1ℓimit – Faucet Design by Yonggu Do, Dohyung Kim & Sewon Oh One Liter Limited 1ℓimit faucet looks more like an elegant test tube inverted on top of a tap. The glass tube holds exactly one liter of water, sufficient for a quick handwash. The theory being that we waste almost six liters of water and use only one, while washing hands. Once the stored one-liter is used up, you have to turn-off the tap till the next one liter fills up the tube.
Solar Panels Compared What is the best solar cell you can buy? It all depends on what is important to you. Two things that can be important are cost and size. For applications where space doesn't matter (like putting panels in your back yard or on your roof), you want to make the most power for the least cost. Solar Panels ranked by least cost per unit of power (best first) Clearly, large panels bought in bulk are more economical. For mobile applications (solar powered cell phone or lawn mower), you want the most power per unit of area. Solar Panels ranked by minimum size per unit of power (best first) Interestingly, some efficient panels are also economical. Please note that I am basing these lists on the data supplied by the referenced web pages. Q: Why didn't you include X? A: If you know about an interesting panel that is commercially available and not included here, send me a link where I can see its specs and actually buy it and I will add it to the list. A: I agree. Q: Why didn't you make a nice graph?
Turn Steel Into Solar Panels With Photovoltaic Spray Paint No, it's not a joke or a crazy awesome futuristic concept . It's real. Tata Steel Europe (formerly Corus) and Swansea University in Wales, UK are collaborating to develop a spray-on technology that would transform steel sheets into solar panels. Earth and Industry says , The technology has significant applications since it is highly efficient even in diffused sunlight. Therefore, countries at higher latitudes or those with limited solar energy resource can generate significant amounts of solar-powered electricity with going for large-scale power plants. If extended, the technology can find its way to the automobile industry where photo-sensitive dyes can be applied to cars to generate electricity to split water into hydrogen and oxygen for fuel cells. Imagine the applications of such a product. The power options could be limitless. And if you think the spray-on solar technology is years away from reality, think again. [Photo: Jaredmoo /Flickr]
Hugh Piggott's home page Scientists Develop Affordable Solar Panels That Work In The Dark It's about damn time, don't you think? Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory announced Wednesday that they have been able to confirm a new high-efficiency solar cell design that utilizes nearly the entire solar spectrum. Translation: They figured out a way to make solar panels generate electricity in the dark. CleanTechnica says , In earlier trials, the researchers used different alloys that achieved full spectrum responses but involved very high production costs. The Lawrence Berkeley breakthrough represents just one path to increasing the efficiency and lowering the cost of solar cells. In the meantime, you could just turn any metal surface into solar panels with photovoltaic spray paint . [Photo: Norby /Flickr]
Plans for solar thermal, PV, Wind, Heating, Cooling, Cooking, and energy saving projects for Do It Yourselfers Search The Renewable Energy site for Do-It-Yourselfers More than 500 renewable energy and conservation projects you can build. Free plans and information on: Conservation, water, solar homes, solar space heating, solar water heating, passive cooling techniques, solar sunspaces and greenhouses, solar pool heating, solar electricity (PV), wind generated electricity, micro hydro, biofuels, methane generators, solar cooking, solar food drying, solar and efficient vehicles, solar water pumping, solar engines, and solar wood drying. So, what were you looking for that you did not find? Questions?
anthropomorphic-futuristic-fantastic-floating-homes/ Futuristic, yet, but not the far-fetched science-fiction fantasy industrial design you might think – the Oculus by Schoepfer Yachts may not be for sale yet but it is already in pre-production mode with naval architects on board, so to speak. Hardly your typical houseboat, it is a virtual cruise ship for the rich and famous who can afford to buy it when it is fully planned and built. The anthropomorphism of this luxury floating home is of course intentional – the front deck like the gaping mouth of a gigantic sea creature and the sleek curves mimicking streamlined oceanic animals. Complete with a swimming pool on top and a futuristic interior design this is far more like a permanent mobile home than a cruising yacht. The smaller and simpler (both adjectives applied relative to its bigger brother of course) version of this spectacular design is the Infinitas, with a more sleek and streamlined profile and a semi-enclosed on-board swimming pool in the center but underneath the shell.
How I built an electricity producing Solar Panel Several years ago I bought some remote property in Arizona. I am an astronomer and wanted a place to practice my hobby far away from the sky-wrecking light pollution found near cities of any real size. In my attempt to escape city light pollution, I found a great piece of remote property. The problem is, it's so remote that there is no electric service available. I built a wind turbine to provide some power on the remote property. Here is a video of the solar panel set up and in use on my remote, off-grid property. Let me state up front that I probably won't be able to help you out much if you decide to build your own solar panel(s). So what is a solar panel anyway? I started out the way I start every project, by Googling for information on home-built solar panels. After a while, I came to some conclusions: Once I came to the realization that I could use blemished and factory-second solar cells to build my panels, I finally got to work. seller. Oops! Next time I will do it differently.
Bees Solve Complex Problems Faster Than Supercomputers In a new study, researchers report that bumblebees were able to figure out the most efficient routes among several computer-controlled "flowers," quickly solving a complex problem that even stumps supercomputers. We already know bees are pretty good at facial recognition, and researchers have shown they can also be effective air-quality monitors. Bumblebees can solve the classic "traveling salesman" problem, which keeps supercomputers busy for days. The traveling salesman problem is a problem in computer science; it involves finding the shortest possible route between cities, visiting each city only once. Bees need lots of energy to fly, so they seek the most efficient route among networks of hundreds of flowers using angles of sunlight, which helps them find their way home, researchers say. To test bee problem-solving, researchers Lars Chittka and Mathieu Lihoreau tested bees’ response to computer-controlled artificial flowers.
BLUE Ready to Rock - a "condensed" version shown for the photo, with a 3/4 hp generator, held by the inventor, Doug Selsam. Here are the blades of a 20 inch diameter turbine, that produces about half a kilowatt. They will be mounted on a shaft that projects for a long distance forward, and backward, at an angle from horizontal, so that the wind encounters the rotors like a stairway. Each additional rotor brings more power. The combined output from all these small rotors really adds up. The New Turbine is flown in Tehachapi, mounted to a Tower by Brent Scheibel, of General Electric Wind and owner of WindTesting.com Well, it's up and running, with data being logged. Brent Scheibel, WindTesting.com, His wife, Teri, with their dog Ezra, and Doug Selsam, windmill is seen in background The Sky Serpent, flying alongside Brent Scheibel of Windtesting.com's SWWP 900 watt turbine. Row after row of clean-turning turbine blades adorn the landscape... pretty cool.
Hubble's Most Mind Expanding Photos of the Universe The just-turned-21 Hubble Space Telescope has spent its entire life taking photographs of such enormous, otherworldly things that words stop working. And the events in its photographs happened so long ago, notions of time stop working too. But don’t speak, and forget about the time. Here, in no particular order, are nine pretty big reminders that you are tiny, insignificant, and yet part of an awesome network of particles and forces that we’re only beginning to understand. 1 — The Red Spider Nebula The powerful stellar winds of this nebula, located in the constellation of Sagittarius, generate waves 100 billion kilometers high. Source. 2 — The Omega Nebula Here, a bubbly ocean of glowing hydrogen, oxygen, and sulfur gas mingle in the extremely massive and luminous molecular nebula Messier 17. Source. 3 — The Pleiades A dark interstellar cloud ravaged by the passage of Merope, one of the brightest stars in the Pleiades star cluster, at a relative speed of roughly 11 kilometers-per-second. p.
Windbelt Micro-wind, 10 Times Cheaper Wind Energy!! [Run time: 2:05 min] I hope you enjoy this short video of Shawn Frayne, a young inventor that has created this device to generate, on the micro-scale, energy for LED lights and radios in developing countries. This is the first approach that uses aeroelastic flutter to create super cheap electricity. We’re talking about changing the way wind energy is harvested and captured. Frayne won a 2007 Breakthrough Award from Popular Mechanics, and he deserves it. This incredible technology is 10-30 times more efficient than the best micro-turbines. So, Frayne hopes to fund third-world distribution of the Windbelt through sales in first-world applications. UPDATE: EcoGeek reports that Shawn Frayne has launched the website for Humdinger Wind Energy. Here’s a different video of Shawn Frayne talking about the Windbelt technology. Article tags: alternative energy, video