Tag Archives: Transportation

Future Ships to Float on Air

hulledSome researchers are trying to find a way to let ships ride bubbles through the water. Ships built in the future my have a specially built hull that releases tiny bubbles using an air pump to provide less friction than water.

The New Scientist article goes into the technical challenges of designing what they call a slippery ship and the positive impact that these ships can have on the environment.

“A craft that has less friction as it slides through the water will be far more efficient than standard ships. Slippery ships could travel across the sea much faster or carry a bigger load on the same amount of fuel, saving money and reducing pollution. This is crucial, considering that in 2003 more than 90 per cent of all goods that were sent around the globe went by ship – that’s more than 6 billion tonnes, and the figure is set to increase.”

Americans Want 40mpg

A new study by the Opinion Research Corporation has found that 78% of Americans want a 40mpg fuel legislation. LeftLaneNews has the story on the survey results.

“A bipartisan 78 percent of Americans want the U.S. government to impose a 40 mile per gallon fuel-efficiency standard for vehicles sold in the United States, according to a new Opinion Research Corporation (ORC) national opinion survey. The report indicates nine out of 10 Americans expect gas prices to go up “in the near future,” with nearly half (46 percent) “definitely” expecting a resumption of higher fuel prices.”

The comments at LeftLaneNews break down into some sort of flame war proclaiming that lower mpg seems to be better. I just skimmed the comments so maybe there are some gems in their. One person made a comment mentioning that he doesn’t want the government telling him what mpg is acceptable.

A Free Energy Future?

Here’s a documentary that aired in 1995 that looks at the feasibility of free energy. Energy from water is brought up a few times. It is very optimistic about the idea of free energy and I’m hoping that one day we get free energy that doesn’t damage the environment.

Most people scoff at the idea of free energy but it wasn’t that long ago that people scoffed at the thought of using water to power machines (steam trains for example) and oil to power more machines (smog machines for example). That being said there is some questionable science in the vide, but we can dream can’t we?

From the movies description at Google Video:
“In the opening stages Arthur C. Clarke explained how there were four stages in the way scientists react to the development of anything of a revolutionary nature. “Free energy” was now working its way through these four stages of reaction, which were:

a: “It’s nonsense,” b: “It is not important,” c: “I always said it was a good idea,” and d: “I thought of it first.””

Ship it Good!

Aside from the invasive species catching a free ride every now and again, the transport industry causes a huge volume of carbon dioxide emmissions annualy. A Maryland-based non-profit, Carbonfund.org, came up with a neat way of offsetting these emissions by launching a Carbonfree Shipping program, which allows retailers to reduce some of the carbon footprint created by shipping packages to customers. Four companies — BetterWorld.com, Evogear.com, 3R Living and alonova.com — have joined the program.

Breathing Concretely

Concrete that breaths is getting a lot media coverage recently, and that’s great to see. Business Week recently ran an article about smog-eating concrete that is on display in Venice (ironically, a city with no cars). The idea of buildings using this concrete is really nice, it will make city air breathable, of course if less people drove this research wouldn’t be needed.

Previously, we looked at an artistic display of this concrete.

“Visitors to the Italian Pavilion of the architecture exhibition in the Venice Biennale, which will remain open until Nov. 19, will get a breath of fresh air. That’s because parts of the concrete walls and grounds have been built with cement containing an active agent that, in presence of light, breaks air pollutants such as carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, benzene, and others through a natural chemical process called photocatalysis.”