Manage that energy!
AGL Energy launched the AGL Energy Challenger, a new online service for industrial and commercial business customers to help them manage their energy usage and encourage energy efficiency. The service was developed in conjunction with energy consultancy Energetics and is complimentary to AGL customers.
It allows customers to evaluate the effectiveness of their energy management practices and use of energy efficient technologies, provides a report on the business energy efficiency rating and a benchmark comparison to assess how others in the same industry perform and a prioritised action plan. It also gives an indication of the potential energy savings that can be made through implementing the recommended measures. (From www.EnvironmentalManagement.net ) Windmill with a Twist
A traditional windmill that drives a pump is the simple concept behind the combination of windmill/reverse osmosis developed by the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in the Netherlands. Except in this case, it involves a high-pressure pump that pushes water through a membrane, producing fresh water directly from seawater.
Windmill/desalination combinations are already commercially available, but these windmills produce electricity from wind power, store the electricity and subsequently use it to drive the high-pressure pump for reverse osmosis of seawater. The storage of electricity is very expensive, and significant amounts of energy are lost during conversion.
In the TU Delft installation, the high-pressure pump is driven directly by wind power, and instead of storing electricity, relies on the storage of water for calm periods. Suited for use by small villages in isolated, dry coastal areas, for example, the windmill is best suited to irrigation purposes.
These windmills turn relatively slowly and are also very robust. On the basis of the windmill's capacity at varying wind speeds, it is estimated that it will produce 5 to 10 m3 of fresh water per day: enough drinking water for a small village of 500 inhabitants. A water reservoir will have to ensure that enough water is available for a calm period lasting up to five days.
Three safeguards (in the event of the installation running dry, a low number of revolutions or a high number of revolutions) are also performed mechanically so that no electricity is needed.
(From www.fastthinking.com.au) Pipedreams coming true in Victoria and Norway?
Progress towards reducing greenhouse emissions from stationary sources such as power plants has been made with the opening of a CO2 capture and storage (CCS) demonstration plant in Victoria. The company behind the project said it is currently working on an assessment of CO2 storage sites in NSW.
The CO2 capture and storage project is located near Warrnambool in south-western Victoria. It was developed by the Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies (CO2CRC) over 10 years.
The project involves compressing and transporting 100,000 tonnes of CO2 and then sequestering it in a depleted natural gas reservoir two kilometres below the Earth’s surface. The CO2 will be injected over a period of one to two years.
The Norwegian Government will build a carbon capture and storage facility at a natural gas power plant capable of capturing over one million tonnes of CO2 per year. Four companies have been selected to possibly build the plant, one of which is HTC PurEnergy who has developed its carbon capture technology at the University of Regina in Canada.
The program will involve the construction of a carbon capture facility as well as installing pipelines for transport and storage of CO2 in geological formations.
The Asia-Pacific rights to the HTC technology are held by Brisbane-based EESTech Inc, which it hopes to pair with its Hybrid Coal Gas Turbine (HCGT) system designed to produce electricity using waste coal dust and fugitive vented methane from coal mine.
(From www.EnvironmentalManagementNews.net )
I&I comment: Don’t be fooled. The photos (including the one here) usually shown of major power stations and industrial sites are of steam generated in cooling towers and not the polluting gases (which are often invisible to the naked eye). Believe it or not? Expressive pen
While the written word has taken great leaps in recent years with the advent of computer-based publishing and the global dissemination of text across the web, the humble pen is more or less the same device it has ever been.
Now the consumer electronics company Philips says it has a breakthrough that could change the way we use pens forever. What the standard pen does not do so easily, Philips notes, is record the mood of the writer at the moment of writing. So it has developed a pen with sensors in its shaft that detect physiological factors, such as heart beat, blood pressure, skin temperature, and finger pressure.
The pen also has a small actuator that can change the properties of the line that the pen traces out by switching inks and modifying the shape of the writing tip. A built-in chip then determines the writer's emotional state and changes the colour and quality of the trace accordingly. The result is a pen that produces a continuous record of how the user felt while writing.
Philips says: "Signatures are currently always the same, yet some documents will be signed with enthusiasm, others possibly with hesitation. Having a recording of this could be useful for historical reasons."
And if you don't always want to reveal your true feelings, the company adds that the pen could have a button to switch the effects off. Or you could use a biro!
Sent on April 1 by Glen Moore, Director of the Wollongong Science Centre and Planetarium (www.sciencecentre.uow.edu.au ) Your Ideas, Innovations or Events?
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