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Tonight I went to SF Beta at 111 Minna. It is a Web 2.0 mixer that brings together founders, developers, investors, bloggers, and key influencers in the technology field. There are also live demos of a dozen startups that you can learn more about. This was not a Green function but it is a Tech function. It is related to Green Technology because I was there to socialize with people and to discuss more about sustainability and green technology.
This is a concept by Jack Godfrey Wood that allows for one simple button that can turn off the electricity for all the non essential appliances and gadgets in the house. This idea works great for hotels as I have previously discussed here, but it will interesting to see whether or not it will ever be a mainstream function for homes. I am sure there are already houses that have this implemented already. In order to use this for existing homes, you just need to put a adapter on specific sockets. You would not want to do this for all the electricity in the house because there are many essentials such as the refrigerator, hot water heater, fan/AC/heater, garage door, fish tank, file servers and probably many more things that require dedicated electricity. I can definitely see this concept built into new houses or mansions where your house is too big to check whether the lights are all turned off. Unfortunately, I do not have that problem right now in my 2 bedroom apartment but maybe someday…
If you are getting rid of your electronics, www.greencitizen.com would be a good resource. This is a video that promotes recycling your electronic equipment. Green Citizen has two drop off centers in the bay area and guarantees that every piece of your equipment that can be recycled will be recycled and all harmful substances will be disposed of properly. If your equipment is still functioning, you can always sell it on Ebay or Craigslist and make some money from it. Not only would that promote reuse, but you can make some money from it. If you want to just get rid of it, you can always just donate it to Goodwill or Salvation Army and they will resell it.
As Beijing prepares itself for the Olympics in 2008, the city is doing numerous things to clean up the city. If you think the air quality in Los Angeles is bad, Beijing is another level. The smog pollution is one of the big concerns, and the plan is to cut down the amount of cars on the road. When officials in Beijing kept 800,000 cars off the road for three days last year, it reduced air pollution by 40%. The Chinese government has spent billions of dollars reducing public transportation fares, developing the transit system, and improving bus routes and services. Driving personal cars to attend the Olympic events in 2008 will be prohibited. The Olympic Forest Park being built for the Olympics is using state of the art technology and sustainable materials as it will be a model for the sustainable city and water management. Pictured above is an environmentally sustainable alternative paving system that is a mix between grass and concrete. Here is a gallery of other green technologies in Beijing:
http://news.com.com/2300-11392_3-6186860-1.html?tag=ne.gall.pg
This is a list of clean and renewable energy projects taken from Shield Innovations for the Beijing Olympics in 2008.
New energy and new technology for energy-use
* Space heating with geothermal energy and water source heat pumps There will be 160 geothermal wells completed in the city by 2008. The construction of geothermal heating project in Olympic Garden will be completed to serve 0.40 million square meters in the stadiums and gymnasiums for space heating.
* Solar energy To devote major efforts to promote energy solar utilization, 3MW solar cells will be constructed in Olympic Park as a demonstrating project, where 90% hot water produced by solar energy. Solar photo electricity application project and solar thermal utilization project in Olympic Park are constructed.
* Wind power The existing and planned wind power capacity is 50MW in the outer suburb areas of Beijing, which can supply mainly 20% of the electricity demand of Olympic Park as committed in the bidding report to the IOC. Efforts will be made to purchase wind power from the neighboring provinces during the Olympic Games. The feasibility of wind power development in Yanqing, north west of Beijing, is also under investigation.
* Biomass energy Quality of rural energy will improve, leading to improvement in rural energy use, air and water environment and comprehensive utilization of agricultural wastes. Main measures include biomass gasification projects for centralized biogas supply and large-scale biogas energy-environment projects
* Fuel cells and electric vehicles efforts will be made in research and development of fuel-cell-driven and power-driven vehicles aiming to mitigate the pollution induced by transportation.
Does your office recycle? If it doesn’t, why not? Set one up! Often times, offices have the mentality of waiting for someone else to do it, but its okay to speak up. For example, my office did not have a recycling bin in the kitchen. We have free sodas at work so people tend to drink a lot of sodas. After having one put in there, the bin actually fills up pretty fast! All that was necessary was for someone to speak up and everyone else will follow in your footsteps.
Tons of paper get used everyday in offices and not all of it gets recycled. A study found that 60% of the waste produced in financial companies was paper waste. Here is a guideline for some suggestions on starting a recycling program at work.
Here are some tips to save paper at work:
For more local recycling resources and services, take a look at this page on the Earth911.org website. There are numerous items that can be reused or recycling and you can find the nearest recycling centers by entering your location.
