Eddy GT Wind Turbine Is Sleek, Silent and Designed for the City

by Cameron Scott

If you launch a clean energy business in Manhattan it’s almost a given you’ll be inspired to start designing products specifically for the urban environment. Urban Green Energy has just launched a new, one-kilowatt wind turbine designed specifically for city rooftop use! A machine certainly made for the modern dweller, the near silent Eddy GT turbine is a chic piece of wind technology that rotates on a vertical axis, optimizing wind capture, even as the air stream shifts within the dynamic city landscape.

The Eddy GT takes up just 40 square feet to generate its kilowatt — to get that much juice from a solar array, you would need up to 400 square feet, which is a tough sell in major cities like New York and San Francisco. While not a light investment at $7,000 per turbine, Urban Green Energy CEO Nick Blitterswyk estimates that in California, which offers a rebate, you could break even in 10 years, and without the $3,000 rebate, it could take 20 years.
If you’re in San Francisco, look for some turbines in action atop Blitterswyk’s company, amongst other products like the Sanya Solar- and Wind-Powered Streetlamp, in front of Civc Center come mid-October. The turbines have scored some other less predictable placements as well, including a position atop the National Guard building in Cleveland, Ohio, and just about every house in a new middle-class subdivision outside St. Louis!

 

Sleek Solar and Wind Powered Hybrid Street Lamps

by Bridgette Meinhold

As designers strive to create a more sustainable future, we’re thrilled to see designs that integrate a variety of renewable energy technologies into objects we encounter in everyday life. This innovative hybrid wind and solar powered street lamp is just such a solution – not only does it use renewable energy to provide light, it’s a stylish update to an everyday object that is capable of operating completely off-grid. The hybrid streetlamps consist of a solar array topped with a wind turbine, and they are capable of generating up to 380 W of power.

 

Designed and manufactured by Urban Green Energy, these solar/wind powered street lamps are mounted to a standard galvanized steel pole that can be made locally and easily swapped with older street lamps. The turbine on top can be either a 300 W 2nd Generation vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT) or a horizontal axis wind turbine. Mounted on the side of the pole are 2 solar panels made by F3 Solar that are capable of generating up to 80 W of power.
The street lamp is capable of producing up to 380 W of power if the sun was shining and the wind were blowing, and the street lamps save excess energy generated in a battery that powers their high efficiency LEDs through the night. Since every location and project is different, Urban Green Energy is taking a component-focused approach to the street lamps’ design – the LED lights, solar panels, wind turbine, tower height, and battery storage are all easily scaled to best fit a particular project.
Decorations on the pole compliment the sweeping lines of the wind turbine and can be customized to whatever color the buyer wants. The hybrid LED lamps seem more like an commissioned art piece rather than a standard industrial looking street lamp.
Urban Green Energy’s Hybrid Wind/Solar Lamps are already gaining attention around the world – they just signed an agreement with an undisclosed city in China to outfit their streets with these street lamps. The company also offers wind turbines ranging from 300 W up to 10 kW, and we recently got a sneak peak at their new 2nd generation 4kW VAWT. We think this new company is on the right track, and we can’t wait to see their hybrid turbines hit the streets.

Architecture: rain collector skyscraper

rain collector skyscraper


'capture the rain' skyscraper by ryszard rychlicki and agnieszka nowak

polish architectural students ryszard rychlicki and agnieszka nowak of H3AR received
a special mention for their proposal in the 2010 skyscraper competition.

'capture the rain' skyscraper is a building whose roof and external shell, which consists
systems of gutters, are aimed at capturing as much rainfall as possible to meet the daily
needs of its inhabitants. average daily consumption of water per person is 150 liters,
out of which 85 liters may be replaced by rain water. within the last thirty years water
consumption has significantly increased. there are lots of factors that contribute to such
an increase such as increasing number washing machines and dish washers, increasing
popularity of garden showering devices and flushing toilets. a third of water being used
in households in western countries is flushed in toilets. since 1900 the total water
consumption in the US has increased by 1000%. at present, an average american uses
five times more water that a citizen of developing countries. such an increase is related
to among others improved living standards. on the other hand, a national hobby of
the danes is collecting rain water for washing and watering plants. within the last ten years
average use of pure water in denmark dropped by 40% and inhabitants of the so called
eco-villages use a third part of the national average.

in view of this data, they decided to design a tower, whose structure will allow for capturing
and processing as much rainfall as possible to provide with water for its inhabitants.
millennia plants have been developing systems of capturing and processing rainfall.
such systems helped them to deal with water deficits or surpluses. similarly, they wanted
to copy their simple mechanisms of rainfall capturing and processing. initially, in designing
the tower, we focused at shaping and modeling the surface of the roof to capture as much
rainfall as possible. under a roof's surface, there are water reservoirs in the form of a large
funnel and reed fields, which serve as a hydro botanic water treatment unit. the unit processes
water into usable water that is further transmitted to apartments. a network of gutters on
the external surfaces of the building is designed to capture rainfall flowing down the building.
such flowing rainfall is transmitted to floors and its surplus is stored in a reservoir under
the building. water captured and processed by the building may be used for flushing toilets,
feeding washing machines, watering plants, cleaning floors and other domestic applications.
having analyzed rainfall in several large cities in developed countries, we obtained a formula
that shows what percentage of daily pure water consumption may be replaced with rainfall
thanks to the technology applied in their building.


top section of 'capture the rain'


detail of balcony


how the rain contributes to the rest of the building


the funnel which is at the core of the building





water consumption table

the water is reused and circulated around the building


project info:
rain collector and skyscraper
design- ryszard rychlicki, agnieszka nowak ( www.h3ar.pl)
4th year students of architecture academy of fine arts in poznan poland
special mention-2010 skyscraper competition evolo

UPCYCLING: Stunning Bowls Made From Plastic Water Bottles.

UPCYCLING: Stunning Bowls Made From Plastic Water Bottles.

ShareThis


Artist Gülnur Özdağlar creates elegant and unusual looking bowls transformed from PET bottles. She calls this process "upcycling". Her aim is to substitute with labor and artistic value the characteristics that the material loses during transformation, thereby obtaining a product of higher value. The collection is named Tertium Non Data (translated from Latin means: the third is not given) and is an alchemic term which refers to the process of combining two disparate elements to create a new, third element.



In this case the new, third element is a collection of diaphanous, attractive tabletop bowls that resemble organic creatures like jellyfish and sea anemones.




The elegant perforated and ornate bowls are created from a regular PET* water bottles. What looks like a flower at the base of the bowls, is the indent from the base of the bottle. If the bottles have a bluish tine, the formed bowls do as well.



Gulnar delicately heats and forms the edges of the bowl to create undulating forms and embellishments like flowers and petals.



With various perforations, cut shapes and added petals, she has managed to create numerous variations, like the ones shown below.











The artist's tools:


The bowls can be used as pet bowls, storage containers, jewelry holders or just as lovely objet d'art. She also makes upcycled jewelry as well.

*PET is Polyethylene Terephthalate, which is a thermoplastic polymer. It can be re-formed by heating. After heating process, it becomes more stiff, rigid, durable and glassy. It becomes even stronger and crystallized when perforated.


above: artist Gülnur Özdağlar with her daughters.

Gülnur Özdağlar studied architecture at the Middle East Technical University and has been active as an architect since she graduated in 1986. She has participated in architectural design competitions, together with various groups, and many of her designs have been recognized with prizes.In addition to being active as an architect, she has also worked in the graphic design and photography fields, and many of these projects have been published in foreign countries in magazines and books. She has received prizes in international competitions of digital art.

•Her website
•Her blog
•Learn to make your own bowls from PET bottles with her "how to guide" on Instructables
•Buy her jewelry or bowls and more at her etsy store