For a minute, let’s put aside all of the personal rumours that have been plaguing Sarah Palin’s nomination to be John McCain’s Vice President, and take a look at her track record on environmental issues. First of all, she wants to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, she sued the Interior Department after it listed the Polar Bear as a threatened species, she has opposed a statewide ballot to restrict mining operations that would harm wildlife in Alaska, and would be considered to have conflicted interests in developing a clean energy policy due to her husband’s position as an oil production operator at BP. She doesn’t exactly sound like a candidate Al Gore would get behind! Click here to watch The Daily Show’s commentary on Palin’s speech from Wednesday night.
Following up on our story about Audi’s interest in fuel efficient technologies is something that Nissan has been working on in recent months: a gas pedal that pushes your foot back when you’re accelerating too hard. The thinking behind this is that most drivers wouldn’t hit the gas pedal so hard if they realized how much fuel they were wasting, and with a friendly reminder in the form of resistance on the pedal, most drivers would ease up. According to results, cars equipped with the Eco Pedal have improved their fuel efficiency by 5-10%. Nissan is so happy with the Eco Pedal that it will be available in some models starting next year. But don’t worry - if you don’t want to deal with it, there’s an off switch.
Tired of slamming on the gas pedal to try and clear a red light, only to realize you were a few seconds late and have to slam on the brakes? Audi figures you are, and also figures that the amount of unnecessary acceleration and idling due to being stuck at red lights is having a negative effect on the amount of emissions in a city. That’s why they’ve developed Travolution, a new technology that sits in your dashboard and lets you know what speed you need to drive at in order to make your next red light. Although right now it’s only in very early testing phases in Ingolstadt, Germany, this may be a wave of the future to optimize traffic flow, and keep your unnecessary acceleration and idling to a minimum.
Starting today and ending this Saturday, a whopping 115 foot sailboat will be docked at New York’s Battery Park in order to raise awareness about the importance of conserving natural resources. The project, started by South African adventurer Mike Horn and dubbed the “Pangaea Expedition”, has been sponsored by Mercedes-Benz and is an international voyage that’s planned to last 4 years. If you’re in New York in the next few days, make sure to stop by and see what the Pangaea Expedition has to offer.
A new service has launched for the greater Portland area called Green Renter that helps potential home renters find a place that matches their environmental needs, along with their housing needs. Their site matches up home or building owners that have taken steps to make their property more self-sustainable with the people who want to live in a place that values the environment as much as they do. The best part of the system is that it doesn’t require properties to have LEED status to be listed. In fact, you only need to meet one out of the seven criteria (energy, water, bulding materials, operations, building surroundings, certifications and awards, other innovative green features) to be considered green enough to rent. If you’re in the Portland area, this is a service you should definitely check out - and let’s hope that it spreads out to other cities soon too.
This week, technology website Always On has announced the award winners for their “Going Green” contest. Although the awards are given out to 100 private companies, they are divided up by the categories where the company is making the biggest difference. The nine categories are as follows: Automotive & Transportation, Biofuel & Agriculture, Energy Management & Efficiency, Energy Storage, Nanotech & Materials, Clean Energy, Solar, Waste Management, and Water. GridPoint, a clean energy storage company, was the overall winner of the entire contest. Check out all 100 winners at Always On’s Going Green site, or watch the awards show live on September 10th right here. Congratulations to all the winners.
Due to the current economic problems in most of the country, The Body Shop decided to see whether, under these circumstances, customers would abandon their purchasing ethics over a cheap cost, and the results were quite positive in the favour of eco-shoppers: 76% said they make their purchases based on the corporate behaviour and ethics of a company more so than 5 years ago, while 70% still find quality of goods and trust in a brand to be a deciding factor in their purchases. While these observations seem pretty standard, compare it to the fact that only 38% say they buy solely on price and value. It’s nice to see that the majority of customers still value doing what’s right over doing what’s cheap. For more information on the survey and collected research, check out the finer details right here.
That’s right, the picture you’re looking at isn’t a kid’s magnifying glass, or even a bulky remote for your Blu-Ray player - it’s a new concept camera designed by Sony that takes pictures by kinetic energy. When you roll the wheel along any surface like a paintbrush roller, it stores up the energy produced by its movement that it can later take pictures with, eliminating the need for batteries altogether. Although Sony has no current plans to put the camera into mass production, and is simply using it to show the capabilities of human powered technology, we’re likely to see some new kinetic products from Sony in the near future.If you’re curious about what kind of pictures the cam takes, check out a video of the ODO Twirl ‘N Take in action right here.
The Hinterland electric car, pictured above, is aerodynamic to the max. The four person cylindrically shaped car was developed by Creative Unit designer Martin Aubé as a long range electric vehicle that would be perfect for city driving. Although production of these vehicles won’t be starting anytime soon, this may be something for Detroit Electric to keep their eyes on. Although Detroit Electric has been inactive for many years now, they’re planning to kick start electric car production next year with help from the Malaysian government. Maybe we’ll be seeing vehicles like this from America’s Auto City.
Geothermal power is a fairly new concept, so here’s a quick run-down: when a lot of heat from the Earth’s core cycles underground, much of it spreads outwards and gets trapped in rocks a few metres below the ground that we stand on. That same heat can be used to heat underground water to produce steam that can then be used at turbine plants (like the one pictured left). Now Google, who has ever expanding farms of servers using endless amountsof power, are looking to stay environmentally friendly with a sustainable energy source. Google seemed to like the sounds of geothermal, and so Google’s charitable organization invested $11 million into research to help reach the goal of the US to produce 100 gigawatts from geothermal in the next 40 years. In a few years, Google won’t just be powering your web-searches anymore - they’ll be powering everything else, too.
Coming as no real surprise to anyone, Al Gore has endorsed Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidential Election. As the face of environmental issues, Gore has been looked to by many as a guide for who to trust in the political spectrum and, this year, his message is clear: Obama is the clear choice to solve the climate crisis. One of the most interesting notes that Gore makes is that John McCain’s past environmental efforts seem to have taken a back seat in this campaign, and that his party is pressuring him to “[abandon] mandatory caps on planet-warming carbon.” For a better comparison of McCain and Obama’s environmental positions, check out the Green Piece Blog, or to buy your very own “Environmentalists for Obama” Button, click here.
That’s right, one of the most well protected Royal figures in the world has just decided that, in order to remain environmentally friendly, she would like her bodyguards at Balmoral in Scotland to switch from cruising around in SUVS to travelling by bicycle. Now, keeping watch of 50,000 acres by bicycle is not an easy task for any bodyguard, but this new switch by order of the Queen is sure to keep her protectors in great shape. After purchasing the world’s largest offshore wind turbine a few months ago, it’s clear that the Queen has the environment’s best interests at heart, so don’t be surprised if you see her making a few more changes around her estates in the coming months.