green

Calif. highways could be source of green energy

It might seem a little ironic, but automotive traffic could be the next source of green energy. A bill for a pilot program that will harness road vibration and convert it to energy passed 6-1 in the California State Assembly's Natural Resources Committee yesterday. It will move to the Assembly Transportation Committee for voting next week.

California Assemblyman Mike Gatto (D-Los Angeles) first introduced bill AB 306 in February.

Piezoelectric generation captures energy that cars, trains, or people generate as they move across surfaces and cause vibrations. These vibrations can be harnessed and converted to energy using piezoelectric materials … Read more

10 old features we don't miss on modern laptops, and 3 that we do

Scary things lurk in the closets and attics of laptop fans everywhere.

With an average lifespan of three to five years, old obsolete models can gather dust for a long time, and can be as hard to get rid of as the annoying bloatware that probably came preloaded on those very same laptops.

While spring cleaning, your two intrepid laptop reviewers dug up a pile of old laptops from circa 2001-2006--a motley collection straight out of Al Component's Vault. Fortunately, there are several good ways to recycle outdated electronics, from Best Buy's in-store drop-off program to periodic free … Read more

Hands-on with the Samsung Replenish

NEW YORK--Earth Day is fast approaching (April 22), and though you might not think it, there are some green tech gadgets out there. Take, for example, the Samsung Replenish. It's Sprint's first eco-friendly Android smartphone, and the carrier just happened to be in town yesterday to show off the handset at an EcoFocus media event, so we thought it would be a good opportunity to check it out.

First, what makes the Replenish environmentally friendly? Well, 82 percent of the handset is made from recyclable materials and the casing is 34.6 percent post-consumer recycled plastic content. This … Read more

On Call: Best carriers for recycling your phone

On Call runs every two weeks, alternating between answering reader questions and discussing hot topics in the cell phone world.

Though you probably know that Friday is Earth Day, I'd wager that you weren't aware that it's also National Cell Phone Recycling Week. Created two years ago by the Environmental Protection Agency, the week encourages U.S. wireless subscribers to recycle and reuse old handsets rather than discarding them into a drawer, or worse yet, throwing them away in the trash.

It's a noble effort, indeed, particularly when you consider how often we're encouraged to … Read more

Manageable manager

Sometimes less is more, and that's definitely the case with SunlitGreen Photo Manager Portable. This lightweight program makes organizing and managing your photos a surprisingly uncomplicated process. It doesn't have a ton of features, but that's kind of what we like about it.

The program's interface is attractive and intuitive, with integrated instructions that help you figure out the next steps. The opening screen asks if you want to create a new album, open an existing album, or view online tutorials. We dove right in and created a new album. Each album can contain multiple collections; … Read more

Basic batch processing

We love taking photos, but we have to admit that our images often end up languishing on our camera because we so hate the process of transferring them to our computer and processing them. SunlitGreen BatchBlitz Portable is a simple program that can make handling batches of images much less of a hassle.

The program's interface is plain, and we weren't sure what to do at first. Although BatchBlitz comes with a built-in Help file, we couldn't get any of its content to load. After a bit of exploration we figured the program out, and it turns … Read more

Sprint announces eco-friendly Samsung Replenish

Sprint unveiled its latest Android effort today in the eco- and wallet-friendly Samsung Replenish.

Powered by Android 2.2, the phone features a portrait-QWERTY design that includes a 2.8-inch touch screen and 2-megapixel camera. The handset also has Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and support for microSD cards.

The Replenish is the fourth Sprint handset to bear the eco-friendly title. Other details that make this one environmentally sound: it uses fewer sensitive materials, it has an energy-efficient charger, and its packaging is fully recyclable. What's more, for $29 you can attach a unique back cover with solar panels that will … Read more

Netherlands tests automated-energy homes

Two new housing developments in Breda, the Netherlands, will serve as a two-year pilot project to see whether a home decked out in smart-energy tech with access to multiple energy sources, not just the electric grid, is the answer to energy savings.

Through a partnership with Netherlands grid operator Enexis, power company Greenchoice, and housing developer Heja, more than 300 homes have been built incorporating the latest energy-saving technologies. The pilot program, called Jouw Energie Moment (Your Energy Moment), could determine how people in the Netherlands choose to handle home energy management and building design going forward.

The Meulenspie development … Read more

Businesses move on green tech sans Washington

LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif.--In the absence of leadership from the federal government, businesses are the best vehicle for slowly transitioning society away from fossil fuels.

That's one of the themes from the Fortune Brainstorm Green this week, a conference to explore environmental sustainability at corporations.

Innovation is the only way to address the "technology gap" that exists between the price of fossil fuels and clean-energy technologies, such as solar, wind, and electric vehicles, said Michael Shellenberger, the president of the Breakthrough Institute.

"This huge gulf that still exists between fossil fuels and clean tech has got … Read more

Bill Joy chases green-tech breakthroughs

LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif.--Six years into green-tech venture investing, Kleiner Perkins continues to see the potential for green technologies to leapfrog incumbent energy systems, according to tech luminary Bill Joy.

In an onstage interview today at the Fortune Brainstorm Green conference here, Joy said Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, where he is a partner, seeks out disruptive technologies that could change energy much the way that technologies, such as PCs and mobile devices, shook up the IT industry.

The famed Silicon Valley venture capital company, which funded Amazon, Google, and many other IT companies, has made about 60 green-tech investments, … Read more