Saturday, September 12, 2009

Virginia Tech Launches 'Lumenhaus'

Now that the Department of Energy is sponsoring an international search for energy efficient homes, Virginia Tech University students and professors are submitting their own solar powered, self sufficient home to the contest. Clean Skies News takes a sneak peek at Lumenhaus, the university's computerized, energy producing contest entry.



Future of Electric Vehicles

2 comments:

heatpumpproducts said...

the second largest use of energy in homes is hot water , for domestic uses.
next to heating in the north and cooling in the south .
a hot water heat pump that uses 7.8 amps of power compared to an electric hot water tank that uses 18 amps + , could make a significant difference on a large scale population .
@ 1/10 the cost of solar water heaters to buy and installs in about an hour , solar panels well maybe 40 hrs .
the cost of solar panels to run , and heat is free thats true , but how much energy does it take to push that water throught the system . a pump is a pump it needs to use energy .
i like solar energy , even thermal energy panels . they have thier place in the equation too.
one solar thermal air panel can produce about 6000 btus of heat and cost about 2x the price of photovaltaic , but for now we only are getting about 80-120 watts of energy / panel that meeans 10+ panels to produce the same amount of energy for heat (btus).
what ever plan you use to lower your home comsumsion for energy is the end result , try to reduce your fosil fuels , not just oil , natural gas , and coal . any thing that produces CO2 .
IT SHOULD BE THE GOVERNMENTS JOB TO MAKE THE POWER PLANTS AS CLEAN AS POSSIBLE .
and are jobs to make our Homes as energy efficient as possible .
INFOMATION is power power of the people let your voice be heard too.

Tucson Bass Player said...

Great comment HPP, a pump is a pump. I am in a different camp when it comes to government though. I wish we would make it their job to do nothing when it comes to Renewable Energy and power plants. No loans, no tax breaks. Nothing! We are just going to be stuck with grid addiction and high taxes and fees.