Fortunately there are people that have ventured beyond the question of whether the refrigerator light actually goes off when the door is closed. And they have developed a more energy efficient lighting system for refrigerator cabinets. Now you might be asking: “Why is his a priority? Did they conclude it stays on?” The new LED system designed by Poly Optics is actually aimed at the large commercial units that are often open or feature glass doors. The owners, mostly retailers, of these units want the contents to be well lit without generating excessive heat or consuming more power than is necessary.

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Prior to the OPEC Embargo of the 1970s, Dubai was a fishing village. When our politicians were killing off the alternative energy programs during that same decade, there began a wholesale transfer of wealth out of the United States. Now that the equity draw-down is almost complete, your elected representatives want you to believe that they have the answer. They want you to ignore the fact that they are almost wholly owned and operated by those controlling the incumbent energy concerns. They want you to accept the notion that “too much dependence on foreign oil” is a new revelation as if it wasn’t the hot topic during the 1970s. Perhaps they are right and the electorate does have the attention span of a gnat. Look and see what a tenfold increase in the price per gallon of gas is buying you now.

Pax Scientific, a US technology company, has developed a fan technology based on the logarithmic spiral found in seashells. The fan offers huge energy savings and is a great deal quieter than most other fans.

See a video explanation by Janine Benyus of the Biomimicry Guild. Watch Video

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Ferrocement is a technique that combines the flexibility of iron (steel) and the resistance of cement. It facilitates the building of many interesting forms: round, circular; globular, spherical; cylindrical; curved … and straight and angular of course. Here this is being used to construct a water treatment tank in EcoOca – Brazil.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7IGsG0TzUo]

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“The Labour-led government believes New Zealand should aim to be the world’s first truly sustainable nation,” Building and Construction Minister Clayton Cosgrove said. “We know the way we design our buildings and homes will be central to that effort.

“Every building component, even the humble nail, has a carbon cost, or simply the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that were created in making it. In a truly ‘green’ building, that cost might be included in the building’s overall energy efficiency.”

Mr Cosgrove said the government is conscious of the world-wide research underway into the environment impact of buildings, and New Zealand needs to be exploring these issues in-depth to ensure it is on the best possible path. “Using the projected lifetime CO2 emissions of buildings as the principal measure of resource efficiency under the new Building Code is worth considering. This approach would take into account energy and water efficiency, construction materials and construction waste.”

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Straw + clay + water = cob, an old construction technique that can be used for walls, benches and entire homes. The folks at the Solar Living Institute in Hopland, California are mixing it with their hands and feet and using it to rebuild their intern center- a project taking shape from recycled and sustainable materials, like broken concrete, straw bales, clay and wine bottles.

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The sun has produced energy for billions of years. Solar energy is the solar radiation that reaches the earth. This energy can be converted directly or indirectly into other forms of energy, such as heat and electricity. It is used for heating water for domestic use, space heating of buildings, drying agricultural products, and generating electrical energy.

Solar energy supplies electricity to several hundred thousand people around the world, provides employment for over ten thousand and generates business worth more than one billion dollars. In the future, the pace of change and progress could be even more rapid as the solar industry unlocks its hidden promise.

The benefits of solar power are compelling: environmental protection, economic growth, job creation, diversity of fuel supply and rapid deployment, as well as the global potential for technology transfer and innovation.

The underlying advantage of solar energy is that the fuel is free, abundant and inexhaustible. The total amount of energy irradiated from the sun to the earth’s surface is enough to provide more than 10,000 times the annual global energy consumption. Yet these benefits remain largely untapped; most energy decisions today overlook solar power as a modular technology that can be rapidly deployed to generate electricity close to the point of consumption. Phasing in solar photovoltaics therefore requires a shift from centralized to decentralized power production, offering far greater control to individual consumers.

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In manufacturing terms, exponential population growth means more factories taking up more land, using more raw materials, and allowing more emissions and waste into the environment. Demand for products and services will grow, but the availability of supplies isn’t guaranteed. Competition for Earth’s finite resources will heat up and it’s easy, yet unsettling, to imagine the socio-economic and political consequences.

A variable-speed drive saves energy that the La Union sugar mill in Guatemala is able to sell for additional revenue of $158,480 per harvest season. Source: Rockwell
A variable-speed drive saves energy that the La Union sugar mill in Guatemala is able to sell for additional revenue of $158,480 per harvest season. Source: Rockwell

“To achieve and maintain world-class sustainable manufacturing, you need continuous improvement – not just of your capital assets but the utilization and return on your raw materials, utilities and human resource assets as well,” says John Blanchard, principal analyst for CPG industries at ARC Advisory Group. “Manufacturing companies should recognize that it will become increasingly difficult for manufacturing operations to drive new growth and margin without considering manufacturing ‘sustainability’ in their business decisions.”

The benefits are practical as well as financial. Blanchard explains, “Maximizing the utilization of assets always brings a return on investment. If you can bring a packaging line from 50% efficiency to 80% efficiency without buying new equipment or using more energy, then you have reduced the cost per unit of product and demonstrated one of many approaches toward achieving world-class sustainable manufacturing.”

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The seven projects to receive funding from the Carbon Trust are:

* Aluminium smelting technology with the potential to reduce energy consumption by up to 20% – Coventry University
* Technology to explode paint into moulds, eliminating the need for paint shops in the manufacture of plastic components – Warwick Manufacturing Group
* Energy efficient kilns, which could reduce the energy used in the manufacture of ceramics – Horizon Ceramics
* Natural ventilation systems for large buildings with the potential of halving the energy used by conventional mechanically ventilated buildings – e-stack Ltd.
* Testing of new fully automated biomass combined heat and power unit – Biomass CHP Ltd.
* Steam trap performance sensors with the potential for reducing carbon emissions by more than 750,000 tonnes over ten years – Spirax Sarco Ltd.
* New generation of ultra bright LEDs with improved life expectancy and massive carbon savings over traditional lighting – GlowLed Ltd.
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The Energy for Sustainability program supports fundamental research and education in energy production, conversion, and storage and is focused on energy sources that are environmentally friendly and renewable.

Sources of sustainable energy include sunlight, wind, and biomass. Hydrogen and alcohols are potential energy carriers that can be derived from renewable sources. Research to produce and store hydrogen for use in direct combustion or in fuel cells is supported by the program. Potential sources of hydrogen include conversion from biomass and from electrolysis, photolysis or thermolysis of water. Biomass is available from agricultural crops and residues, forest products, aquatic plants, and municipal wastes. In addition to hydrogen, biomass can be a source of liquid, solid and gaseous fuels including biofuels such as ethanol. Fuel cells have the potential to convert fuels such as hydrogen and alcohols to electricity at high efficiencies and should play an increasing role in energy conversion. Critical components of low temperature fuel cells requiring additional research include catalysts, membranes, and electrolytes.

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