIC CAR
Electric cars: they're rather slow, aren't they? They whir a bit
and then
run out of juice on the motorway? Not Tesla Motors' first car.
This will be
a clutchless, Lotus-inspired roadster capable of going from 0 to
60mph in
just four seconds, with a top speed of 130mph. That's
electricity with
attitude. And it does the equivalent of 135mpg. The real
benefit? This car
(named after the electrical engineer Nikola Tesla) will generate
one-third
the CO2 and one-tenth the pollution of hybrid cars -- and, as
Richard notes,
as electricity supplies get cleaner, so will the car. It can
drive for a
respectable 250 miles before its lithium-ion battery needs
recharging and
will be available for delivery from autumn of next year. Tesla
Motors is new
in terms of its business model as well as engineering; it's
backed by the
founders of eBay, Google and PayPal.
http://www.teslamotors.com
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THE POWERISER
If ever you thought people wobbling around on in-line skates
looked silly,
you'll be tickled pink by the Poweriser. Essentially, these are
springy
stilts that strap on to your calves and, once you've got the
hang of the
correct rocking motion, allow you to leap forward around five
metres with a
single bound, leap vertically about two metres, and generally
upset the
animals. With practice, this mode of transport is just as green
as skates,
but faster. And a few stunts (of the kind used in The Lion King
stage
production) will impress the doubters: there is already a
"scene" developing
around the device in Germany, where the idea was first
developed. "This one
is a bit out there," admits Richard, "but as far as alternative
transportation goes, this has got to be the coolest."
http://www.powerisers.de
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SOLAR-POWERED LEDs
Picture a world in which the kids have to stop reading because
the sun has
set. Or where you have to burn dangerous, dirty and expensive
kerosene to
see what you're doing. The Indian government hopes to remedy
this sutuation,
which affects 112,000 rural villages across the country, over
the next
decade. The solution is a combination of light-emitting diodes
(LEDs) and
solar power. The former are more efficient than lightbulbs --
the power
required to light one conventional 100w bulb can now light an
entire village
-- and the latter allows electricity to be stored in batteries
and provides
lighting where there is no grid supply. Both LEDs and solar
panels can also
take the rough and tumble of village life: having few moving
parts, they are
very durable. "People in the West often take electricity for
granted, but in
some places just being able to see once the sun is gone is a big
deal," says
Richard.
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