The researchers found a way to make an “optical battery,” said Stephen Rand, a professor in the departments of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Physics and Applied Physics.

“You could stare at the equations of motion all day and you will not see this possibility. We’ve all been taught that this doesn’t happen,” said Rand, an author of a paper on the work published in the Journal of Applied Physics. “It’s a very odd interaction. That’s why it’s been overlooked for more than 100 years.”

Light has electric and magnetic components. Until now, scientists thought the effects of the magnetic field were so weak that they could be ignored. Rand and his colleagues found that at the right intensity, when light is traveling through a material that does not conduct electricity, the light field can generate magnetic effects that are 100 million times stronger than previously expected. Under these circumstances, the magnetic effects develop strength equivalent to a strong electric effect.

“In solar cells, the light goes into a material, gets absorbed and creates heat. Here, we expect to have a very low heat load. Instead of the light being absorbed, energy is stored in the magnetic moment. Intense magnetization can be induced by intense light and then it is ultimately capable of providing a capacitive power source. Rand said, “the finding, according to the researchers could lead to a new kind of solar cell without semiconductors and without absorption to produce charge separation.”

In traditional optical rectification, light’s electric field causes a charge separation, or a pulling apart of the positive and negative charges in a material. This sets up a voltage, similar to that in a battery. This electric effect had previously been detected only in crystalline materials that possessed a certain symmetry.

The light must be shone through a material that does not conduct electricity, such as glass. And it must be focused to an intensity of 10 million watts per square centimeter. Sunlight isn’t this intense on its own, but new materials are being sought that would work at lower intensities, Fisher said.

This new technique could make solar power cheaper, the researchers say. They predict that with improved materials they could achieve 10 percent efficiency in converting solar power to useable energy. That’s equivalent to today’s commercial-grade solar cells.

In experiments this summer, the researchers will work on harnessing this power with laser light, and then with sunlight.

The paper is titled “Optically-induced charge separation and terahertz emission in unbiased dielectrics.” The university is pursuing patent protection for the intellectual property.

Via: Michigan Today

Keeping local culture in mind designers are creating products to meet communities’ needs. It turns out that even the most pressing problems, from health care to potable water, can have affordable -and beautifully designed- solutions.

Infant Warmer

Around 19 million low-birth-weight babies are born every year in developing countries. Unable to regulate their body temperatures, many die. The embrace helps to warm vulnerable infants (a special pouch slips into the back of the bag to provide hours of safe heat) while allowing for nursing and cuddling.

Website: embraceglobal.org

Purifying Straw

Some 900 million people lack access to safe drinking water. Sipping through the LifeStraw filters surface water on-site, reducing the transmission of bacteria and viruses. Each filters about 160 gallons (around 600 litres).

Website: lifestraw.com

Water Container

In impoverished rural areas, clean water is often miles away from the people who need it, leaving them susceptible to waterborne diseases. The sturdy Q drum holds 13 gallons (around 50 litres) in a rolling container that eases the burden of transporting safe, potable water -a tasks that falls mostly to woman and children.

Website: qdrum.co.za

Portable Clay Cooler

Built upon an ancient food-storage technique, the pot-in-pot system uses evaporation from a layer of wet sand between two nesting pots to help extend the life of farmers’ goods. Tomatoes can last weeks instead of just days, meaning more fresh produce at the market and more income for farmers.

Sugarcane Charcoal

Burning wood and dung, the main fuel sources for many in the developing world, has contributed to deforestation and respiratory ailments. Not only do briquettes made from crushed sugarcane stalks make use of an abundant local resource, they burn more cleanly and allow residents to start start a charcoal business for less than U$S50.

Website: d-lab.mit.edu/resources

Affordable Laptops

The one laptop per child project aims to educate children in remote parts of the world. Governments purchase the computers, each equipped with Wi-Fi “rabbit-ears” and e-book mode, for schools. Uruguay has already distributed some 400,000 laptops, with another 90,000 on order. A tablet version is due in 2012.

Website: laptop.org

Via: National Geographic Magazine

Via: Engadget

The Skinny Player is a concept by industrial designers Chih-Wei Wang and Shou-His Fu to allow people to listen to music without needing to carry a player or use headphones. They envisage that you would buy the player with an album preloaded onto it. To listen to the music you would simply stick the Skinny Player onto your body, on your arm for instance, which would provide the heat to power the player.

The Skinny Player comprises of a plaster/band aid shaped device that features an on/off button in the middle of it and has flexible speakers running down the ‘arms’ of it. By sticking the player to you it would gain power from its flexible battery charging device. This part of it must always be in contact with you for the device to function, by using body heat the player is powered in an eco-friendly and sustainable way.

The one issue with the player is the concern over the ability of the player to stick to a person without coming off. The device is intended for exercise, a time when the body is hot, and usually sweats, most stick on items do not remain stuck on a sweating body for long. The player would allow anyone to listen to music at any time without any forethought, or the need for batteries, which for some would make this a useful eco-friendly powered device.

Source: Yanko Design

If you’re going to download on a notebook computer, energy efficiency gets better but I used to feel guilty about hammering the small notebook hard drive which tends to be more fragile than the standard desktop 3.5 inch drives.

Lately, I fantasized about getting a Mac Mini. But at a starting price of $699 it’s definitely an expensive little bittorrent client. If you’re going to use the mini for a whole bunch of other purposes, it’s certainly very energy efficient at 85W for surfing the web but it still draws too much power for just downloading the latest episodes of your favorite TV Series. Apple claims the Mac Mini is the most efficient desktop computer and it’s probably true. This article details power and thermal output.

I thought there still had to be a more efficient way. A couple of months ago I saw the WDTV Live, one of the new media players from Western Digital, the company that makes the popular Passport external hard drives. The device plays pretty much any type of media file around today, from mp3 songs to the current mkv H264 HD video files. Even though it lacks a couple of expected features like skipping instantly to a specific part of a movie, it felt great to play movies on my LCD without any noise whatsoever since the WDTV has no fans and no moving parts. To play movies, simply plug in an external hard drive to one of the two USB ports on the WDTV.

WDTV Live with the flash drive plugged in

While trying to use my Android phone as a wifi remote control for the player, I stumbled across a special firmware called WDLXTV that among lots of goodies contains, you guessed it, a Bittorrent client. Here seemed the perfect solution so I looked up the WDTVs power consumption:

Source: WDC Community

It’s not perfect but it’s a huge improvement over the mac mini’s 85W. Downloading will probably hit between 6 and 8 Watts.

To make it even better and not hammer an external mechanical hard drive, I just plugged in a 16GB USB 2.0 flash drive (32 would be even better) and make the nightly electricity consumption a fraction of the Mac Mini’s. The whole setup is 100% silent.

If you’re ready to start, the software setup takes a little work but this wikipedia article will walk you through. Of course you need a computer to get your torrent files and get the downloads running but you can turn it off as soon as you get your torrents going. You just connect remotely via web to the WDLXTV interface and feed it the torrent files. Once downloads are finished, transfer the files via network, to the hard drive attached to your WDTV, or by unplugging the flash drive and transferring the files directly to your computer. The rtorrent interface is not as sleek as a desktop application but serves its purpose.

The WDLXTV rtorrent interface

The savings won’t change the world but it will make you feel good and if we all hop on, it will make a difference. Happy energy efficient downloading!

Tugboat engines typically produce 500 to 2,500 kW, but larger boats (used in deep waters) can have power ratings up to 20,000 kW. They usually have an extreme power, with a tonnage-ratio of 2.20 to 4.50 (times they can maneuver their own weight). Small harbour-tugs have a ratio of 4.0 to 9.5. The engines are often the same as those used in railroad locomotives, but typically drive the propeller mechanically instead of converting the engine output to power electric motors, as is common for railroad engines.

As you might suppose, ports can have a negative impact on air quality in the populated areas that surround them. The many emissions sources at ports include ships, trucks, trains, and cargo-handling equipment. Harbor-crafts also contribute a significant portion of total port emissions. These, obviously, include tugboats, ferries, fishing boats, and dredge vessels.

But recently, the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have started using a hybrid electric tugboat. A new study by the University of California (UC) Riverside has shown that this has been effective at reducing emissions.

Since the massive engines can consume large amounts of fuel and produce harmful emissions full of diesel particulates, the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have become the largest contributors of air pollution in the South Coast Basin according to the California Air Resources Board (CARB). Pollution from the diesel-powered tugboats and other port emission sources has caused negative health effects on the surrounding population, including cancer and respiratory illnesses.

Now the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, the largest container ports in the US, are home to the first and only hybrid electric tugboat in the world. Named the Carolyn Dorothy, it runs on four diesel engines and 126 batteries. Thanks to the fundraising of the two ports and the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the vessel, which was built by Foss Maritime and costed US$1.35 million, began its operational duty in January of 2009.

Researchers from UC Riverside’s College of Engineering Center for Environmental Research and Technology conducted a study to see how much emissions the new hybrid tugboat saved. They found it decreased emissions of soot by 73 percent, nitrogen oxides (smog forming compounds) by 51 percent, and CO2 (greenhouse gas) by 27 percent.

Via: ENN | California Environmental Protection Agency

The new nanoparticles could replace the electricity powered street light with biologically powered light that removes CO2 from the atmosphere 24 hours a days.

"In the future, bio-LED could be used to make roadside trees luminescent at night," said Yen-Hsun Su in an interview with Chemistry World. "This will save energy and absorb CO2 as the bio-LED luminescence will cause the chloroplast to conduct photosynthesis."

The gold, sea urchin shaped nanoparticles are the key to turning a material that normal absorbs light into one that emits it.

Chlorophyll, the photosynthetic pigment that gives leaves their characteristic green color, is widely known for its ability to absorb certain wavelengths of light. However, under certain circumstances, such as being exposed to violet light, chlorophyll can also produce a light of its own. When exposed to light with a wavelengths of about 400 nanometers the normally green colored chlorophyll glows red.

Violet light is hard to come by though, especially at night, when glowing leaves would be useful to drivers and pedestrians. The scientists needed a source of violet light, and found it in the gold nanoparticles.

When shorter wavelengths of light, invisible to the human eye, hit the gold nanoparticles, they get excited and start to glow violet. That violet light strikes the nearby chlorophyll molecules, excites them, and the chlorophyll then produces the red light.

The scientists, who published their work on bio LEDs in the journal Nanoscale, hope that that trees treated with the gold nanoparticles would produce enough light that they could replace electric or gas street lights.

For now however, the effect is limited to the scientist’s test subject, an aquatic plant known as Bacopa caroliniana. Expanding to terrestrial plants, the kind that line streets, should be possible, said Krishanu Ray, a scientist at the University of Maryland, with some additional work.

"They certainly could be used as street lights," said Ray. "But that’s a long way away."

Via: Discovery News

With several domestic manufacturers all working in this direction, such a goal does not seem too far fetched. BMW, Mercedes and Audi have all been moving forward with their own electric vehicle plans. Compared to other automobile manufacturers, BMW has been behind in electric car research and development. BMW’s German competitors have released or are developing new electric vehicle models the past several months.

But aware of its backward situation BMW has taken a large step forward towards the electric vehicle technology. The German firm announced it will invest about US$560 million in electric vehicle manufacturing. So far efforts had been limited to the Mini E pilot program, which might lead to a broader range of electric vehicles (EV).

The decision to boost spending in EV will keep some BMW designers, engineers, and production line workers busy the next few years. For now the new investment will create about 800 jobs at BMW’s Leipzig plant. By 2013, what BMW describes as its "Mega City Vehicle" will churn out of the assembly lines.

Much of the Mega City Vehicle’s design will be based on the data from BMW’s 600 or so Mini E leases. Evidence suggests that that car will have a 150 mile range per charge, a 134 horsepower motor, and can reach a top speed of about 90 miles per hour. It is expected a complete redesign, from the chassis to the material used in the panels, which will be a lightweight carbon-fiber plastic composite.

Via: ENN | Triple Pundit

With a a weight of 324 lbs (147 kg) and a power battery of 6.0 kWh, the motorcycle has an average urban commuting range of 80 miles (sub urban/rural commuting range is 60 miles and high speed commuting range is 40 miles). This means that the latest Brammo Power battery doubles the range of its previous model (Enertia), which was just 40 miles.

The Enertia Plus will also feature a number of enhancements including simplified charging, improved maneuverability, plus the option to add a center kick stand and rigid Givi side bags.

The company webpage includes a visual and useful carbon calculator which allow users to check out the economic and carbon benefits of using the Enertia Plus. According to their estimates (and compared with a mid-size motorcycle) with a typical daily trip of 32 miles, a fuel price of US$ 2.91 per gallon and an emission factor of 5,035 lbs of CO2 per gallon burned, the Enertia Plus allows you to reduce your carbon footprint by 12% and your transportation CO2 by 41%. This is just in case your electricity is supplied 100% clean. If it came from petroleum, values would vary to 8% and 28% respectively.

Furthermore, the Enertia Plus will be eligible for all applicable Federal and State electric vehicle tax incentives. The expected final price is US$ 8,995.

Some of the ways that Brammo and the Enertia help to keep the world cleaner are:

• 100% electrical motor; no gasoline, motor oil, or other petrochemicals
• Manufactured in the United States with 100% clean energy
• Uses recycled materials in many components
• Production requires less than 10% of the material resources needed for an average car
• The Enertia powercycle can be recycled
• The Enertia’s Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries are very safe and do not contain any heavy metals
• The Enertia’s batteries can be recycled for many other uses
• BRAMMO is a 100% clean technology company
  

Brammo Inc is a leading electric vehicle technology company headquartered in North America. Brammo designs and develops electric vehicles including the award winning Brammo Enertia voted electric motorcycle of the year 2010 and the game changing Empulse. Brammo has vehicle distribution and marketing operations in North America, Europe and Asia.

Via: Engadget | Brammo

It will sound like a paradox for a show whose goal is to drive the fastest way possible, and consequently burning fossil fuels to the max. However, the National Association for Auto Stock Car Racing, the world’s largest motor sports association, is trying to green its image.

43 cars can be in the starting field and the races can be up to 500 miles long driving at extremely fast speeds. The fastest track is the Talledega Superspeedway with an average speed of 188 miles per hour! (303 km/hr). And with an average fuel consumption of one U.S. gallon every 5 miles! this means somehow like 21,500 gallons (81,377 liters) for the full race.

One environmental critic recently estimated NASCAR’s total fuel consumption across all series at 2 million U.S. gallons (7.57 million liters) of gas for one season. This means approximately 1,800 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year.

Realizing the environmental impact, and the bad opinion that is surging consequently, the league has taken some big steps to green their image in the last few years. The management of the association, under NASCAR chairman and CEO Brian France, is making efforts to offset their carbon emissions. They have joined forces with sponsors to set up the world’s largest recycling program. They maintain the world’s largest solar-powered sports facility at the Pocono Raceway. They have also done a massive tree-planting which NASCAR claims neutralized all carbon emissions produced by the Sprint Cup Series racecars.

The last and most recent step may be undertaken by the association in 2011. It would consist of changing the fuel used in all three major national series to Sunoco Green E15, a 15 percent ethanol blend made from domestic corn. While the benefits of corn-based ethanol are debatable, they will help NASCAR lower carbon emissions while not affecting engine performance, the sport’s biggest concern.

This is not a huge step, but it is a significant one in the right direction. The next move which the league is considering is the introduction of electronic fuel-injection which could greatly improve miles per gallon.

Via: ENN | NASCAR

Due to their comparatively early stage of development, OLEDs typically emit less light per unit area than inorganic solid-state based LEDs similarly designed for use as point-light sources. Despite this, OLEDs are used in television screens, computer monitors, mobile phones and PDAs, watches and can also be used in light sources for general space illumination and in large-area light-emitting elements.

But traditionally, OLEDs have had some disadvantages. Probably the biggest technical problem was the limited lifetime of the organic materials (historically around 14,000 hours compared to 60,000 hours of LCD or LED technology). And a second issue has been a color unbalance problem, because material used to produce blue light degrades significantly more rapidly than the materials that produce other color. And there has been also a final problem, the power consumption. While displaying primarily black images with an OLED would consume around 40% of the power of an LCD, the proportion is over three times as much power to display an image with a white background. But quick improvements have changed this situation radically!

Novaled, a leading company in OLEDs for display and lighting applications, has demonstrated white top-emitting devices with a lifetime exceeding 50,000 h and a power efficiency of 30 lm/W at an initial luminance of 1,000 cd/m². It’s by far a better power efficiency than conventional 60-100W incandescent light bulbs (which produces around 15 lm/W) but still far beyond standard fluorescent lights (which can produce up to 100 lm/W). But at least is an important step and there is hope for optimism.

Furthermore, active matrix OLEDs offer colour range equals or exceeds NTSC standards. Contrast ratios in the range of 1,000,000 to 2,000,000:1 make these colours look even more brilliant. And OLEDs refresh takes microseconds as opposed to LCDs’ milliseconds, and there is no loss of contrast at off angles.

OLEDs represent an interesting future for a vast array of completely new lighting applications. By combining colour with shape, organic LEDs can introduce a new way to use light for decorating and creating personalized surroundings. Additionally, OLEDs offer the potential to become even more cost and energy-efficient than energy-saving bulbs. Do you want to see some examples of the potential of OLEDs? Just check this out.

Via: Inhabitat | Novaled

In February 2009 the city of San Francisco announced that it was installing three EV charging stations as part of a pilot project. The aim of the project is to allow the Bay Area attain and mantain state and national air quality standards. Fostering the use of electric vehicles will be a key action to reduce pollution, since in the Bay Area the transportation sector accounts for more than 50 percert of air pollution.

In November 2008, the mayors of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose announced their ambitious goal of turning the Bay Area into the electric vehicle capital of the country. In December 2008 the San Francisco Mayor’s office released a nine-point plan to foster the implantation of the electric vehicle:

1.Expedited permitting and installation of electric vehicle charging outlets at homes, businesses, parking lots, and other buildings throughout the Bay Area;

2.Incentives for employers to install EV charging systems in their workplaces and provide similar incentives to parking facilities and other locations where EV charging stations can be installed;

3.Harmonize local regulations and standards across the region that govern EV infrastructure to achieve regulatory consistency for EV companies as well as expanded range for EV consumers;

4.Establish common government programs that promote the purchase of EVs;

5.Link EV programs and infrastructure to regional transit and air quality programs;

6.Establish programs for aggressive pooled-purchase orders for EVs in municipal, state government, and private sector fleets, and future commitment of purchasing preference for EV vehicles;

7.Expedited permitting and approval for facilities that provide extended-range driving capability for EVs in the region through battery exchange locations or fast-charging;

8.Identify and secure suitable standard (110V) electric outlets for charging low-voltage EVs in every government building in 2009;

9.Identify roll-out plan for placement of 220V EV-charging equipment throughout each city including city parking lots and curbside parking.

Via: Cnet News

“This enclosed turbine should produce significant power at half the life-cycle cost of the windmills” says Howard Fuller, its inventor.

By rebalancing the blades of conventional wind turbines, the inventor was able to eliminate the up-tower maintenance.

A proof of concept model exists and a prototype is expected to generate 10kW, with production units ranging from 5 to 100kW. An insignificant amount, perhaps, compared to a 3MW windmill, but – argues Fuller – power generation can be scaled up by grouping arrays more densely, with blade clearance no longer a concern.

“The fact that people are coming up with such a variety of solutions testifies to the vibrancy and viability of the wind energy market, and shows that there is a lot of potential”, said Nick Medic of Renewable UK

Whether the Fuller can boost micro-wind for the home remains to be seen.

Via: World Changing

Now we want to introduce you an even more amazing project: an unmanned solar-powered plane. It is called Zephyr: a super-lightweight, carbon-fiber craft, weighing only 50 kilograms, with a giant wingspan of 22.5 meters.  The wings are covered in thin-film solar panels that charge its lithium-sulphur batteries, which power the engines when the sun goes down.

This solar aircraft is breaking both man and unmanned records, by spending an entire week in the air, which is twice the time an unmanned flight was ever recorded. But that is just the beginning: Zephyr aims to stay in the air for a total of 14 days!

The Army´s Yume Gronund in Arizona is the place where the craft has been flying. The reason: the potential applications for this type of solar-powered craft include military surveillance (as well as scientific roles like ecosystem observation).

Via: EcoGeek

The main reasons it took so long to design an all-electric helicopter were the weight of the batteries and their low capacity. But fortunately advancements in battery technology brought as an outcome the development of the next-gen batteries. These batteries are not only lightweight, but energy dense.

And Sikorsky proves that time has arrived for batteries to be used to power helicopters.

We present you the new Project Firefly: an all-electric helicopter that replaces original 190hp 4-cylinder gas engine with a 200hp electric motor powered by lithium ion batteries.

Project Firefly will be unveiled at the EAA Airventure in Oshkosh as a technology demonstrator designed to enable manned flight of an electric helicopter.

At the time, the electric helicopter is able to fly for approximately 15 minutes.

Via: EcoFriend

Scott Faris is the CEO of Planar Energy, a spin-off of the National Renewable Energy Laboratories (NREL). Scott looks happy. Why? His startup has developed new manufacturing techniques that could improve the stability and lifetime of batteries used in electric vehicles.

Conventional batteries use a liquid electrolyte which can suffer from chemical reactions that damage the battery’s cathode. Solid-state batteries are an option, but their production requires complex and costly methods, and have been difficult to scale up to the size needed for vehicles. Planar Energy has opted to replace the liquid electrolyte with a solid ion conductor. This technique improves battery stability, lifetime and allow to reduce its size. Furthermore solid electrolytes are also compatible with a wider range of battery chemistries that could potentially offer higher power or storage density.

The thickness of solid-state batteries is crucial for a higher energy storage capacity. For this reason thin-film batteries are used only in small devices. But efforts to use printing processes to make thicker solid-state batteries have been stymied by the lack of a printable solid electrolyte material.

For this purpose Scott is clear: “the key to Planar’s technology is its printing process”. And Sudipta Seal, director of the Advanced Materials Processing and Analysis Center at the University of Central Florida, adds: "They’re able to make a solid electrolyte using a roll-to-roll process–that’s their strength".

Planar Energy has received $4 million in funding from the Advanced Research Projects Agency Energy Program this spring. With that money it has developed a roll-to-roll process for making larger solid lithium-ion batteries, with three times more storage than liquid lithium-ion batteries of the same size.

Currently the company is working on scaling up solid-state lithium-ion batteries and on reducing capital costs by half compared with solid-state battery manufacturing by using high-vacuum machinery. Next year the company plans to build its pilot line. In the long-term solid batteries have the potential to scale from portable electronics to automotive batteries.

Via: Technology View

Palestina is sadly known for its never-ending conflict. But today a bright light ray is appearing among dark clouds. In Palestina there is also space for the green technology. At least is what engineering students from Hebron have demonstrated.

Three students at Palestine Polytechnic University (PPU) in Hebron have built the first solar-powered car of the region, as a part of a project developing renewable energy sources to replace the diesel, petrol or donkey power in the transportation sector. The car is bedecked with banks of solar panels and doesn’t manage to reach a speed much above 19 mph (30 kmph) – but it is being lauded as a feat of creative engineering in the face of limited funds and scant resources.

“It was a complicated project and our students designed and built everything in this car from scratch," says Dr Zahdi Salhab, director of the mechanical engineering department at PPU in Hebron. Salhab also stresses the importance of the project in a region where there is “almost no industry, so nearly all our pollution is from vehicles".

The car, which took several months to design, is equipped with a 2bhp electric engine fed by a battery that stores energy harnessed by roof-mounted reflective solar panels. Luckily the region is abundant in sunshine, but just in case the car battery can also be charged using mains electricity on cloudy days.

The cost to build the prototype was around $4,000, but the cost for building a real one (that would perform better, go faster, for longer and would be able to drive in all conditions) would double that price.

Although this is a pioneering project in Palestina, one neighbor, the Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi, already launched a pilot electric car network two years ago. The company he runs, Better Place, seeks to have electric cars available for commercial use in Israel by 2011.

Via: Guardian.com

This shift to hybrid technology suggests that Honda is looking to invest in initiatives that will bring them to a point where they can produce an effective vehicle at a price that can attract a significant number of buyers.

Great initiatives that we applaud and expect other companies will follow!

Via: Inhabitat

Jointly with Vinod Khosla, from Khosla Ventures of Menlo Park (California), Bill Gates has invested $23.5 millions for engineering and testing the EcoMotors International trademarked opoc™ engine technology. EcoMotors is working on its sixth-generation engine and the new funds may be used for the next engine configuration.

Gates said in a statement that “the technology may be a stepping stone in advancing affordable, low-emission transportation”. Khosla adds that “the only truly disruptive technologies are those that can provide not only payback in months but also economic and carbon benefits to large segments of the world’s population without the need for subsidies or massive infrastructure investments. Among next-generation propulsion systems, the opoc™ engine is broadly applicable and can provide lower carbon emissions than almost any other technology.”

EcoMotors, based in suburban Detroit, says the opoc™ architecture allows its opposed piston-opposed cylinder engines to use 50 percent fewer parts than standard engines, while providing 50 percent more fuel efficiency.

Thus, according to EcoMotors the revolutionary opoc™ architecture of opposed pistons and opposed cylinders provides unparalleled benefits:

× High Efficiency: The unique engine architecture – which offers true modular displacement capability — delivers up to 50% greater fuel efficiency compared with conventional engines of similar output, along with a corresponding reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

× Half the weight and half the size of conventional engines: The opoc™ engine provides unparalleled power density and flexibility in automobile and truck design as well as other engine applications.

× Low Cost: With 50% fewer parts than a conventional engine, the opoc™ is less expensive to manufacture, to purchase, to operate and to tool up.

How does the engine work?

As EcoMotors reports, the opposed-piston opposed-cylinder engine patented design “creates a ground-breaking internal combustion engine family that will run on a number of different fuels, including gasoline, diesel and ethanol. The engine operates on the 2-cycle principle, generating one power stroke per crank revolution per cylinder. It comprises two opposing cylinders per module, with a crankshaft between them, and each cylinder has two pistons moving in opposite directions. This innovative design configuration eliminates the cylinder-head and valve-train components of conventional engines, offering an efficient, compact and simple core engine structure. The result is an engine family that is lighter, more efficient and economical, with lower exhaust emissions compared with conventional designs. Here you can see this revolutionary 2-stroke engine in operation, which helps to illustrate the simplicity, elegance and compactness of its design”.

Via: AutoWeek | Eco Motors

Imagine you are about to get the top of a 3,000 meters mountain height. The sunset is amazing and the potential shot is the one you were expecting for long time. And suddenly the batteries from your camera run out!

In that case you would be really pleased to Yanko Design, the website which hides the name of the designer of a new concept of a camera strap, capable to power your camera only with the help of the sun. The Solar Camera Strap is a sturdy strap to secure the camera and to power it via thin solar panels across the width of the strap.

The Solar Camera Strap concept was an idea of Weng Jie, and consists of a row of tiny flexible solar panels on the strap that enables the camera batteries to be charging whenever the photographer is shooting in daylight. And what happens when the night is coming? No problem, the strap also contains a storage battery into each end of it.

The strap is a new pilot design, so it’s not clear if cameras would need some modification to allow them to be powered by the solar camera strap itself. At first sight it is a good charger gadget since power requirements for modern cameras are very low. Thus the solar camera strap may be more successful than other existing solar chargers, like the ones used to power smartphones.

At the moment, the strap is only at the concept stage and is not yet available and there is no word on when or if it will ever be commercialized.

Yanko Design is a website focusing on introducing modern designs in a wide range of fields, including interior design, architecture, fashion, and industrial design.

Via: Physorg

At first sight it may appear to be a regular soccer ball, except for the iconic black pentagonal patches, which have been replaced with solar cells.

But Greendix has even more ambitious plans for this soccer ball: using motion-sensing technology that the company is currently developing, the ball will allow visually impaired people to play soccer. This way, and thanks to an audio device, each time the prototype is kicked, it emits a tracking sound.

“The main goal of this project was to prove that solar panels can be integrated into any object that we interact with on a daily basis and to push the limits of what is possible with solar panels,” explained Joseph Lin from Greendix.

Wouldn’t it be great to see this solar powered ball being used at the next World Cup?

The wireless mouse relies on piezoelectric elements to generate power, a technology that is available and has made an appearance in some watches. Thanks to an innovative design, which includes regional sourcing and assembly, product take-back and recycling and availability of disassembly data to recycling centers, Corky participated in the 2010 Greener Gadgets Design Competition. It didn’t win but a 5th place, out of 18, is not that bad.

In electronics recycling the process of dismantling and recycling a device is difficult if not impossible, since disassembly information is often considered proprietary and not disclosed. For this reason, the sustainability system-based approach involving Corky is highly appreciated!

The author, Adele Peters, well deserves an applause… On second thoughts we’d better use our hand to power the mouse!

Via: Inhabitat | Green Packs | Green Gadgets

Ideally, our homes and buildings would not need air conditioning during summer. Constructions could be made in a way that they efficiently keep summer heat out and cool air inside. But unfortunately most of our present day buildings do not have these features, so they require AC units to maintain a comfortable, cool environment during summer working hours. In fact, air conditioning is responsible for up to 5 percent of USA’s annual energy use, so in addition to better insulated and better designed buildings, more efficient air conditioning units would be another solution to tackle this extreme energy consumption.

A team of scientists from NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory) has created an air conditioning process that is 90 percent more efficient than the top of the line units available today. The new discovery consists of membranes, evaporative cooling and liquid desiccants to remove heat from the air. Evaporative cooling is a process that has only worked well in dry climates in the past because the cooled air added humidity to the cool air output.

Combining those two things isn’t new, but nobody has made it work well so far. Until now, that is. NREL has solved the issue in their newest technology (called DEVap) through the addition of the liquid desiccants, which remove humidity from the cooled air.

Yet another benefit to be found in this innovative product is the replacement of the harmful refrigerants chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) or hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) which produce about 2,000 pounds of CO2 per pound of refrigerant (a typical residential size AC has as much as 13 pounds of these refrigerants), by simple, harmless salt solutions.

The DEVap technology is being created and tested as we speak, so it will still be under development for the next 5 years, but once perfected it is sure to be put up for commercial use. NREL has designed these new AC units in a way that they can easily replace the already existing ones with little modifications necessary , allowing the DEVap technology to be used as soon as it is ready.

via: EcoGeek

Kettles are one of the most used appliances in the kitchen. In the UK, a standard kettle is used between 4 and 7 seven times a day, that is to say, between 1,500 and 2,500 times per year. According to Energy Saving Trust, if every household in the country used a 20% more efficient energy kettle there would be a saving around £170 million of electricity a year. As well as this, if everyone boiled only the water they needed each time they used the kettle, the electricity saved in a year would be enough to power the UK’s street lights for nearly 7 months.

How can a standard kettle be more environmentally friendly? There are three simple ways:

1) Making it easier to view the level of water in the kettle: 1.27 billion kWh of electricity could be saved every year only in the UK doing that.

2) Keeping water hot for longer: having a well insulated kettle would mean less energy would be needed later on when you needed more hot water.

3) Fitting a temperature gauge: There wouldn’t be need to re-boil water if you knew that the water inside the kettle was still hot enough to make your drink.

And for this purpose, we have eco kettles. The eco kettles heat water efficiently, which means just heating the amount of water that you need, and keeping boiled water hot for longer. And, which is the latest champion in eco boiling? The Energy Sense Kettle, by Kenwood. This new kettle, via and improved water heating technology and the guidance to only boil the water required, is able to save up to 35% of the electrical usage of an average electric kettle.

The Energy Sense Kettle is just £47.99 and comes in a recycled box that can itself be recycled, and without bright pictures to help towards more eco friendly packaging.

And if you want to find more recommended eco kettles just click here!

Via: Envirogadget | Energy Saving Trust

The company started off applying it’s fuel cell technologies in simple consumer products, but continuously evolving towards more complex and higher power industrial-grade products. As a consequence Horizon is today the world’s leading producer and marketer of fuel cell products, innovating constantly with different breakthroughs.

Fuel cells are basically electrochemical cells that convert a source fuel into electrical current, generally, hydrogen is used as fuel, and oxygen (from the air) is used as the oxidant that will trigger the chemical reaction to create the electrical current. Horizon strives to solve the access to hydrogen for mainstream users as a power source buy providing their hydrogen-powered fuel cells.

Horizon’s newest and most innovating product consists in a palm-sized fuel cell power plant, the MiniPAK. This new gadget costs only $100 a unit, and includes two refillable “solid-state” hydrogen fuel cartridges. Each one of these contains the same amount of energy as 1,000 disposable AA batteries! Simply placing the cartridge in the fuel cell will allow people to charge electronic devices on the go. A single cartridge works on any electronic device that needs up to 3W of power, this includes cell-phones, MP3 players and GPS devices.

via: Inhabitat

The inventor was awarded the 2010 Millennium Prize which consists in a 800,000-euro prize, awarded once every two years for a specific and groundbreaking innovation that has a favourable impact on the quality of life and human well-being. Graetzel is the 4th winner of this prestigious award, which was handed out for the first time in 2004 to Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web.

The Graetzel Cells where created at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, where the inventor pioneered their research. He claims that natural photosynthesis was what triggered his interest in organic energy generators. “The way a plant is able to use molecules from water, oxygen and CO2 to generate charges, and how nature then uses those charges to make chemicals”. Trying to mimic what plants do by nature, Graetzel brought the organic Solar-Cells to life.

The greatest aspect of these dye-sensitized solar cells is the price-performance ratio they have achieved. These low-cost solar panels hope to bring large-scale solutions in renewable energy technologies. Manufacturing them consists of using a few simple materials: conducting glass, titanium oxide, graphite, electrolyte liquid and finally colorant, which can be easily squeezed from berries.

The simple manufacturing process involved in making these solar panels allows them to be used almost anywhere. Although their efficiency levels are not as high as that of the regular silicone panels, they have the great advantage to be able to be made translucid. The glass has to be colored in order to work, but faint coloring is still as efficient and would allow people to see through these solar-cell panels.

Another positive characteristic that these panels hold is their flexibility, they are perfectly adaptable to any shape. Graetzel hopes his solar cells will start to become integrated in living spaces, to be used in pieces of furniture street lights, windows, virtually any object. This could be the beginning of the slow process in creating a world without plugs.

Via: PC Mag and Engadget

The concept of packed garbage was born when one of Gignac’s co-workers challenged him into selling something no one would want just by placing it in some pleasant looking packaging. So, in other words, the project was actually just proving the importance of package design. But it didn’t end at that.

When faced with the idea of packing something no one would want, not to mention buy, one immediate idea came to him: garbage. Gignac then started wandering around NYC in search for trash, Times Square turned out to be one of the best sources for his art. He later packed his newly found garbage in “smell-proof” boxes and started selling them at $50 each. Who could have guessed that 8 years later over 1,200 NYC Garbage cubes had been sold, and are now to be found in more than 25 countries worldwide.

Embracing the success that these boxes had, the artist then went off to create special editions cubes: New Year’s Eve at Times Square, opening day at Yankee Stadium, St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin, Ireland, to name a few.

Not only is this concept of packing trash very inventive and creative, it also helps keep trash off our streets. Although it may be alarming that so much trash is to be found lying around the city to have been able to sustain this project, it is great that someone found a creative way to do something about it. Not only is Gignac creating conceptual art, he is also doing his small part in keeping NYC green.

Via: NYC Garbarge

American designer Justin Kakobson came up with an amazing idea to stop feeding landfills with our takeout packagings: he has managed to transform the discarded material into lightweight portable speakers. The speakers do not only contribute in keeping our planet clean, they are also incredibly functional and look amazing!

This ingenious designer did not stop at the paper takeout box speakers, he has also designed a bamboo camera and a milk bottle USB.

Via: EcoFriend

The pilot was Markus Scherdel, one of the leaders of the project. He said that “Despite its immense size and feather weight, the aircraft’s controllability matches our expectations.” The wingspan is of more than 60 meters, but the weight is similar to that of a small car, around 1600 kg.

The plane is entirely powered by solar photovoltaic power, with 12,000 solar cells covering the wings.

Yesterday’s flight was 87 minutes long, and Scherdel took the plane to 5,5000 ft high. The average speed was 44 mph. The pilot recognized that this is quite slow, “at one point the ground speed had dropped to 12 knots per hour (22 km/h)”. One of the next goals is to test “the critical parameters of the plane”.

We hope this flight has shown the world that renewable energies can be trusted and are worthy of being investigated and developed. The best of lucks to the Solar Impulse team, hoping they continue to advance the application of solar power to aviation.

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