Liquid Tree is decorative, functional, and green. It’s a liquid feedback display created by [Jia Yi Lin] that is designed to tell you exactly how much water you’re wasting in the shower. Behind the pretty tubes is some interesting hardware. [Lin] used an Arduino board, and based her code off the Unipolar Stepper example. She’s posted her own code and wiring for the project. When hot water is turned on, the motors decrease the amount of liquid in the tubes. This causes the pattern to slowly disappear, indicating water consumed.
[garygadget15] in the UK has an interesting youtube page showing an electric bicycle. On his page titled, saving money the “green way” he has replaced his commuter car with one of these electric bikes. He then videos the commute with both to compare the results. The DIY electric bicycle kit he uses is made by Cyclone comes in multiple wattage’s ranging from 180 watts to 1500 watts where they do a great job of showing the conversion steps. They’ve got enough detail that you could fab your own from salvaged parts if you felt like it.
With concerns about the environment at an all-time high, do we roll up our sleeves and fix the situation or set our fears aside and dance the night away? [Andrew Charalambous], a nightclub owner in from Britain, doesn’t think we should have to choose, so he installed a dance floor that harnesses power from dancers into one of his clubs.
The dance floor uses piezoelectrics to collect the power: as clubgoers dance, electricity-producing crystals under the floor are compressed, producing a small current. The current is collect by embedded batteries, which in turn provide the power to lights, audio systems, and other parts of the club that consume electricity.
It’s certainly an interesting idea, but we’d like to know just how much power these floors are able to generate. Is this a gimmick or a genuinely practical solution? [Charalambous]‘s club has adopted the somewhat hokey policy of forcing patrons to sign a pledge to be climate-conscious and do what they can to help the Earth, but that’s a small price to pay to earn green karma and have fun at the same time.
Aside from having a very cool name, parasitic power is an innovate way to recapture already spent power. This power can come in the form of wasted heating or cooling of a building for example. Last week the Southern Methodist University activated the first commercial Green Machine from ElectraTherm. The unit recycles residual heat from the building into electricity. So far, the 50kW Green Machine has exceeded expectations. The company also says owners can recoup the units cost after about three years.
Back in November we asked what you would do with an old unused laptop. If you have an old laptop that’s not doing much more than gathering dust, chances are you could put it to better use. You could sell it, but you probably wouldn’t get too much for it. Donating or recycling can also get it out your hair, but if you’d like to try something different, read on for some ideas.
I was starting to wonder when [Bruce] would send in this years final projects from the Electrical and Computer Engineering students at Cornell University. The first project looks like a great one for the green geek – a controllable power usage monitoring power outlet. The music geeks should dig midi trumpet interface, but the car geeks might have problems keeping away from the soldering iron after they see the CAN bus SD card data acquisition system. There are plenty more, so go check em out.
