Quite a number of people are out to find a solution to their power consumption. As many have come to realise, there is a lot of electricity being wasted in their house by technology they use at home. Getting a gadget that will be able to monitor your power consumption and even help you in a way that you are aware of the amount of electricity getting into your home is what some people are out to find. With ecowizz.net, you will be able to save energy in a more efficient way.

It is the need for us to save energy in our homes that birthed ecowizz.net. Ecowizz.net is a company that makes products that will help you in saving energy in your home with ease. With the products that they have to offer you can have complete control over your energy consumption. This is really good news for quite a number of individuals.

When you look at the type of products that they offer, you will notice that they are the only players that are currently in the field. This means that the field is quite scary for many businesses. Just recently we saw Microsoft, Google and Cisco launch experimental software and hardware to help homeowners in this particular regard. It was after a while that all of the mentioned companies bailed out of the project. This left a gap and which ecowizz.net has come in to fill. The products help you monitor the amount of energy getting into your home each and every day making it easy for you to know exactly where it is being used most and what you can do to minimise power usage in your house by employing the right measures. Picture this for a moment, you just dozed off and left the lights on, your television set on, and a lot of other electrical appliances using energy on. What ecowizz.com products aim to achieve is for you to have little or no cases of energy wastage in your house.

Press on cc button to switch english subtitles on

As for my personal opinion on what the future holds for ecowizz, I can say that it will be a tough ride. The idea is really good for me, but when it comes to using the technology that ecowizz has to offer, you can be sure that not so many people will be interested. The market is now aware of the amount of energy the consume and the majority think they are doing enough, this means it will require a huge amount of work to educate the costumer base. The reason being; people cannot see the benefits of such great technology, it very likely to be seen as a small gadget that will help them monitor a fraction of their consumption and that looks complicated. The interest in monitoring one’s own electricity consumption will become a growing trend but in the near future all I can see is gloom.

It is one thing to have great products and services, but quite another to have products that are actually meet the requirement of large target market. To conclusion, I think ecowizz needs to rethink their sales strategy and make their product more attractive. They need to grab attention by using real success stories and maybe giving away the device for free and take a small percentage on the savings the costumer makes. I think a strong and well structured referral system  could be a could idea as this kind of devices will sell well on word of mouth. It’s all about sales & unfortunately is also the case for green technology. I’m looking forward to how this company will shape up in the future.

Today I received an email from swiss “couponing” website Qoqa.ch an offer for a half price ecowizz system I was two fingers from buying it but I didn’t. The main reason is that is the majority of my plugs and an ON/OFF button and that I cannot connect my lights on the system. I will only invest in this if I can control my entire house from my iphone and monitor the consumption otherwise I see it as a gadget.

Related articles

• Measuring Your Energy Consumption (lumoenergy.com.au)
• Facebook Launching “Social Energy” App for Improving Energy Efficiency (treehugger.com)
• Do smart energy gadgets actually save you money? (moneyexpert.com)
• The Recession’s Toll on the Green Economy Home energy-monitoring systems have wilted, green job growth is lackluster, and we’re left to worry about the state of green tech By Rebecca Boyle (imullins89.wordpress.com)

Instead of spending, why not earn something. Keeping a very simple fact in mind; that the oil prices are rapidly increasing while wind power is a source, which is totally free for, and full of potential if you find the methods to take advantage of it. Furthermore wind power is environment friendly and infinite source of energy.

A market that could benefit from such energy are shipping companies. If they are provided with efficient sail technology they would be able to reduce fuel costs considerably. At the moment there is no sail system that has meet the strict requirements of the maritime shipping industry.

This until a company named SkySails came into the picture offering top-notch wind propulsion system. This is the only company that has been able to meet the requirements and needs of the maritime industry. According to the company with current wind conditions around the world, average annual fuel costs of ships can be lowered by 10 to 35. This figure can vary according to wind conditions. The company states that under an ideal wind condition the fuel consumption of a ship can be reduced by 50 % on temporary basis!

The Main focus of Skysails is their towing kite propulsion systems specifically created for cargo ships. With current products it can accommodate cargo vessel weighing between 8 and 16 tons. The company is investing importantly on research and development. Future plan are to deliver a similar upgraded product designed for heavier load. The goal is to be able to move loads of around 32 tons in the near future after that further down the line the target capacity they want to achieve is of 132 tons.

High tech rope for green shipping is another creation by the SkySails. They have worked closely with DSM Dyneema and Gleistein to create an innovative product aimed to increase quality & sustainability of ropes within the maritime market. The company has gathered experts in the fields of synthetic fibers manufacturing to develop an amazing product called the “towing kite technology”. It is known as the world’s most powerful wind propulsion system that reduces the consumption of fuel of ships up to 35 %. The venture of the company is a success and according to themtogether they will push the boundaries of the traditional and existing technologies to optimize and scale the SkySails system.

With this new technology being introduced in the market, existing cargo vessels will be out dated. Skysails kites are specifically design to be installed on any old vessel, which will be a key strength when approaching shipping companies. If early adopters prove the benefits of such innovation it will surely give a jolt to the other companies. Gradually it seems logical that wind towing technologies will be allied to more costly a traditional fossil fuel energy.

Related articles

• Three Tips to Avoid Costly Shipping Mistakes (entrepreneur.com)
• Cargill will have a kite sail on a 30,000 ton cargo ship (nextbigfuture.com)
• Green mega-yachts: Not-so-filthy rich (economist.com)
• Climate Change and the Impact of Shipping (gcaptain.com)
• Maine wind farm could be latest ‘not in my backyard’ casualty (venturebeat.com)

For many people, the dawn of the New Year presents opportunity for new beginnings. This is what drives the practice of New Year’s resolutions. But the statistics are not good – few people manage to sustain the momentum on their resolutions beyond March.

Even worse is that this is not a problem bedevilling New Year’s resolutions alone but also many other day to day activities people purpose to do. The Getupp app for the iphone has been developed by a German start-up precisely to increase the completion rate of one’s commitments. Getupp does this by introducing a human element that has long been known as a powerful driver for goal realization – peer motivation.

Set a goal that only you know and chances are, you will struggle to meet it. On the other hand, if you make a commitment jointly with 2 or 3 friends, the camaraderie will reduce the likelihood of you giving up along the way. The very notion of ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ is evidence of how seriously people instinctively consider the opinions of those around them.

How does the Getupp app work? First, you commit to performing a certain action that requires you to be physically present in a specific location at a specific time in order for you to perform it. For instance, you can commit to go to the gym on Monday and Thursday at 1800hrs. Or you could commit to be home for dinner by 1900hrs.

When you make the commitment, the details are automatically shared with your Friends on Facebook. Your friends have the opportunity to vote on whether or not you are likely to fulfil your pledge.

Once you arrive at the site of the intended activity, launch the Getupp app and it automatically flags the commitment as fulfilled notifying your Facebook friends in the process. Getupp is location based, meaning you cannot flag a task as complete unless you are physically present (or at least the iphone is) at the location you indicated you would carry out the action.

If you fail to be at the activity’s location at the time specified, your Facebook friends are notified of your ‘failure’ and are free to mete out any other ‘punishment’ they deem fit.

Getupp addresses a real need. But while many people will not mind using it once in a while and mainly for fun, few are likely to use it daily. This app appears mainly geared to young adults. Even in this demographic though, it will have to struggle with a ‘juvenile-ish’ perception. This is regardless of whether one is actually succeeding or failing in fulfilling their commitments.

The very thought that one’s information is being distributed to all their Facebook friends (who are often of very varied temperaments, ages and convictions) can create a fear of embarrassment that may reduce uptake and ultimately, the Getupp app’s use.

We’ve always all dreamt about wireless energy. The world is that why we want everything to be wireless. No cable and less infrastructure.

Imagine a house with one simple generator that powers every single device without any cable. You wouldn’t even have to think to charge your phone, it will simply charge from your pocket as soon as you are close en enough to the “generator”.

The first question that comes up when you talk about wireless electricity is SAFETY, people are worried about safety and they are totally right who wants to take the risk of being electrocuted just for the sake of innovation. Well Wi-Tricity is totally safe as electricity travels through a magnetic force which is completely harmless to us humans. You can walk in and of the magnetic field and not feel anything at all, while your tv is being powered up!

What is surprising is that Wi-Tricity has been discovered a while ago, the question is why don’t we here about it more often! Of course cables are cheaper and “safer” but imagine the marketing potential that could have if apple came out with a wireless iphone charger.

Watch the video and now start to imagine your life with such technology!

http://www.witricity.com/

Now what? In my mind, diesel engines are the future. We fixed their pollution problem a long time ago, they don’t consume much, and they are fast! (Audi wins every 24h du Mans with a diesel powered car since 3 years now). And you know the best part? A friend of mine recycle old restaurant frying oil in his diesel new beetle and drives with it.

So far, there have been some opposition to bio fuel because people make it out of crops. How can you justify starving people of destroying the amazon to power your car? Arable lands are precious, we should not grow petrol on them.

However, 75% of the world is covered with oceans. Salted water cannot be used to water crops, and there is a problem of fertilizers getting to the sea from the over use we make of them. Why not make petrol out of algae then?

I have read that some species have 10 times the energy potential of land crops.

I see many different ways of growing them: directly farm them in the sea, have them grow between glass just like solar panels, etc.. What is sure is that the potential will be enormous as soon as the petrol price will go up. I read that big companies like boeing are already spending some money in R&D, but this is the kind of new technology that you can develop low cost if you are creative. The most important point I think is finding the best algae specie, it should be resistant, grow fast and produce much oil.

They already do it: http://earth2tech.com/2008/03/27/15-algae-startups-bringing-pond-scum-to-fuel-tanks/

This article from MIT is interesting too: http://www.technologyreview.com/business/20319/page1/

This is another approach to nuclear fusion.

It occurred to me while considering the current status of nuclear fusion (by opposition with nuclear fission):

1. We can do it, we know how to.
2. It’s cleaner than fission, and tremendously more powerful.
3. Actually, it’s so powerful that we only use it in bombs. We cannot handle it in a plant yet.

I’ve bought several magazines to read on the beach this summer, and a new trend everyone starts speaking about is the recycling of human crap for agriculture. From scientific american to wired, smart people preach this idea.

Finally, why not? We already have sewers that collect all the crap and drive it to purification plants. Those plants should transform excrement into fertilizer instead of burning it… The numbers are enormous. Assuming that a typical human being releases 300 grams of pooh every day, that makes 18’000’000*0.3=5’400’000 kilos of pure brown matter every day for a city like Tokyo. I’m sure you can grow some plants on that.

Imagine what would australia or israel be if they could produce as much fresh water as they like just with the energy of the sun and sea water?