It seems that the movie Back to the Future accurately predicted that cars will be powered by rubbish. NPR has a story posted on their website about an international contest to make a car run using a chemical reaction for a lengthy 16.5 meters.
Students from Oklahoma won the prize.
Category: Energy
From Sails to Solar
As the price of oil increases (because we are running out of the stuff) some smart people are realising that we need to look elsewhere for energy. It is only suiting that the shipping industry does this since renewable resources for energy (wind) have been used longer than human-made forms of energy. One company, Wallenius Wilhelmsen, has designed a ship that uses three forms of energy: wind, solar, and water.
The linked article also has a list of other innovate approaches that have been spawned by this boating project.
Thanks, Emily!
Oiling the Squeaky Wheel
Venezuela has ordered Royal Dutch/Shell to pay almost $131 million in back taxes. The government is cracking down on tax evasions by oil companies and so they also confiscated financial data form Chevron. Hugo Chavez, the current president of Venezuela, is trying to tighten the government’s control over the lucrative and strategic oil industry. The government has said that they are going to alert two more oil companies in the coming weeks if they owe back taxes or not.
Hydrogen Made Efficiently?
There is a start up company that has researched a new way to produce hydrogen. Producing hydrogen is generally inefficient with (until now I guess) a energy loss of 70% on average when used in a car. So this is promising. Oddly enough the trick was to pour some salt on the wound
Yellow = Green
New York City yellow cabs are going green. They were having some problems with government red tape, but that seems all cleared up now. The cabs will be converted into hybrid cars to ensure much better fuel efficiency. Apparently 7 out 10 New York state citizens support a switch to hybrid vehicles.
Hopefully this will pave the way for more and more cars turning into green machines.