The Invention Nation guys build a wind turbine

Invention Nation is a show about three guys trying to make it across the country on a bus that runs on used cooking oil. Along the way they seek out everyday people who have made awesome eco-inventions. Today’s episode centers on inventions that generate energy, with the focus being innovative ways to use old technologies.

First they visit Working Bikes Cooperative in Chicago. This is a place that gives away 5000 bikes a year and sells bikes to pay for shipping. They also promote bikes for power generation within the home. The demonstration on how a simple bike can be used to create energy is really cool.

The next stop for the guys is Chip Energy in Goodfield Illinois. There they build a gasifying stove. The stove is green because when you burn gases you get cleaner combustion or something like that. I have to admit that didn’t totally get it. It just looked like a fancier grill chimney with a fan to me. If you have a better explanation of how it is green please leave it in the comments.

Next the boys go to New York state to meet two people who build wind turbines. One of these guys, James S. Juczak, lives in a house that is completely off the grid and is made from 80% recycled materials, and looks incredibly awesome. In upstate New York that they try to build a small wind turbine, and in a show of my ignorance I discover a turbine is much, much more complicated than a Dutch windmill.

How Green Was the Show: Very. Everything these guys do and show is green.

Fun Facts:

• I lived a few miles down the street from Working Bikes Cooperative in Chicago for two years and never knew it was there
• The turbines that power the off-the-grid house need winds of only 7 mph to function

A theoretical orbital solar cell field

Professor John Mankins has an idea of creating a field of solar cells in outer space that could beam power to Earth and in theory could provide 10,000 times the energy needed by all of Earth’s civilizations. This episode of Discovery Project Earth on Planet Green TV presents a number of tests designed to prove whether such a lofty goal would be possible.

The first test consists of launching a normal solar cell, and a solar cell whose effectiveness is intensified with a Fresnel lens 100,000 feet into the air to make sure that solar cells could function properly at the edge of the Earth’s atmosphere. I won’t ruin the results for you, but I will say that I wasn’t surprised at what happened.

After that test was complete, things got much more interesting. For solar cells to function from space there would need to be a way to get the energy back to Earth. One way that this could be possible would be to beam the power back to Earth using concentrated microwaves. To test this a set of controlled experiments were conducted starting with beaming energy over 12 feet in a lab and finishing with the transfer of energy over 60 miles between two Hawaiian islands. The controlled experiment worked perfectly as did a much shorter version of the 60 mile experiment. The larger experiment didn’t work quite as planned, but going from 100 yards to 60 miles is a rather large jump.

How Green Was This Show: It was extremely green. You don’t get much greener than proposing a way to generate 100% of the world’s energy through solar power.

Fun Facts:

• Solar cells strengthened with Fresnel lenses were eight times as effective in the experiment compared to normal solar cells
• Solar cells in space could generate five times as much energy.

Just Joking, Bill Nye Doesn't Really Smoke Crack

Bill Nye is great. He makes science fun and easy to understand. The same can be said about his newest show Stuff Happens. Stuff Happens airs on Planet Green Tuesdays at 9 PM.

Today’s episode of Stuff Happens titled Garage asks questions such as:

• Is corn based ethanol really green?
• Are any biofuels really green (i.e. sugar based, algae based, or switchgrass based)
• What happened to the electric cars that 10 years ago people were claiming would be the next big thing?
• What is the world’s most efficient form of transportation?

Some of the answers the show gives might be surprising. For example, Bill Nye seems to be very against corn based ethanol. He also mentions an amusing University of Pennsylvania study that claims people who ride bicycles on a regular basis were actually harming the environment. This is because bicyclists live longer, and by doing so they are around to consume more and produce more waste.

Stuff Happens is probably my favorite show on Green Planet, and this was one of its better episodes. So if you are lucky enough to have a cable company that carries Green Planet, I highly recommend checking this episode out.

Fun Facts Mentioned in the Episode:

• We have used about 1/2 of world’s oil in 150 years
• The energy required to make 1 gallon of corn ethanol is equal to burning 65 gallons of gasoline
• Corn erodes soil 18x faster than it can regenerate
• By 2020 there will be over 1,000,000,000 cars on Earth
• There are 15,000,000 skateboarders in the U.S.
• Skateboards are largely recyclable

10-Minute Energy-Saving Secrets – 250 Easy Ways to Save Big Bucks Year Round

By Jerri Farris

I didn’t really like this book. I found that some of the ideas were too simplistic and others seemed a little too ridiculous for me. For example Jerri recommends making sure that skylights have adequate shade. That could be a very cost effective tip depending on where you live. The part where I think she goes too far is when she recommends possibly planting mature trees in your yard to create this shade. I understand that a skylight that is constantly being bombarded by direct sunlight will lead to higher energy costs, but how long would it take to make up for the cost of having a large tree planted just for shade? There are a few other head-scratching suggestions like this to be found in the book.

On the other hand, I think that almost everyone will find a handful of tips in this book that they really hadn’t thought of before. That alone will make up for this book’s reasonable $10 price tag. I personally would recommend reading another energy saving book, but the way this book is presented as a list of tips will definitely be perfect for some readers.

I rate this book 2 out of 5 apples. It may be a great read for some, but I couldn’t get into it.

Find 10-Minute Energy Saving Tips at Green Store and More