Wind Energy really seems to be gathering wind as a viable alternate option in the last couple of years and people are starting to use it alongside solar energy to get the best possible results. But the major problem in harnessing wind energy has traditionally been the use of tall and huge wind turbines which do not fit in to modern city patterns and also require considerable and consistent wind for production of energy. But designers and engineers have put an end to that problem by creating wind turbines that suit the urban lifestyle and ‘Energy Ball’ might be the best of the lot.

Energy Ball works on the principle of the Venturi Effect, making use of the change in fluid pressure at different points to produce motion. In simple terms, it acts a lot more effectively than wind turbines and is a lot more quiet and adept for city life. The wind turbine can be put on your roof or in your backyard, and it will start immediately producing energy. The efficiency is pretty high, and all that is achieved without changing the ergonomics of your home or your backyard in a major way.

While Energy Ball makes for a great wind turbine, we need more such wonderful designs which will harness other renewable sources with equal ease. So if and when you can get your hands on Energy Ball, just go for it.

Via Theenvironmentalage

Smart is one company that is relatively new in the world of automobiles and is only now celebrating its 10th anniversary. Now that is a very young age for a car making company and it is almost akin to an infant still in his first year. Then how is that Smart is this awesome and fancy with its work and so confident about its market? For those still wondering, Smart is a joint venture of Swatch and Mercedes. That is quite simply a phenomenal combination, which ensures that there is neither in shortage of funds or skill or even technical support.

To celebrate its 10th anniversary Swatch has released a Limited Edition car that it quite aptly calls the Smart Edi10n and the car is a perfect urban commuter in every sense of the world. Style and automobile finesse aside, Smart is a diesel-powered vehicle for two. Before you even shout about how it still spills out fumes and is not good for the planet, just remember that it only holds two people. This saves on space, energy while engineering the car and putting it together, parking space, fuel consumption and costs.

With most urban commuters using cars either all on there own or just for a couple, it is time every carmaker starting making this ’smart’ choice. While it might not be appealing for all, it does its job to perfection and saves the roads from plenty of messy jams and fumes. The rest of the car is simple impeccable with world-class interiors, top-notch styling and great design. It comes with the 0.8-cdi engines or the 1.0-liter 84hp gasoline engine and is priced at €16,850 - €19,790. That is no surprise at all either.



Via Leblogauto

If thinking out of the box is your cup of tea then Japan is the land for you. People there surely think out of the box even when they do not need to and ‘tea’ is pretty much all you will get their to drink. Japan is a land that has been known for its amazing new creations and amalgamation of electronic perfection with spectacular new gadgets. But here is an idea by the Japanese that is both needed and welcome. The spectacular Eco-Rigs to adorn Japan’s Coastline would soon make a mighty power source of free energy.

Huge Village-sized floating Eco-Rigs would soon float close to the Japanese shore to generate clean power for the country. These humongous structures would be fitted with both wind turbines and wide solar panels to produce energy in more ways than just one. While the 2 km by 800 meters solar base would be busy turning the power of the sun in to electricity, the wind turbine blades would be swirling around to power up Japan further.

So what about the ocean eco-system in all this? It gets better actually with some of that solar and wind energy to be used to power banks of underwater LED lights. They’re intended to be the source of light for nurseries of seaweeds to encourage the growth of fish and plankton population. That is indeed king-sized eco-revolution.

Via TimesOnline

It is nice to see that more South American nations are actively taking to production of alternate energy and with the immense natural resources the continent possesses; it will not be long before they start producing clean energy in a large way. South America is endowed with natural resources that are varied and unique and the continent is only now realizing its true potential. With vast open desert and plenty of Sunshine, Peru seems to be ideal to harness power from alternate sources.

Iberoperuana Inversiones plans to invest $240 million in a wind farm, which is projected to provide clean electricity for an estimated 80,000 families in Peru’s southern desert region of Paracas. The wind energy park will be located near the city of Ica and will be known as the “Parque Eólico San Andrés”. Iberoperuana Inversiones hopes that the park would already be generating 22 megawatts of energy by the end of this year.

This new venture is the first major investment in Peru in regards to the production of alternate energy and the country hopes that this will encourage further investments in both wind and solar energy. This is not just a wonderful new venture that will benefit Peru and other South American nations around it but will also help the planet to cool down that tad bit further.

Via Ecoworldly

For centuries now Bats have been creatures that have been plagued by our ignorance and horrible myths that were created around them. The creatures have been often misunderstood and with little knowledge about their ways even till this day, we still have a lot to learn about these creatures of the dark. They were always considered as carriers of death and plague while they actually stop both of those catastrophes by weeding out insects and saving crops across the world. Now they are apparently falling prey to the wind turbines spread across not America and it is not even the razor sharp blades that are killing them!

Researchers a the University of Calgary found that the vast majority of bats found dead at a wind farm in Southwest Alberta suffered severe injuries to their respiratory systems consistent with a sudden drop in air pressure - called Barotrauma. Barotrauma is a condition resulting from drastic changes in air pressure occurring, for example, when the bats fly through an area where the pressure drops dramatically, such as it does near a spinning turbine blade.

While people have been switching to smaller wind turbines in the urban and semi-urban locations, there are plenty of windmill farms that fall in the birds’ migratory path from Canada to Mexico. These wind turbines are killing the bats at a rate that is much higher than normal causing depletion in their population which subsequently would lead to increase of pests in farms across North America. While we indeed still need wind energy, one must study the ecological implications of setting them up in a certain location before we end up disturbing the entire ecosystem.

Via Cleantechnica

Geothermal Energy is almost like the step-child of renewable resources and the Solar and Wind Energy departments get the treatment of being the perfect brand ambassadors for green energy. This is due to a couple of factors. One is that people do not quite comprehend how valuable and immense the potential of geothermal energy is and secondly those who know about its worth are still unable to find ways to properly harness it. But that seems to be changing fast off late as people seem to have rediscovered its magic.

Google, which has an interest in affordable power to run its growing numbers of server farms, is heavily investing (through Google.org) in research into the development of geothermal power. In the US, Google is the largest funding source for geothermal research. While traditionally the US and North European nations have been considered Geothermal Energy hubs, there seems to be a new leader in the race as well.

The Australian government is investing nearly four times as much as Google to develop geothermal power for Australia. The Australian group estimates that just 1 percent of the country’s geothermal capacity could provide 26,000 years worth of clean electricity. With more countries like Australia and firms like Google investing both money and time in Geothermal Energy, the future indeed looks ‘steaming hot’ for the energy that lays hidden in the heart of the planet.

Via Ecogeek

Our first look at the Ventomobile was around a couple of months back as the students of the Stuttgart University were working hard on it. At that time they appeared pretty confident about the chances of their unique trike in a unique wind-powered race that was to test their creation. Now the race is over and as the dust still settles, the Ventomobile has finished on top as expected by many.  The solely wind-driven Ventomobile constructed by the InVentus team, a team of some 20 Stuttgart University students of Aerospace Engineering, came in first at the “Aeolus Race” in the Dutch town of Den Helder.

Racing the extremely stylish and lightweight three-wheeler, the vehicles of five European universities and research centres had difficulties to catch up. For their “innovative design” and public relations work, the InVentus team was also awarded prizes. In this first time ever race the participating teams were challenged to drive directly into the wind, without tacking. During the preliminary races, the Stuttgart Ventomobile had already proven to be the most lightweight and most efficient vehicle among the contestants when, with its 130 kg, it succeeded in racing at 64% of the wind speed directly against the wind. From then on it was considered a serious contender for the win.

Beyond being a single race wonder, the Ventomobile proves the immense capability that wind energy holds and it gives the world a new alternate source of energy to look at other than the traditional solar power. Now hopefully more bikes and trikes in future will be powered by the wind!

Via:  Nextenergynews

Wind Energy is one alternative source of power that has been under-utilized and especially since Solar Power has really taken off in the last decade. But harnessing the power of the wind could be essential in our effort to cut down our dependence on conventional sources of energy. If we wish to go green with our energy production and consumption in a grand fashion then we need to try and cap every possible source of energy. California Edison seems to be doing exactly that with its new project that taps in to the energy of the wind.

Southern California Edison (SCE) signed a 20-year contract with DCE, an affiliate of Caithness Energy, which will provide up to 909 megawatts of wind power. The project, called Caithness Shepherd’s Flat, involves the installation of 303 wind turbines across 30 square miles in Gilliam and Morrow Counties in North-Central Oregon between 2011 and 2012. Shepherd’s Flat is expected to generate 2 billion kilowatt-hours per year of renewable energy, which is more than one-tenth of SCE’s overall renewable portfolio. Looking at the numbers though one wonders if SCE is a bit superstitious about figures- 909 megawatts of power from 303 windmills spread across 30 square miles!

The project though, will benefit SCE customers because it requires no additional or upgraded transmission lines, which significantly lessens the time it takes for a power plant of this magnitude to come on line. Developers say that once completed, the Caithness project will be one of the world’s largest fully permitted wind farms. It is indeed nice to see such new avenues being explored considering the increasing pressure on conventional resources and growing crude oil prices.

Via: Nextenergynews

Well, yes we have been talking about the lengths that China is going to keep the Olympics alive and kicking. Here’s more. For the Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing, Chinese meteorologists fired 1000 plus rockets into clouds to prevent rain showers to disrupt the grand sporting affair.
These rockets, filled with silver iodide crystals, were part of the largest operation of its kind in China. It dropped the rain onto other areas of Beijing and nearby Hebei province. Guo Ho, head of the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, said, “A total of 1,104 rain dispersal rockets were fired from 21 sites across Beijing between 4 pm to 11:39 pm that intercepted the stretch of rain belt moving towards the stadium.” He added, “We were compelled to take a step like this because humidity had reached 90 per cent and even a small bubble in the rain cloud would have triggered rainfall.”
Via zeenews

When the whole of America was perturbed about the oil crisis, a tiny prairie town in Minnesota decided to do something about it. You can well imagine what the town must be like when the local radio carry news updates like the price of cattle and feed, but they were wise enough to embrace renewable energy long before gas prices reached 4 dollars a gallon.

A group of farmers in Trimont came together to build a massive wind energy farm. As a result of their vision, the town ended up with 67 giant turbines, each taller than the Statue of Liberty, that produce enough electricity to light up 29,000 homes. Not only this, the farmers and the local government are making around two million dollars thanks to the wind energy. Buzz is that this is only step one, as the number of the towers will soon be doubled.

Imagine what a little foresight can do. For starters, it can bring a solution to America’s energy problems.

Via http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=5566001&page=1