Mad Friday Miscellany: Ideas You Might Come to Eventually
- August 13th, 2010 (by Woodrow)
- In: Electrical, Other Improvements, The good, Uncategorized, furnishings, green
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There are so many bizarre home ideas and alternative energy contraptions circulating the blogosphere right now that it’s hard to put them in a single box. In the interest of stimulating your own creativity, I’ve rounded up a miscellany of concoctions and gee-gaws that you might have otherwise missed in everyday surfing. I know I was tickled.
A Swill Idea
Qiqiao village’s own broad thinker, Ma Yanjun, plumbed together 66 used beer bottles to collect solar rays—a contraption with sufficient efficiency to heat enough water for his three-member family to shower every day. Not only is Ma off the grid, he’s convinced ten neighbors to wire up their own roof-top bottle generators.
Home on the Range
From the simple to the sublime. Designer Marc Philipp Veenendaal created this vent-less fireplace for The Fire Company. The free-standing fireplace doubles as furniture. The EcoSmart Burner runs on renewable, denatured ethanol.
Body Heat
I admit to a lot of queasiness about this innovation from the plucky Swedes, who are diverting the heat produced from crematoriums to local buildings. The Town of Halmstad officials were concerned about all the smoke trailing up into the air. When the crematorium looked at options… well, you know where they went. Since bodies contain toxic chemicals like mercury fillings, the emissions are filtered before sent onward for home heating. Guess who’s coming for dinner?
Ball of Energy
The same country that created crematorium power has also developed a more pleasant home-energy source in the form of the EnergyBall, a wind turbine that spins up to six times the speed of available wind to generate power. If you want to be blown away, visit Inhabitant.com.
3 Responses to “Mad Friday Miscellany: Ideas You Might Come to Eventually”
A ventless fireplace? That thing is so small it doesn’t even look like it would warm anything in its vicinity. That ball of energy is a brilliant design, hopefully they patent that and sell it!
Even if it’s run on denatured alcohol, ventless fireplaces that use combustion to generate heat have no place in a home. If it runs perfectly and all the combustion is complete, you still get a lot of water vapor put into the air. I’ve seen houses with ventless combustion that have water dripping down the inside of the windows and mold growing on the walls from all that humidity.
Besides that, these are some interesting ideas, and I love your pun on ‘body heat.’
Wow, some of these are so amazing! I really like the vent-less fireplace and the EnergyBall. I think it’s because both add real eco-friendly value while still being attractive (I’m looking at you, beer bottle solar panel!). Today there are so many ways to save energy without it having to be an eye-sore. I really appreciate products and services that do that.