What new ‘green’ technology would you like to see?
We have hybrid cars and solar homes and windpower, what would you as a consumer like to see on the market to help greenify your life? Help you save money, produce less waste, or preserve the environment?
Birth control and sterilization.
THe MOST effective thing we can do to "save the planet" is to stop procreating.
Humans use FAR more than their share of natural resources, and create all of the pollution and dangerous waste.
I have read several reliable sources that estimate the maximum human population, to ensure biodiversity and life for all species, is ONE billion.
Solar energy is becoming popular nowadays for commercial buildings and housing. Hope they would sell those solar panels cheaper though, its no use if nobody can afford it.
I am all for wind power !!
If you eat a full tin of beans a day,
Could you start your own wind farm ?
I would like to buy cheap green systems, however I’m using a lot of costly led bulbs at my home!…
Just to pull one idea out of the hat till some of these other big ideas take hold and do their job, it bugs me that I have so many gadgets at home that require a transformer to power them, and that each of those transformers gives out a different voltage.
Couldn’t manufacturers power all our gadgets on a common voltage, just like our houses run on a standard voltage? That way houses could have two voltages in the wall sockets: appliance voltage (AC) and gadget voltage (DC).
Maybe manufacturers could toss a coin for chosing a common connector like the Mini-USB socket instead of having so many different solutions of varying efficiency to the same problem, different plugs, voltages and manufacturers. I am sure the industry would have a kitten at the very idea because in diversity lies profit, but killing off the clients in the long run does not justify profits in the short run.
That said, I would feel less guilty about having so many gadgets in the first place if all these transformers were more efficient at converting household electricity to gadget voltage. The heat they give off! Such a waste! Till we manage to get all the manufacturers in the world to accept a common voltage (ha!) would someone please invent a power-pack cozy that turns waste heat into some extra volts, kind of like a Turbo does for exhaust gasses in a car or an after-burner does on military jet engines.
I think I have my facts right when I say that in Korea the government has imposed that mobile phones must all use the same charger sockets and voltage instead of each manufacturer having their own model. Someone in Motorola, in an interview, said that the amount revenue generated by the sale of phone transformers was huge. I do not recall now if it was a quarter of their expected profits, or half.
In the end, what we need is some way of convincing the industries of the world that we will buy efficiently green products and not buy wasteful products, and that they should manufacture and sell to us accordingly.
Stirling engine cars. Twice the mileage, can burn most anything and are extremely quiet. Takes a few minutes to warm up though, so the demonstration vehicles weren’t popular.
Nuclear power, combined with solar and wind in areas where they are practical. We must have the Nuclear for its 24/7 reliability. The wind and solar can help, but both only produce about 35% of the time.