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Posts Tagged ‘wind turbine’

Tree-Shaped Wind Turbines

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on April 22, 2017| 3 Comments »

Photo: Biosphoto/Ardea/Caters News Agency
New energy generator may not be as attractive as a tree, but it’s also not as noisy as a standard wind turbine.

While you and I are just bopping along following our familiar routines, it’s reassuring to know that inventors are out there inventing.

Victoria Woollaston writes for the Daily Mail about one inventor who may help reduce global warming by making the use of wind turbines more widespread.

She says, “Monstrous, noisy conventional wind turbines may soon be a thing of the past thanks to tree-shaped wind turbines being installed in Paris. …

“French company ‘New Wind’ is installing the first at Place de la Concorde in Paris and is hoping to expand throughout the country and abroad. The 26ft (8 metre) trees are fitted with 63 aeroleaves. Each one uses tiny blades inside the ‘leaves’ and can generate electricity in wind speeds as low as 4.5mph (7km/h), and regardless of the wind’s direction. …

“The company’s founder, Jérôme Michaud-Larivière, hopes the trees can be used to exploit small air currents flowing along buildings and streets, and could eventually be installed in people’s backgardens and urban centres. …

“The trees are also silent, so sound pollution would not be an issue — a major improvement from past designs. The trees currently retail at £23,500 ($33,670).

” ‘The idea came to me in a square where I saw the leaves tremble when there was not a breath of air,’ said Jérôme Michaud-Larivière, the founder of the Parisian start-up. …

“In the future Mr Michaud-Larivière hopes to develop a ‘perfect’ tree that has leaves with natural fibres, roots that could generate geothermal energy and ‘bark’ covered with photosensitive cells.”

Readers can probably guess what I love most about this invention: “The trees can be used to exploit small air currents flowing along buildings and streets.”  That sure fits with my mantra about small things adding up: “One and one and 50 make a million.” (Line adapted from Pete Seeger’s “One Man’s Hands.”)

More at the Daily Mail, here.

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Charitable Venture Capital

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 22, 2015| Leave a Comment »

Here’s a story about venture capital with a do-good focus.

Sacha Pfeiffer writes at the Boston Globe, “Among entrepreneurs, there’s a dreaded place called the Valley of Death. That’s where startup companies go when they run out of funding before making money on their own, and it’s an especially common fate for clean-energy startups, like manufacturers of solar panels and wind turbines. …

“But what if that early-stage, high-risk financing could instead come from philanthropists, who aren’t driven by profit? Later, traditional investors could step in and supply continued funding.

“That’s the concept behind PRIME Coalition, a year-old Cambridge nonprofit that has pooled $1 million from wealthy donors, including Hollywood actors Will and Jada Pinkett Smith, as seed money for its first investment: an energy storage startup company. …

“PRIME rethinks the traditional definition of charitable work and charitable giving. Its founder, 30-year-old MIT graduate Sarah Kearney, argues that companies whose products or services reduce greenhouse gases are doing a social good, just like soup kitchens and homeless shelters, so they should be able to receive philanthropic funding. In this case, the social benefits include conserving the environment and fighting climate change.

“The group searches for early-stage alternative energy companies … then locates philanthropists or socially minded for-profit investors to fund them. Those could include charitable foundations, investment offices of wealthy families, and donor-advised funds. …

“Peter Rothstein, president of the New England Clean Energy Council, said philanthropic funding ‘can make a significant dent’ in filling the need for early-stage capital for clean-tech companies.” More here.

It is not unheard of for philanthropy to put its investment dollars into companies that provide a social good. Read about the Heron Foundation’s decision to do so some years back in “Expanding Philanthropy’s Reach: Mission-Related Investing,” here.

Photo: Lane Turner/Globe Staff
PRIME Coalition founder Sarah Kearney says that companies whose products or services reduce greenhouse gases are doing a social good and should be able to receive philanthropic funding.

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