100 W incandescent bulbs have always been energy vampires, sucking out energy and lengthening electricity bills. Researchers at the University of Toronto recently came up with a fantastic solution to replace these bulbs and fill in the 75 to 100-watt range. Called the NanoLight LED light bulbs, these were designed by Gimmy Chu, Tom Rodinger and Christian Yan. These 12 W LED bulbs provide the equivalent of 100 W classic bulbs with 1600 lumens.
Mercedes Benz is going the fuel-efficient way and ha just unveiled to extremely green BlueEFFICIENCY Edition models, the A180 and the A180 CDI BlueEFFICIENCY Edition. The A180 petrol model boasts a consumption of 5.2 l/100 km and 120 g of CO2/km and is easily one of the most efficient in its class. The A180 CDI on the other hand has a consumption of 3.6 l/100 km and CO2 emissions of just 92 g/km, making it the most efficient Mercedes-Benz car!
Plugging into a grid connection for a bit of juice isn’t always a luxury one can enjoy. There are times, particularly during emergencies, when grid connections fail the best of us. As a solution to off-grid power requirements, Goal Zero recently unveiled the Yeti 150, a solar energy generator, at CES 2013. In essence a portable plug-and-play solar generator, this one powers up your devices on the go without harming the environment.
People living in slums and makeshift houses have their fair share of trouble trying to stay connected with urban grids. Giving the inhabitants of in the windswept slum of Enkanini, South Africa, some respite, is the iShack. A clever overhauled version of a slum, the iShack uses solar energy to its advantage. By researchers at the University of Stellenbosch, the iShack sports a rooftop solar panel that soaks in the sun to generate enough energy for those living inside to use.
If you’ve been looking for a fantastic way to blast out those beats in a clean and green manner, here’s one you’re bound to find interesting, the Rugged Rukus! Designed by Eton and unveiled at CES 2013, the Rukus is a solar-powered Bluetooth boombox that can be carried to the outdoors. The Rukus sports an IPX-4 shell that makes it shockproof and water proof. While the Rugged Rukus is a smaller entertainment solution for the outdoors, the Rukus XL sports a 72-square-inch solar panel.
Tossing out waste on earth is a breeze. Tossing waste while out in space isn’t such a smart idea however! Instead, researchers from NASA’s Ames Research Center in California have come up with a fantastic way to put waste to rest. The team has designed a compactor that melts waste without incineration. An extremely efficient process, this compactor is capable of transforming a day’s worth of waste into an 8-inch diameter tile.
All of us would love to work from home if given the opportunity. American designer Victor Vetterlein has explored this possibility with his conceptual office units. The concept units are designed to be bought up by companies and sent out to employees’ back gardens to enable them to work from home. The conceptual project is dubbed MOSS – Micro Office Systems Space, and is described by the designer as a “self-contained auxiliary office unit.”
A street in Chicago has paved the way for future environment friendly streets. Earning the title of the “greenest street in America” is Cermak road in Chicago. The title was conferred upon this street by Chicago Department of Transport (CDOT). A fine example of a green street, it comprises of natural landscaping, bicycle lanes, wind powered lighting, storm water diversion for irrigation, drought-resistant native plants and innovative “smog-eating” concrete. Opened to public in 2012, this first phase two mile stretch is part of the Blue Island/Cermak Sustainable Streetscape project in Pilsen, which was launched with an aim of reducing overall energy usage by 42 percent.
As technology soars higher, we keep coming across newer and cleaner ways to power up our lives. Recently, we caught up with designer Laurence Kemball-Cook’s brain child, the Pavegen system. Simply put, this concept generates energy as you walk over specific energy-harvesting tiles. The Pavegen can easily be incorporated in footpaths and the like.
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Recycle on January 7, 2013
Shipping containers have always been a particularly “huge” mess to clean up once retired. However, abandoning these in shipping yards certainly isn’t the best way to put these large chunks of metal to rest. The Canadian design studio Castor Canadensis has come up with a fantastic way to recycle old shipping containers, turning them into traditional wood-burning steam baths called Sauna Boxes.
