Technology – Page 61 – Things Are Good

Renewable Energy in 2005 and 2006

Sterling D. Allan from Pure Energy Systems has written a year-end review of renewable energy and he includes a projection of what to expect from 2006. It is a really neat read that includes stuff covered here and stuff that I planed to write about here but failed to do.

“Imagine a non-polluting power plant, the size of a local gas station, that would quietly and safely power 4,000 homes, for a few tenths of a penny per kilowatt-hour, compared to 3-6 cents/kw-h of coal or natural-gas-powered plants.”

Really crazy-advanced renewable technologies are on the horizon!

Eliica: 8-Wheeled Electric Car

Eliica a good fast car Eliica is short for Electric Lithium-Ion battery Car, it’s a eight-wheeled eletric car that can move fast. It’s even faster than a Porsche 911 Turbo. The inventor of the car wanted to prove that electric cars can be fast and slick. He notes that when dealing with a technology thought to be slow one has to make it really fast to make it even appear fast to others.

The Eliica can reach 370Km/h thanks to each of its eight 100bhp in-wheel motors.

Ramp up the Power

traffic Highway off ramps have started to generate power in England by using a speed hump in the road. Each time a car passes over the hump 10kw of energy is created by compression – so the heavier the vehicle the more energy generated.

Many local authorities in England have expressed interest in purchasing the Â£25,000 ramps to power street lights.

No Pain, Mo’ Gain

This month’s Scientific American contains an article about how testing chemicals for human safety is becoming both more effective, and less dependent on animal suffering. From the article:

Safety testing of household, agricultural and other chemicals as well as medical products traditionally uses many millions of animals every year in protocols that are often painful. New methods involving cell and tissue cultures, noninvasive imaging, or plain statistics are greatly reducing the need for, and the suffering involved in, animal testing. The new toxicology is more rigorously based on scientific evidence and can save time and money.

For more information, check out the Johns Hopkins Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing.

Not Wasting Waste

Bangladesh’s capital city, Dhaka, the garbage is piling up in the streets and sewers, and that’s a good thing. A small company has started to use the methane created by the city’s organic waste and turning it into energy.

“By converting trash into organic fertilizer, they reasoned, small communities could sell it to farmers desperate for an alternative to soil-stripping chemicals. This would help clean city streets, increase crop yields and provide the urban poor with a steady stream of revenue.”