Non Toxic Vision

India wins solar power funding

This article was published in the Financial Times, March 22, 2010:

by Joe Leahy

..."The International Finance Corporation is investing in India's first commercially viable solar power project, giving a vote of confidence to ambitions to develop the technology there. Azure Power Private is India's first megawatt-scale solar power developer, and the IFC is set to invest USD 10 Million. .... India is engaged in a vast expansion of power infrastructure to drive its rapidly growing economy and aid its 1,14bn population, more of half of which do not have access to electricity. The country is seeking to increase its solar power generation capacity from near zero to 20,000 megawatt by 2022. The Azure project sets a precedent in India for connecting to the national grid. .... Connected to the electricity grid the plant supplies power to 20,000 people in 32 villages  in the Amritsar district of Punjab. ..."

The Digital Greenhouse

The Digital Greenhouse is the transmediale.09 salon for strategic artistic,
performative and net-based discourse. Bringing together artists, cultural
activists, hackers and a cosmopolitan array of thinkers and makers the salon
seeks to address the cultural 'raison d'etre' beyond the daily headlines of
climate change rhetoric. How does digital art and culture maneuver across
political and societal boundaries between 'our' North and an emergent, less
'silent' and deep South to create new voices and strong cultural networks? With
the irreversible global transformations we face, the Digital Greenhouse becomes
a training camp for the cultural revolution essential in creating new tools and
methods of agency and dialogue.
All Salon events take place in 'conference room 1' of the House of World
Cultures in Berlin. Admission is 5 euros, reduced 3 euros.

Tickets may be purchased in advance, starting January 15th.

More information go to: http://www.transmediale.de/en/theme-main

M.I.T. Engergy Club

New York Times, Thomas L. Friedman: "The People We Have Been Waiting For"' December 2, 2007:

.....The Energy Club, which was founded in 2004 by a few graduate students discussing energy over beers at a campus bar. Today it has 600-plus members who have put on scores of events focused on building energy expertise among M.I.T. students and faculty, and "fact-based analysis" including a trip to Saudi Arabia. Then he got together with three engeneering undergrads who helped launch the Vehicle Design Summit - a global, open-source, collaborative effort, managed my M.I.T. students, that has 25 college teams around the world, including in India and China, working together to build a plug-in electric hybrid within three years. Each team contributes a different set of parts or designs. These kids are building a hyper-efficient car, which, they hope "will demonstrate a 95 % reduction in embodied energy, materials and toxicity from cradle to cradle to grave" and provide "200 m.p.g. energy equivalency or better." The Linux of cars!

They're not waiting for G.M. More informationon their goal, they explain on their website vds.mit.edu...