(apologies for the lowfi video quality!)
I’m not sure if this is the first augmented reality marketing campaign ever but it’s the first I’ve seen. The folks at GE obviously want a slice of the ’smart grid’ action. This campaign is super slick and has an incredible website. It’s worth checking out so follow the links below:
Vertical wind turbines are quieter and kill less birds than their propeller based relatives. Not to mention they look rad.
Eric Schmidt / Google / energy / environment / green / solar / talks / videos / wind
November 19, 2008 0Eric Schmidt, Chairman and CEO of Google, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the New America Foundation, and a member of President-Elect Barack Obama’s Transition Economic Advisory Board, addressed a packed auditorium at the Ronald Reagan Building on Tuesday, November 18th.
Schmidt provided insight into the junction of technology and government, stressing that solid infrastructure is the key to an efficient and effective government, and using the internet as the model for how government should approach the current fiscal crisis facing our nation and the world. He also pressed the need for open networks and systems as a foundation for innovation.
The Google CEO also emphasized that engagement is the fundamental component in finding solutions to our countrys current economic woes, and used President-elect Obamas addresses on YouTube as an example of the way government should enlist modernization and embrace the voices of all as it contemplates solving the financial and social ills of our society.
Schmidt concluded that while there is no silver bullet, but he remains optimistic in our countrys future and its prosperity.
“Rock Port, Missouri, is a small city of 1,300 people, and they just made history by being the first city in the US to be 100% powered by the wind, also making them #1 in the US for percentage of renewable energy. The Loess Hills Wind Farm, built by the Wind Capital Group, employing 500 workers from 20 states for about a year, is expected to produce about 16 million kilowatt hours annually, while Rock Port only uses 13 million. The excess wind power will be sold to other communities in the area.”
Way to go Rock Port!
[via TreeHugger | photo by andrijbulba]
“Britain unveiled plans Monday to generate enough electricity through offshore wind farms to power every home in the country by 2020, increasing production more than 60-fold and changing the look of its coastlines.”
Illustration by Bryan Christie Design
The following article was written by David Gelles
(original story on The New York Times)
“Traditional wind turbines can be unreliable sources of energy because, well, the wind blows where it will. Not the case 1,000 feet up. “At a thousand feet, there is steady wind anywhere in the world,” says Mac Brown, chief operating officer of Ottawa-based Magenn Power.
To take advantage of this constant breeze, Brown has developed a lighter-than-air wind turbine capable of powering a rural village. “Picture a spinning Goodyear blimp,” Brown says. Filled with helium, outfitted with electrical generators and tethered to the ground by a conductive copper cable, the 100-foot-wide Magenn Air Rotor System (MARS) will produce 10 kilowatts of energy anywhere on earth. As the turbine spins around a horizontal axis, the generators convert the mechanical energy of the wind into electrical energy, then send it down for immediate use or battery storage.
Planning for the MARS has been under way for a few years, but this fall Magenn got the $5 million it needed to build prototypes from a California investor. In October, the MARS received its U.S. patent. Already, larger models — ones that might light a skyscraper — are in the works. Brown says he hopes his floating wind turbines will power off-the-grid villages in the developing world. He says the governments of India and Pakistan have expressed interest.
At least one argument against wind turbines — that they slice up birds and bats — isn’t valid, according to Brown. “This thing is bigger than a house,” he says. “A bird can see it and a bat can sense it.”
[via New York Times]
