A Catalogue Of Sustainable Achievements
Green and blue glow bricks
What are your thoughts on a light you don’t have to turn on? The Glow Brick (pictured above) is made up of a phosphorescent light bulb encased in a see-through acrylic “brick”. Should you sit one on your window sill (or any other sun-drenched nook), it’ll soak up the solar energy and, by dusk, begin to glow.
The overall effect is of a disembodied shining light bulb suspended in mid air, which, you’d have to agree, is not something you see every day.”
Cool, no?
This morning the (rather hilarious) news reached me that the Netherlands are going to use chicken poop as a source of energy. Hilarious in a good way of course.
So what’s going to happen in the little country I live in? Well, our minister of agriculture announced that they’re going to built a biomass power plant which can extract energy from chicken manure. The plant is going to cost a fierce 150 million Euro, but in return it gives power to 90,000 households. This by using 440,000 tons of chicken manure annually.
That’s a medium sized city running on chicken poo!
But it gets just a little bit better. Normally farmers use the chicken manure to fertilize the land. So they can grow crops on it. When this happens carbon dioxide and methane are released into the environment which contributes to the enhanced greenhouse effect. Now there’s less chicken poo to do this with so farmers will look into cleaner alternatives.
Jay, this was one good day for green energy in the Netherlands.
-jdh
The few times I exercise in a gym on fitness machines (I prefer the outdoors for sporting purposes) there’s always the display function that shows how many watts I’m generating. But where does all that power go? Indeed, into nowhere. (My indoor rower is an exception, it uses some of the generated current to power it’s display. But that’s still just a fraction of what’s generated).
Now, some very bright guy living in Portland, Oregon, also thought about this loss of energy. And he came up with a solution! The Green Microgym is the answer. How great is that. The gym has got a diverse range of equipment, which all contributes to a greener world in some way.
For example the Team Dynamo (above), created by Human Dynamo the installation is an entirely new way of group fitness. And more importantly, the installation generates enough power for a television or a radio. Which can be plugged in while working out.
Another great piece of equipment in the Green Microgym is the EcoPwr treadmill. Treadmills, unlike other fitness machines, need an external power supply to get you running. So it isn’t possible to generate human electricity here. Though the founder of the Green Microgym managed to get up with something that made the treadmill ‘green’. The EcoPwr uses 30% less energy then any regular treadmill and as an addition, in the Portland gym, it’s powered by solar panels.
At this very moment I think it’s too bad I don’t live in Portland. Such an awesome gym is just an experience.
-jdh
SuperForest is a positivity blog.
SuperForesters are all over planet Earth, all united in exploring how to redefine "environmentalism" and "sustainability" to encompass every aspect of our lives. Everything you find on this website has been personally created to uplift and inspire you.
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