Sydney’s ugliest building may soon be getting a new lease on life through to a plan to ‘reskin’ the entire tower with a high-performance photovoltaic skin. Architecture firm Laboratory for Visionary Architecture (LAVA) has proposed the retrofit, and if their plan is enacted it would turn the 1960’s brutalist building into a brilliant super-efficient eco-tower.
It’s easy enough to find a solar-powered charger for iPods, cell phones, and other gadgets, but this ultra-tiny solar-powered sensor system is smaller than anything else on the market — 1,000 times smaller than standard systems, in fact. Developed at the University of Michigan, the 2.5 x 3.5 x 1 millimeter system is the smallest in the world, and it can harvest energy from its surroundings almost perpetually.
Imagine: a solar-powered screen that could quickly charge up your new iPad. Solar chargers are certainly nothing new, but this circuit is embedded right in the touchscreen, so you don’t have to set the device on its back to catch light. It’s not a reality yet, but it might be soon, courtesy of researchers from the University of Pennsylvania.
In the hurried and fast paced lives we lead, travel can be just one more stressful, cramped and environmentally unfriendly activity. What if you could slow it down, take some time, and relax – all while aboard a zero emissions luxury cruise that travels not on the water but in the air?! That’s what London-based designers, Seymourpowell, are proposing with Aircruise, a solar and fuel-cell powered airship designed for luxury travel.
Solar engineers have long sought to develop an energy-generating glazing that is as capable of producing power as it is easy on the eyes. The feat may just have been accomplished by The Center for Architecture Science and Ecology (CASE), who have developed a concentrating solar system that is not only modern and attractive but extremely efficient and cost effective. The system is made up of rows of pyramid-shaped glass receptors that move with sunlight throughout the day, magnifying the incoming light and capturing it in a small photovoltaic cell located in the center of each pyramid.
The European Solar Decathlon takes place this summer, and the competition is already heating up with some stunning designs for zero energy homes! One of the first we’ve seen is the FabLab House from the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia. Completely unlike any of the designs we saw in the US competition, the solar panel-coated passive house is rounded and built off the ground.
Virginia Tech’s sun-powered Lumenhaus was one of our favorite entries in the 2009 Solar Decathlon, so we’re thrilled to announce that it’s currently on display in Times Square, New York! This gorgeous self-sufficient house is features a shifting solar facade that moves throughout the day to allow daylight to enter while controlling the interior temperature. If you’d like to check …
We tend to have a love/hate relationship with Wal-Mart, but we will give them props for their latest green effort. The retailer has just installed close to 5,300 solar panels at its Apple Valley distribution center in California – that’s enough to power 175 homes. The array is Wal-Mart’s largest solar installation and will provide roughly 20 percent of the power for the …
Apple may soon be rolling out iPods and other Apple products with thin film solar cells integrated right into the body of the device! Apple recently filed a fresh patent for solar powered portable devices, including iPods, iPhones, Shuffles, MacBooks and even the hotly anticipated tablet computer. Exciting news keeps coming from the world of Apple and we like how green it’s getting.
The humanitarian emergency in Haiti has resulted in a complete loss of the country’s power infrastructure. To bring it back, a host of companies and aid agencies are using the most plentiful resource on the planet to begin powering one of the biggest reconstruction efforts the world has ever seen: Solar power.
At first glance it may look like a cyber-robotic monster is eating the historical district of this lovely Italian city, but in reality it’s the roof of a new energy-generating walkway in Perugia, Italy. The ‘Energy Roof’, designed by Coop Himmelb(l)au is powered by both the wind and the sun and serves as the canopy of a gallery that explores important archeological sites around the city.
If you only made between $400 and $4,000 a year in income and didn’t have easy access to electricity, what would you do? For many rural Indians, the answer is the Duron, a $130 solar home power system that allows users to generate and store solar energy, charge gadgets and appliances, and run LED lights.
Put green power in the palm of your hand!
Having trouble keeping your gadgets charged on a daily basis? Ever had your cellphone run out of juice on you in the middle of an important day? You’re in luck – we’re giving away one incredibly handy HYMini charger so that you’ll have access to clean green energy anywhere you go! This handheld universal charger and adapter harnesses the power of the wind and sun to recharge almost any mp3 player, cell phone, or camera, and all you have to do to win is tell us what your favorite green gadget in the gallery below is!
TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY:
1. SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER HERE >
(We’ll be announcing the winner in our newsletter, so if you want to find out who the winner is, you’ll need to receive and read our newsletter)
2. COMMENT BELOW and tell us which Greener Gadget (see the gallery below) from the Greener Gadgets Design Competition is your favorite and why. The deadline for this fabulous giveaway is Monday, January 18th. We’ll pick the comment we like best and announce the winner in our newsletter, so make sure you’re signed up!
And don’t forget to stay tuned for the Greener Gadgets conference taking place in NYC on February 25th – it’s going to be packed with influential speakers from the green technology sphere and all the most innovative sustainable gadgets and gizmos.
If you’re going to dress your dog up in silly outfits, they may as well serve a purpose. That’s the tack behind this solar puppy sweater created by Erik Shiegg. According to him, the hi-tech canine couture is capable of charging an Android phone in no time, plus “the dog feels good and I’m feeling good and planet mud is turned a little bit more into planet earth”. Eco-conscious pooches rejoice!
Now there’s no excuse not to bring solar power into your life – in just a few weeks IKEA will be stocking their shelves with a new line of solar-powered summer night lighting! Dubbed SOLIG, the collection ranges from the practical to the decorative and features energy-efficient LED bulbs. Best of all, these new lamps are not only fun, funky, and earth-friendly — they’re affordable as well!
Energy storage is one of the greatest milestones facing the renewable energy industry. You can’t control the winds or the sun’s rays, so intermittency is a problem and you can’t flood the grid when you most need an electric boost. This also means that a lot of the power that is ready for the grid isn’t used, and is lost. Southwest Solar Technology is developing a totally clean Compressed Air Energy Storage System (CAES) that looks quite promising. The system uses clean technology during the day to pump heated and compressed air into an airtight chamber, which is released through a turbine to create power when it is needed the most.
For anyone unfamiliar with hearing aids, know that they require a great deal of two things: money and batteries. Luckily, one humanitarian project aims to make the medical devices much cheaper and more eco-friendly. Solar Ear, a Brazil-based company, creates low-cost hearing aids that get their juice from solar-powered batteries. Not only are the devices much more affordable than traditional hearing aids, they decreases reliance on fossil fuel-based power and seriously cut back on battery waste.
Australia-based EnviroMission Ltd recently announced plans to build two solar updraft towers that span hundreds of acres in La Paz County, Arizona. Solar updraft technology sounds promising enough: generate hot air with a giant greenhouse, channel the air into a chimney-like device, and let the warm wind turn a wind turbine to produce energy. The idea isn’t new — it’s been around since the mid 1980’s — but it’s only now starting to take off.
As the world energy crisis mounts and the threat of catastrophic climate change looms near, the need for clean and green energy sources has never been greater. Fortunately, the future is bright and 2009 saw no shortage of sustainable energy solutions! From space-age solar power beamed down from above to glitter-sized solar sequins to power producing plasma plants, check out our top 5 energy stories from 2009 and vote for your favorite!
SOLYNDRA – a report from Earth2Tech
There are hundreds of solar companies developing new materials, new business models, new installation techniques and new manufacturing processes in an effort to bring down the cost and up the efficiency of solar panels. But there’s only one company that has made progress in 2009 with uniquely-designed solar tube-shaped panels: Solyndra.
LOTS MORE GREAT GREEN DESIGN STORIES HERE... KEEP READING!
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