London was awarded the 2012 Summer Olympics partly for the promise of making the games green. From what I can tell they have accomplished most of it.
When making room for the venues, they demolished buildings, recycled most of the materials, cleaned up the soils, re-invigorated the Lea River, and many other actions. Some of the wood utilized was not painted as it will be reused after the Olympics. That is a pretty good stab at greening the games.
Items not used were picked up by the locals for upgrading of local theaters, DIYers, etc. Most of the seating will be temporary as they will be recycled back into the community.
For a good example of low carbon building, the Veladrome was built by utilizing surplus gas pipe. That is about 1/3 of the pipe used on the Beijing Birdnest.
The London Bridge has had its lighting redone using LEDs which certainly is much cheaper and much brighter illumination. The lights can rotate to three (3) different colors and I really like that.
The streetlights on ground level are also being swapped out with LED and floodlights taking their place, for an estimated 45 percent reduction in energy use.
So what do you think? Do you believe that the Games will be greener than Beijing? Do you think that they reached a sustainability?
Green …. as the green future unfolds.
With all of the attention of the American people needing jobs, this infographic indicates where, who and how.
Many of the companies listed are IT companies and many of them have plans to update their computer centers into green environments.
Even NREL(National Renewable Energy Lab) is updating their huge computer center which generate a tremendous amount of heat. Many variations are being utilized.
Green jobs are not only in the wind, solar and other energy sectors but in our hometowns as well. Planting a garden on a roof top is a green job as it takes time and effort to do it. Hopefully, the expense will be worth the crop produced.
Just click on the image to enlarge it. Sometimes it may take two clicks. Either way, give it a try.
(Infographic by Jobvine Jobs)
Pretty cool right?
Green ….. as the green future unfolds.
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| Renmatix Super Converter |
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| Hackers hacking at Cleanweb Hackathon, NYC. |
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| Hackers will hack for food. |
Tekon has developed the first lifetime clean glass coating process for architectural applications and is specified by leading architects for major projects, exclusively.
Tekon advanced technology opens a new chapter in the maintenance cost, visibility, appearances and life of architectural glass products.
Protective treatment, Tekon , is applied to new or installed glass. This chemical process links oxygen with carbon in the porous surface, blocking hydrolysis, making it super hydrophobic and repellant. Water beads up and runs off like quicksilver.
Tekon consists of multiple co-polymers that prevent hard water, soap and other stains from adhering to the surface. Dirt rinses away leaving the glass sparkling clear and streak-less. Cleaning is far less frequent and much easier, without “harsh cleaners” of any kind.
Under a microscope, new glass is seen to be very rough and porous. Contaminates, oil, hard water deposits, finger prints, even dust cling to the surface. Water spotting can become permanently part of the glass.
Tekon transforms glass at the molecular level creating a highly hydrophobic smoother surface that is slick, impervious to moisture, thereby blocking corrosion and permanent spots.
TEKON bonds and seals to almost all hard surfaces such as:
GLASS
FIBERGLASS
PLASTICS
GRANITE
MARBLE
STONE
PORCELAIN
CERAMIC
VINYL
ALUMINUM
CHROME
STAINLESS STEEL
Tekon products come in a variety of home kits: the Bath Kit, Countertop Kit, Stone Care Kit and Stainless Steel Kit. They can be used on sliding glass doors, shower doors, kitchen counters, sinks and floors.
The product has been on the market for a while but there is no reason why it cannot be brought to your attention now. Especially if you can get rid of the harsh chemicals in your home when using Tekon.
Tekon …. as the green future unfolds.
I am writing to you as a voter in your district. I urge you to vote “no” on cloture for S. 968, the PROTECT IP Act, on Jan. 24th. The PROTECT IP Act is dangerous, ineffective, and short-sighted. It does not deserve floor consideration. I urged my representative to vote “no” on SOPA, the corresponding House bill.
Over coming days you’ll be hearing from the many businesses, advocacy organizations, and ordinary Americans who oppose this legislation because of the myriad ways in which it will stifle free speech and innovation.
Please view the video and make your decision. Your blog and/or website depends on it.
PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.
It seems like everyone is complaining about the size of their monthly electric bill, from companies to homeowners to renters. But how many people actually have an idea how they accrued their kWh (kilowatt hours), and even more importantly, what they can do about lowering them?
The solution is getting insight and control over our plug loads – the amount of energy consumed by our plugged-in devices. In the United States an estimated $10 billion (100 billion kWh) per year is wasted on appliances that are left on, or that are left plugged in, all the while consuming energy. Standby power consumption single handedly contributes to 10% of residential use nationally, and more than half of all the energy used in buildings is outside of office hours, which tells you that our systems and habits are simply not efficient.
In 2007 Plugwise launched their first smart-plug in The Netherlands, and buildings and houses using the devices were quickly seeing plug loads drop by up to 50%. Although widely used and praised throughout Europe, Plugwise products have not been available to Americans until now, via their California distributor kWh Power.(http://www.kwhpower.com)
“We don’t realize what it costs to leave devices plugged in. From phone chargers to home entertainment and lighting systems – even when you are not using them they are consuming energy. People are basically burning money without realizing it,” says Derek Fehmers of kWh Power.
Plugwise products help consumers and businesses save money by using a simple interface accessible via smart phone or browser that shows how much energy appliances are using and what this costs per hour. The user plugs their device into a Plugwise smart-plug, and a wireless system relays all information to the software. The software then allows users to program the plugs to turn off automatically when in standby-mode, or on set schedules. The plugs will be available at major retailers and can be purchased on the kWh Power website at a cost of $50 per unit, yielding a return on investment of 4-8 months.
In the next couple of months new products will be released that work together with the smart-plugs, including motion detectors that can trigger plugs and lights to turn on or off, wall switches that wirelessly communicate with the plugs, as well as temperature and humidity sensors that can trigger A/C and space heater units based on occupancy and presence in a room.
All of you that have solar panels installed for your home. The combination of generating your own power, knowing the amount of energy you are producing, and seeing how that energy gets distributed amongst the appliances in key to understanding your system. Plugwise has the unique ability to measure in-and-output, so it will tell you what your plugs are using in terms of energy, but also what is coming in if you are generating your own power.
Plugwise …. as the green future unfolds.
Fact: 20-25% of landfill weight is plastics. Landfills are one of the most common waste disposal methods in the United States today, with an overall increase in Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) consistent with population increase.
In the 1960s, about 1% of MSW was made up of plastics. This has increased by 12% (30 million tons) in 2008. 43% of this is made up of plastic packaging, 22% made up by non-durable goods, and 35% consists of durable goods. Total? 11.3 million tons of just containers and packaging end up in landfills each year.
Plastic is going into landfills in alarming amounts, and is one of the hardest materials on the planet to break down properly. It doesn’t biodegrade – which means that natural bacteria are unable to break it down. What happens instead is a process called photo degradation, wherein the sun breaks it apart into smaller and smaller pieces – still plastic, by the way – eventually becoming individual molecules of plastic that just sit there and do absolutely nothing, still too tough for anything to digest. Landfills are filling up fast, and soon there won’t be any space left as the planet goes about wastefully and irresponsibly using plastics in everyday life.
Most people agree that the sensible solution to this problem is to reuse and recycle, and to do it well. By maximizing the use of plastics in our lives, using them and reusing them as many times as humanly possible, we lessen the amount of waste volume we throw out, thus lessening the amount going into landfills. Recycling the products by turning what plastic materials we already have on hand into ‘new’ products achieves more or less the same effect.
Another option is to use biodegradable plastic products in lieu of non-biodegradable ones. These are made from natural material and can be broken down naturally. Yet still another, but far more drastic, option is to live completely plastic-free, but most people find that this lifestyle is an exercise in futility, as plastic is literally everywhere nowadays.
In the end, the best solution is still to use plastic as responsibly as we can. Single-use plastic products like packaging, plastic straws and other disposable items are things that we can live without with a little ingenuity and some common sense. If we can somehow lessen the waste volume of these products being brought to the landfills, we’re probably doing the planet a bigger favor than we think. So think twice before you pick up that straw on your way from the counter at your favorite fast-food. Use reusable cloth bags to carry your purchases in. Mother Nature will thank you in the end. PlasticPlace.net makes garbage bags that are made out of 80% recycled material, doing its best in helping to preserve our environment. Make the responsible choice today, use Plastic Place. Visit their website at http://www.plasticplace.net.
The Green Skeptic | 
01 31st, 2012| 
