Category Archives: Alternative Energy
The Queen’s University and Aquamarine Power Limited in Belfast have come up with a new idea to generate power. It is called an Oscillating Wave Surge Converter placed offshore, 10-12 meters deep. When it is moved by waves, the device’s double acting pistons push seawater to the shore through high pressure flow lines. This is then converted to power using hydroelectric generators. The company can generate between 300 and 600 kW of power depending on the unit’s location and configuration.
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Afsluitdijk in The Netherlands could be the world’s leading site for generating saltwater power which will be 30 to 40 per cent more efficient than burning coal according to a new plan to improve this area. The process called reverse electrodialysis will capture energy created when freshwater becomes saltier by mixing with seawater. If this works, it can produce 300 megawatts of electricity per hour helping to offer many homes in the northern parts of the country which is facing the dangers of rising sea level due to global warming. Time has hence come for everyone to honestly and full-heartedly make efforts to repair the damage that people have done on this planet.
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Furniture guru Ikea has come up with a concept – the solar-powered garden lights. This includes lights kept placed out in the garden to collect the sun’s energy all day long and this in turn can be used for their rechargeable batteries. At night, these lights turn on with all the energy it saved from the day. The lights used are LED which consume 70 per cent less energy than conventional garden lights and lasts four times longer.
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When it comes to green thoughts, no idea is too bad. Here’s a new one. Deriving energy from wind with a replacement of a helmet with a windmill. The headgear would have a small propeller that can catch the flow of wind on top of the helmet which acts as a turbine connected to a generator to in turn recharge a set of batteries. With this stored electricity you can charge any kind of electronic devices.
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Saving power, saving money, saving economy, saving mankind. Comes in that order. So when the world is busy shifting focus to saving energy than whine on the money they have lost, one important aspect of the economy’s money spender comes under spotlight. The streetlights. To reduce operating costs, BetaLED company has come forth with two light control systems one of which will be implemented to help save money. One is a power line communication system and the other is a radio frequency system. The former communicates over the same wires that deliver power to each fixture to monitor and control streetlights that have specially-designed hardware and software and the latter uses a wireless mesh network to transmit information to a remote source.
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SolarBotanic is a company which researches and specializes in an emerging tech which is dubbed as biomimicry – which seeks to mimic nature and use nature-inspired methods to solve human problems. They have developed Energy Harvesting Trees. These are not the real trees that you find in your backyard, but fake ones. These trees have Nanoleafs which uses nanotechnology designed to capture the sun’s energy in photovoltaic and thermovoltaic cell and then convert this radiation into electricity. The trees also have twigs and branches which act as generators that produce electricity from movement of wind or rain. The company has got several patents and now seeking partners for funding and development. We still don’t have any details on what these trees actually look like.
[Engadget]
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You have your fuel station, now you will have your energy station. If you own an electric vehicle and you live in San Francisco you can charge your car at any of three charging stations across the city. Coulomb Technologies announced their Smartlet Networked Charging Stations as part of a two-year public demonstration to power the city’s plug-in fleet and car share plug-in vehicles. Isn’t that a radical thought?
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Finally the Earth’s southern most continent can boast of green, clean energy. Eight wind turbines are rolling to provide 230V of electricity to charge up the Princess Elisabeth Station. Braving temperatures as low as -60 degrees Celsius and 200mph wind gusts, these Scottish 6 kilowatt turbines will be able to power up the station’s heating, computers, lights and scientific instruments for up to 16 scientists at a time. Along with the usage of solar power, this station is touted to be the most eco-friendly research station in Antarctica. Till now most stations relied on diesel generators because no wind turbines were thought to be robust enough for such extreme conditions. Enduring the most severe weather conditions on the earth, the station is expected to generate highest output of any small wind power system in the world.
[A2mediagroup]
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Since the sun has the energy and power to run an entire solar system, it is about time somebody thought about getting their acts to derive a large amount of energy form it. Southern California Edison and solar power plant maker BrightSource signed a deal where more than 1,300 mega watts of energy will be generated from the desert outside Los Angeles. This deal may be able to provide electricity for 845,000 homes. This is of course, if the plan doesn’t go wrong and if it actually works. This is huge and something this huge always has obstacles. Hopefully this one will indeed keep its oath of using solar thermal power to generate electricity.
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In the coming month, Sanyo’s parking area in Japan will go green with the Solar parking area to test its solar cells and rechargeable batteries. Located at the premises of Tokushima Prefecture, this solar roofed parking lot is intended to charge up the electric bikes like Eneloop via Sanyo’s HIT (heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer) solar panels and Li-ion battery unit. To promote the use of the same, folks from Eneloop company have donated three vehicles to be used as official vehicles. Since many people are still wary about easy access to charging stations for charging such electric bikes, this kind a green move by a company is a boost for its people to opt for the green vehicles. Fitted with three 210W HIT solar panels and a Li-ion battery unit, the solar parking area will be able to churn out about 690kWh in a year.
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