Energía Renovable | Renewable Energy

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Iowa Now Receives 20% of Its Power from Wind

by Diane Pham, 08/11/11


If you thought that middle America was the last to be concerned about their carbon footprint, think again. Iowa now ranks as the top state to receive the greatest percentage of its power from wind. According to the Des Moines Register is reporting, wind generation hit the 20% the second quarter of this year, and it looks like the state is working hard to increase this number even further. Currently best known for their production of corn, our friends in the midwest could soon be changing their street cred by rocking wind power.




According to the American Wind Energy Association, the second quarter boost came from MidAmerican Energy’s new 594-megawatt wind farm near Adair — the first of three major wind projects the Des Moines utility plans for this year. The company already had 1,330 megawatts of wind generation capacity on its system.
Iowa is now the second biggest wind power market in the nation, with over 4,000 megawatts of installed capacity, only behind Texas who produces 9,000 MW.
So does this mean wind power back on the rise? Here’s hoping we all get swept away by the trend.

Read more: Iowa Now Receives 20% of Its Power from Wind | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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D.I.Y. LARGE SCALE SOLAR POWER.
by Bruce Mulliken, Green Energy News


Cut costs. That should be the mantra of solar energy. (Or any other renewable, for that matter.) Use every trick in the book. Do everything possible to reduce the cost of a solar energy installation, even if it means doing it yourself, with your own two hands.
Solar energy is doing great. Business is booming. But to compete with conventional energy for widespread deployment it has to get much, much cheaper.
Aside from looking to manufacturers, competition in the marketplace and government incentives to lower costs, total system costs including installation and maintenance need to be constantly tweaked and fine-tuned to pinch pennies.
This snippet from the “Seven Days of Solar”column in this publication says more than few words.
“UPS has installed a rooftop solar array on its 70,000-square-foot Lakewood, New Jersey facility. The installation is the first in a series of investments planned by UPS to increase the company’s reliance on renewable energy. The 250 kW solar power system, using 1036 solar panels from Suniva, will provide nearly 30 percent of the building’s annual energy needs.
“The Lakewood installation was custom-designed and will be owned and operated by UPS in contrast to many solar projects that are owned and managed by third parties. This owner-operator approach saves engineering and construction costs. UPS is assessing other facilities now to gauge their suitability for solar installations.”
Read that above paragraph again.
“The Lakewood installation was custom-designed and will be owned and operated by UPS in contrast to many solar projects that are owned and managed by third parties. This owner-operator approach saves engineering and construction costs. UPS is assessing other facilities now to gauge their suitability for solar installations.”
UPS is spot on. Many large-scale solar power plants are operated by outsiders that don’t own the site of the project or the facilities using the solar generated electricity. Those third parties don’t work for free. The services they provide, from installation to maintenance after completion, generate revenues for those companies and add to to cost the of the solar plant. What UPS is saying is that a solar systems can be designed, engineered, built and maintained in-house, saving a bundle over time by not paying a middleman.

UPS - United Parcel Service – the package delivery company with the dark brown, government-looking vans (Brown shows less dirt) has a long history of closely evaluating its own business operations and developing solutions for problems in-house. For instance, after considerable study of driving patterns the company announced in 2004 that they would save fuel by minimizing left hand turns. (Waiting to turn left across traffic or at traffic lights wastes fuel while idling.) UPS developed its own software package that creates pickup and delivery routes that have a preference for right-hand, go-with-the-flow turns.
In 2005, for example, UPS eliminated 464,000 miles from its travel and saved 51,000 gallons of fuel within Washington D.C. alone just by steering mostly to the right.
If a company is smart enough to figure out how to save money by changing drivers routes it clearly has the ability to design and install solar systems.
Developing solar cell chemistry and manufacturing solar cells themselves IS rocket science. Figuring out how and where to install thousands of solar panels is not. It can be learned. Many companies, particularly those large enough to have a maintenance and construction staff or an in-house engineering team, ought to be able to learn the ropes of designing, building and maintaining a solar electric system. In particular, companies where the physical plant itself is a major component of business operations, such as manufacturers or shipping and handling business, should be able design and build their own systems. I would guess the engineers at any car company could figure out how to design a solar electric system to put on a plant roof.
It’s true that many companies don’t have or will never ever have the skills needed to install their own solar system. Many companies simply won’t want to. These companies will provide plenty of business opportunities for solar system integrators well into the future.
Still for companies willing to learn a new trade, that have the tools to install a system, and like taking on Do-it-yourself (DIY) projects, they will get clean reliable power without paying a middleman one penny.
http://www.green-energy-news.com/arc.../20110055.html

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Clear Path to Power: Transparent Battery = Clear Gadgets?


It would be hard to hide our enthusiasm for transparent gadgets, but for the most part the see-through things have been nothing more than concepts. That’s thanks to the innards of most gadgets being so difficult to produce in a transparent form, with the bulky battery being one of the biggest hurdles to overcome. A team of researchers at Stanford University has developed a transparent lithium-ion battery that could lead to truly transparent working gadgets in the very near future.
The battery isn’t actually invisible; rather, it is made up of an incredibly fine mesh of electrodes a mere 35 microns wide. That’s thin enough to appear invisible to the human eye. Currently the transparent battery doesn’t have a huge capacity; it can only hold about half as much power as a traditional lithium-ion battery. The capacity should increase as the research continues, but the battery already has the advantages of being flexible and inexpensive.
http://gajitz.com/clear-path-to-powe...clear-gadgets/

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Cheapest wave power yet: boats that go fishing for electricity






Okay, so this right here is a pretty terrible rendering. But the idea that it represents is a good one: by turning ships into mobile wave energy harvesters, you can cheaply and efficiently go out to the ocean and haul a big fat load of electricity back to your hungry customers. It's like fishing, except for power.
This idea of mobile wave energy harvesting is a simple one: you put wave energy harvesters on boats, send those boats out to sea, they sit out there for about a day riding the swell and charging their batteries, and then they come back in to shore and offload their electrical cargo. There's no complex and expensive undersea construction, no need for cables to run back to shore (at $1 million per mile), you can move the generators around easily, and best of all, we can retrofit ships to do this relatively cheaply.
Each 150 foot ship (like the concept pictured above) would be able to harvest about one megawatt of energy per hour, which is enough to power about a thousand homes. It would store up 20 megawatts in giant batteries over 20 hours at sea under average conditions, and then head back to port and pump all of that power into the grid. Once the transfer is complete, the generator can go back out again and fish up another load. Get enough ships together, and you can harvest as much power as you need, since it's not like you're going to use up all the waves or anything.
Testing of scale models suggests that power produced this way could be as cheap as $0.15 per kilowatt-hour, which is half the cost of solar and between half and a third the cost of conventional (stationary) wave harvesters. The residential consumers in the U.S. pay on average anywhere from $0.09 to $0.16 per kilowatt-hour, so this could definitely be a viable method for coastal areas. And besides, even if it does cost a smidge more, you're getting clean, renewable, eco-friendly power, and isn't that worth paying just a little extra for?
http://dvice.com/archives/2011/07/cheapest-wave-p.php

[NUMERATZI]

Que mucha noticia intereasante hoy!

[luisr]

La pregunta que me hago es qué fuente de energía usa ese barco para moverse? Porque si va a usar motores diesel no le veo tanta ventaja en términos ambientales. Solo me hace sentido si es totalmente eléctrico.

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Vycon Plans to Tap Speeding Subway Trains for Immense Amounts of Kinetic Energy

by Timon Singh, 09/01/11



London, New York, Paris – what do they all have in common? Apart from being among the world’s most energy-hungry cities, they all have underground subway systems. These public transport systems help millions of people each day to get to and from work, but what if they could also be used to help power these metropolises? Vycon Energy, who makes industrial flywheels, believes that they can tap the immense amount of kinetic energy carried by moving subway trains to subsidize city power systems. Not only would this reduce emissions, but it would also help to avoid peak power emergencies.




Vycon’s technology works in a similiar way to regenerative braking. Moving trains carry a lot of kinetic energy, and the company believes they can harness this energy whenever a train slows down at a station. By connecting a flywheel to the rail system, Vycon believes that the kinetic energy could be converted to electrical power. This electricity could then be used to get the train moving again – it is a system that has had been used with great success in hybrid vehicles. However trains would certainly generate a lot more energy then a Prius.
According to Green Tech Media, a 10-car subway train in New York’s system requires a jolt of three to four megawatts of power for 30 seconds to get up to cruising speed. That’s enough energy to power 1,300 average U.S. homes. The power usage is so great that train departures are staggered in order to accomdate the availability of power. Despite this, stations can still experience power drops. “Almost every rail company in the U.S. has a station where voltage sag is a problem,” said Louis Romo, vice president of sales at Vycon.
Vycon’s plan would see a decelerating subway train generate up to four megawatts of energy. This power would be sent to the company’s Regen flywheels, which would be housed at the station. It would then be sent to the train’s electric motor via the electric third rail.
“We can put back 90 percent of what we capture,” he said. “When the train wants to leave, you just use the energy you created.” If the energy that trains create can be re-used to power them in all these major cities, just think how much energy can be saved worldwide.
http://inhabitat.com/vycon-plans-to-...inetic-energy/

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NASA Developing Laser System That Could Increase Space Speed Communication by a Factor Of 100

by Timon Singh, 08/24/11


Those boffins at NASA are currently developing an optical laser system that will not only increase data rates, but also increase speed space communications by a factor of one hundred. According to the US Space Agency, the new system will also decrease the mass, size and power limits for interstellar communication.









The Laser Communications Relay technology is going to be trialled by NASA within the next four years in order to test communications in near-earth and deep-space human and robotic missions. Currently space communication is done on radio frequency (RF) systems. This severely limits data transmission rates and takes 90 minutes for a single high-resolution image to be beamed back to Earth from Mars. The new laser based system would allow 100 Mbps data rates instead of 6Mbps allowing a image to be beamed back in five minutes. For near-Earth communications, laser-based systems would speed communications up from Mbps to Gbps.
“Optical communication will enable rapid return of the voluminous data associated with sending spacecraft and humans to new frontiers,” said NASA chief technologist Bobby Braun in the statement.
Laser communications could also allow missions to use more bandwidth-hungry equipment such as hyperspectral imagers that collect images across the range of the electromagnetic spectrum.
The Laser Communications Relay will be tested on a demonstration mission planned for launch in 2016, and is part of a $175m (£106m) package to develop disruptive space technologies. Similiar projects will include solar sail deployments which NASA hopes will reduce the costs of commercial space flights.
If it’s successful, expect the Laser Communications Relay Demonstration Mission to be used by other US government agencies and possibly Earth-bound communication vendors.

http://inhabitat.com/nasa-developing...factor-of-100/

[NUMERATZI]

Lo bueno del lazer es que nadie te puede robar la señal... Lo malo es si la quieres robar.. Ahi te chabastes..

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New Carbon Nanotube Wind Turbine Blade is Lighter, Stronger, More Efficient

by Brit Liggett, 08/30/11


A researcher at Case Western University recently developed a wind turbine blade that is lighter and stronger than conventional prototypes. Increasing the size of wind turbines in order to increase their energy capacity has been difficult, since the parts become too heavy and prone to damage when enlarged. Now Case Western has created a new composite material made from a polyurethane base reinforced with carbon nanotubes that is lighter and eight times tougher than the material currently used to create wind turbine blades.






“Results of mechanical testing for the carbon nanotube reinforced polyurethane show that this material outperforms the currently used resins for wind blades applications,” said Ica Manas-Zloczower, professor of macromolecular science and engineering and associate dean in the Case School of Engineering. The turbine blade was built by Marcio Loos, a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, with the help of his Case Western colleagues.
Loos used a commercial template to build a 29-inch blade that is lighter and stronger than any blades currently on the market. “The idea behind all this is the need to develop stronger and lighter materials which will enable manufacturing of blades for larger rotors,” Loos said. Current large blade turbines are heavy, more wind is needed to turn them, and they spin less, which produces less energy. They are also prone to flexing in the wind, which also causes them to capture less energy than they potentially could. Loos’ blade — which was tested on a 400-watt turbine — promises to solve these problems, and his Case Western team is looking to use their turbine as an industry jumping point into carbon nanotube-reinforced turbines.

Read more: New Carbon Nanotube Wind Turbine Blade is Lighter, Stronger, More Efficient | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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The US and UK Join Forces and Lasers to Create Nuclear Fusion Energy

by Molly Cotter, 09/09/11


Scientists at the United State’s National Ignition Facility (NIF) are currently working on unlocking the key to nuclear fusion power by zapping atoms with giant lasers – and the project just got a major show of support from companies and laboratories the UK. The Rutherford Appleton Lab and the british company AWE have announced that they will join forces with the US to make this sustainable energy source a reality.





For those of us who need a science class refresher, nuclear fusion and fission are very different things. The nuclear plants that operate today use fission, the splitting of heavy atoms to create energy. Nuclear fusion is the slamming together of two light atoms to create much more energy. Think about the energy produced by an atomic bomb versus the energy produced by the sun.
In a meeting this week sponsored by the Institute of Physics, the Rutherford Appleton Lab announced their collaborative experiments with NIF’s lasers, which happen to include the largest one in the world. Scientists essentially fire hundreds of lasers at tiny pellets of hydrogen to compress the atoms. The energy, in the form of heat, can be captured and used.
Fusion technology has been in the works for many years. However its one fatal flaw is that no fusion reactor has been able to produce more energy than it consumes. The recent experiment finally did, for a tiny fraction of a second. If and when this technology is perfected (which scientists are now predicting will be a matter of a few years), the US and the UK will be at the forefront of alternative energy, creating miniature stars on earth.


Read more: The US and UK Join Forces and Lasers to Create Nuclear Fusion Energy | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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Scientists Developing Fuel Cell that Generates Power While Cleaning Nuclear Waste

by Brit Liggett, 09/07/11


Researchers at Michigan State University (MSU) have isolated and explained the phenomenon that causes microbes to generate electricity while cleaning up nuclear waste. The team is hoping to use their findings to create a microbial fuel cell that is capable of generating renewable energy while it cleans up environments exposed to nuclear waste. The bacteria the team studied is a kind of geobacter that is covered in a coat of tiny, natural nanowires that protect the bacteria from the toxic materials. The nanowires are also the essential elements in immobilizing radioactive material and preventing it from seeping into the groundwater. While completing the complex task of stabilizing radioactive spills, the bacteria simultaneously creates energy that can be harnessed and used as a zero-emissions power supply.






To study their findings the team took their research into the real world to a uranium mill tailings site in Rifle, Colorado where toxic spills had been documented. The MSU team released acetate — geobacter’s favorite food — into the groundwater that stimulated the growth of geobacters already in the area. The small geobacter colony already existed but the acetate allowed it to grow to a size that was successful in stabilizing the toxic spill and keeping it from spreading — all the while producing electricity that the team hopes, in the future, won’t go to waste.
“Our findings clearly identify nanowires as being the primary catalyst for uranium reduction.They are essentially performing nature’s version of electroplating with uranium, effectively immobilizing the radioactive material and preventing it from leaching into groundwater,” said Gemma Reguera a MSU microbiologist.
Reguera and her team were successful in genetically modifying the geobacter strain to increase their nanowire productivity and are currently filing for a patent on their research. The next step is developing that toxic waste-cleaning, energy producing, bacterial fuel cell.


Read more: Scientists Developing Fuel Cell that Generates Power While Cleaning Nuclear Waste | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

[Jaykar]

Esa ultima si que esta interesante.

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SolarCity’s SolarStrong Project Will Double the Number of Residential Solar Panels in the U.S.

by Jessica Dailey, 09/11/11

From solar backpacks to solar tents, the U.S. military has been implementing solar power (and other renewable energy sources) in innovative ways for quite some time. So it’s really no surprise that the military would want to expand its green efforts on the home front. Yesterday, the Obama administration approved a partial $344 million loan guarantee for SolarCity‘s SolarStrong Project, which will install solar panels on 160,000 homes across 124 military bases in 33 states. The new panels will essentially double the number of residential solar panels currently in use in the United States.






“This is the largest domestic residential rooftop solar project in history,” Energy Secretary Steven Chu said in a news release. “This groundbreaking project is expected to create hundreds of jobs for Americans and provide clean, renewable power to our military families.”
The SolarStrong project is currently underway, installing some 2,000 panels at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii. The private companies that run military housing bases are working with SolarCity to install the panels, but SolarCity will own and operate the systems.
Solar advocates hope that the project will show other home owners around the country how easy it is to use solar power to help our country improve its energy independence. Additionally, Tim Newell, the managing director of the U.S. Renewable Energy Group, the private equity firm providing the loan for the project, said that its a “low-risk” project, which should help the public see that residential solar panels really are a viable option for all home owners.
The Energy Department’s loan program has come under fire in the last week because of Solyndra’s filing for bankruptcy. The solar company had received some $530 million in loans.
“It’s important to remember that all of the capital (including the loan) for this project is being provided by the private sector,” Newell said in an email to the Associated Press. “DOE is only providing a guarantee for a portion of the project’s loan in order to reduce the financing cost and make it possible to include more states and more military bases in the project.”
But SolarCity and Solyndra are very different situations. SolarCity is an established company that has a very positive track record. Plus the loan will not even kick in until after many of the panels have already been installed. Solyndra, on the other hand, was a company just getting off the ground and was using the loan money to build facilities.


Read more: SolarCity's SolarStrong Project Will Double the Number of Residential Solar Panels in the U.S. | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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Green Energy Fund hands out $6.6M in solar incentives for homes, businesses

By : JOHN MARINO
marino@caribbeanbusinesspr.com



The Green Energy Fund (GEF) has handed out some $6.6 million for solar energy projects in island homes and businesses in its initial round, Puerto Rico government officials announced Wednesday. The government, which will contribute up to 60% of a project’s costs, said the 25 projects the fund would sponsor would comprise a total $14 million investment in the island economy and would create 2.4 megawatts of clean, solar power.
“The GEF provides economic incentives that drive the use of renewable energy sources at the residential, commercial and industrial levels, which will grant these sectors increased energy independence and a more sustainable development for the island,” Economic Development & Commerce Secretary José Ramón Pérez-Riera said.
“Each day more businesses, organizations and the public in general see renewable energy and energy conservation as the alternative to confront the high dependence on oil and energy consumption, while creating a green economy on our island,” added Juan Carlos Díaz, deputy director of the Puerto Rico Energy Affairs Administration.
The largest project the GEF is investing in is the Ports Authority’s $1.7 million, 500 kilowatt solar project at Ponce’s Mercedita Airport.
“With this first step, we are not only contributing to lowering the cost of energy and environmental contamination, but also strengthening an aggressive plan of reducing spending that we have implemented to return fiscal health to our agency,” Ports Authority Director Alberto Escudero Morales said.
Other large projects include Master Paints, Protecto Manufacturing, Martex Farms, Universidad Politécnica, Hogar de Nuestra Señora de Providencia and shopping centers like the Isla Verde Mall, Central Gran Caribe Mall in Vega Alta, Centro del Sur Mall in Ponce, Santa Rosa Mall in Bayamón and the Walmart store in Manatí.
Luis Raúl Pérez, vice president of operations for Protecto Manufacturing, said the firm is investing in solar technology because of its $120,000 annual power bill.
“The main reason for our participation is simple: the high cost of power. We are reducing power consumption but our energy costs have been climbing skyward anyway,” he said.
Grants are divided into Tier 1 (projects up to 100 kilowatts [kW]) and Tier 2 (100 kW to 1 MW), with the government covering up to 60% of Tier 1-project costs and up to 50% of Tier 2-project costs.
A four-day application window will be opened at the beginning of each quarter for Tier 2 projects, with the next one taking place Oct. 1-4. These projects are awarded on a competitive basis.
Tier 1 projects must meet standard requisites but otherwise are awarded on a first-come, first-served basis. These will be awarded every six months, with the next round taking place Jan. 1, 2012.
The fund, financed through the excise tax on motor vehicles, will provide $290 million over the next 10 years. The fund’s annual budget will increase in steps from its $20 million initial annual allotment to $40 million over the next several years. The fund’s administrative, oversight and other costs will be $1 million annually, officials indicated.
Officials say the fund will spend some $8 million on Tier 1 and $11 million on Tier 2 projects this year. They estimate it will create 150 direct jobs and an equal number of indirect jobs while funding 150 residential and small-business projects and 10 larger business projects during its first year of operation. The projects are expected to create more than 5 MW of power each year.
The GEF was created as part of energy reform legislation which calls for the government to generate 20% of its power from renewable resources by 2030. Currently, there is less than 1%.

http://www.caribbeanbusinesspr.com/n...=62156&ct_id=1

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Solar Dok Create a Green Charging Point for University of Florida Students

by Allison Leahy, 09/14/11

The University of Florida has just added a Solar Dok to its growing sustainability profile. Solar Dok is an off-grid solar powered electronics charging hub perfect for Internet cafes, college campuses and your back deck. Designed and fabricated by EnerFusion, the “SD-1″ design is made from recycled and recyclable materials (milk jugs, water bottles, aluminum) and includes internal batteries large enough to store energy for nighttime use, 4 power outlets, 2 USB ports and timed LED lights for late night bookworms.











The hub is capable of recharging pretty much any battery-powered device a gadget-loving college student would ever think to own; including laptops, cellphones, PDAs, DVD players, digital cameras, recorders, and personal gaming devices.
The Dok was chosen from a portfolio of solar projects because, according to Housing Green Team Captain, Sharon Blansett “It’s high profile, you can’t miss seeing it”.
A high-tech eyesore, “SD-1″ is basically a clunky climate-conscious picnic table framed in aluminum and reinforced with a solar umbrella.
The fully functional, no frills furniture was purchased with grant money and joins other sustainability projects in the University of Florida’s Diamond Commons including an herb garden, greywater collection, and recycled glass tile flooring.
A “cutting power cord ceremony” is scheduled for September 14th.


Read more: Solar Dok Create a Green Charging Point for University of Florida Students | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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Wind-Powered Pavilions in Shanghai Are Fun Candy-Coated Play Houses

by Bridgette Meinhold, 09/16/11


These candy-coated pavilions could be straight out of a Teletubby wonderland, but are actually an art installation in a waterfront park in Shanghai. Before the 2010 World Expo last year, the city created a new park along the Huangpu river to contribute to the expo's theme of “better city, better life”. Although the expo is over and done and most of the amazing pavilions are torn down, the park remains and is a fixture in the lives of the people who live nearby and use it daily. These wind-powered pavilions in Bailanjing Park designed by Taranta Creations are part of a series of art installations along the waterfront. Their nighttime lights are powered by the wind and each pavilion serves a different fun purpose, like singing karaoke, playing chess, dancing, or sitting and relaxing with friends.








Parks in China are used extensively by residents throughout the day to practice tai chi, dance, meet friends, relax or eat. Bailanjing Park along the river is a new development to increase the urban green space and includes a number of interactive art installations along the way. Inspired by ancient Chinese Fengkafei tea pavilions, Taranta Creations wanted to build an installation that added more than a visual stimulus to the park. They wanted people to use the pavilions, play in them, interact, socialize and relax. Built up on stilts to protect from flooding, the pavilions also remind visitors of the potential for flooding.
Brightly painted, the candy-coated pavilions are a stark and welcome contrast to Shanghai’s perpetual gray skies. The quirky shapes and in combination with their super saturated colors give the pavilion cluster the appearance of candy. Each pavilion is inspired by the diversity of Chinese recreational cultures and serves a different purpose. For instance one is equipped with microphones and a screen to be used to sing karaoke, while another has trays to store chess and card games. Another pavilion has places to keep you bottles cold while you sit in there visiting with friends during the summer and another is a jukebox for dancing. Shiny silver wind turbines mounted on top of the pavilions generate enough power to light the pavilions at night.


Read more: Wind-Powered Pavilions in Shanghai Are Fun Candy-Coated Play Houses | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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E-MiLi: New Idle Technology Could Make Smartphones 44% More Energy Efficient

by Brit Liggett, 09/16/11


Researchers at the University of Michigan have found a clever way to make our smartphones up to 44% more energy efficient without changing how we interact with them. They found that when your smartphone goes into “power saving mode” it isn’t actually saving much power – it’s really just shutting its screen off. That’s because a smartphone is coded to constantly search for a clear signal to make sure that you receive messages as quickly as possible. The University of Michigan team found that they were able to recode this “idle mode” to slow down to 1/16 the speed normally needed to receive messages without compromising data sync times. They call their new smartphone hardware E-MiLi — short for Energy-Minimizing Idle Listening — and it promises to make your smartphone’s battery last a whole lot longer.





“My phone isn’t sending or receiving anything right now,” said University of Michigan computer science and engineering professor Kang Shin about his iPhone. “But it’s listening to see if data is coming in so I can receive it right away. This idle listening often consumes as much power as actively sending and receiving messages all day.” Shin and his colleagues that worked on the study noted that this energy squandering happens because on a busy network it can sometimes be difficult to find a clear signal and your phone is trying not to disappoint you with delayed messages.
The team also found that by slowing your phone’s idle network searching and then coding E-MiLi to jump back to high speed once a message is detected they could cut your phone’s big gulp energy habits down to tiny sips. This is no hypothetical study, by the way, the team exclusively tested their ideas on real world wireless networks thereby coming out of their research with real world technology that could change how often we all have to plug in to an outlet. The team didn’t mention this in their research but we’re also wondering if this slower idle searching speed might also cut back on the radiation your cell phone could be spewing into your body potentially cutting back on gadget-related health issues.


Read more: New Idle Technology Could Make Smartphones 44% More Energy Efficient | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World

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USDA: $342K for solar projects in PR

By CB Online Staff
cbnews@caribbeanbusinesspr.com



Projects in Puerto Rico will split nearly $342,000 in federal funding under a program that helps agricultural producers and rural small businesses across the country implement renewable energy and energy efficiency measures in their operations, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced. U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced Friday loans and grants for more than 500 projects through the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP), a 2008 Farm Bill initiative.
Puerto Rico received $341,926 for four projects in Aibonito, Guayanilla, and Hatillo, said José Otero-García, USDA Rural Development state director for Puerto Rico.
In Guayanilla, Master Paints & Chemical Corp. was selected to receive a grant of $210,176.00 to install a grid-tie photovoltaic system to replace 100 percent of energy consumption currently provided from fossil fuel source.
Grid-tie photovoltaic systems connect with the existing power grid and allow users to sell excessive electricity back to the utility through a plan known as net metering.
Other recipients in Puerto Rico were Hacienda Carian ($35,000.00) in Aibonito, Brothers Dairy, Inc. ($61,000.00) in Hatillo and Vaquería Caco, Inc. ($35,750.00) in Hatillo. All of these projects changed the fossil fuel source to photovoltaic systems.
“This funding is an important part of the Obama administration’s plan to help the nation’s farmers, agriculture producers and rural small businesses conserve natural resources, create more green jobs and lead us on the path to becoming an energy independent nation,” Vilsack said. “These projects are in addition to the more than 900 renewable energy and energy efficiency projects recently announce during the president’s Rural Economic Forum.”
REAP offer funds for farmers, ranchers and rural small business to purchase and install renewable energy systems and make enregy-efficiency improvements. The federal funds leverage other funding sources for small businesses. In all, USDA announced today more than $27 million in energy grants and guaranteed loans for projects.
Funding of each award is contingent upon the recipient meeting the conditions of the grant or loan agreement. Grants can finance up to 25 percent of a projects’ cost, not to exceed $500,000 for renewable, $250,000 for efficiency.


http://www.caribbeanbusinesspr.com/n...id=1&ct_name=1

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SeaTwirl Turbine Could be the Most Cost-Effective Wind Energy Generator Yet

by Molly Cotter


Swedish eco-designers, Ehrnberg Solutions AB, have just completed their most successful prototype of the floating SeaTwirl vertical wind turbine. The device captures and harvests offshore wind, without having to convert the energy as it is being stored. SeaTwirl is the first of its kind with only two moving parts, and it uses only sea water as a roller bearing, omitting the need for a gearbox or transmission.






SeaTwirl is already being praised as one of the most simple and cost effective wind turbines ever made. Its vertical blades spin, absorbing energy from the wind and storing it throughout a water filled torus. The torus also holds the turbine above sea level and assists in the spinning even when winds have died down. Meanwhile, a tiny generator at the bottom of the turbine then converts the energy to electricity.
The floating design also makes for a more cost effective turbine. The weight of the water makes it easier to utilize and move heavy, cheap material that can spin slowly and still collect wind. The discarding of energy conversion equipment also saves a great deal in production costs and makes the turbine much lighter, allowing it to be positioned further offshore.
The successful SeaTwirl prototype has been installed near Halmstad off the coast of Sweden for the past month, and test results are currently being analyzed. We hope to see these in commercial production soon!


Read more: SeaTwirl Turbine Could be the Most Cost-Effective Wind Energy Generator Yet | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World