Green Christmas

Christmas is just around the corner, and many still need to find suitable presents. If you want a meaningful present with a green twist, I suggest buying a gift from the Rainforest Foundation!

See the Rainforest Foundation Norway´s selection of environment friendly presents here.

You can help protecting the rainforest by purchasing diplomas, calendars, books or photos. Or become a permanent Rainforest Guard, giving a set sum per month. It´s brilliant! You bring it closer somehow, getting a more personal relationship with the forests. It feels good to contribute, especially when you know the organization is reliable and deliver tangible results. Which is the case with the Rainforest Foundation. They do a marvellous job to coordinate, protect and maintain the unique climate and biological diversity found in the vulnerable rainforests. Just see the cute beauty up right, immortalized in the middle of breakfast by Thomas Marent´s lens.

Other tips for a greener Christmas

is to give away services! Give a gift card for shoveling snow, cooking, cleaning, painting, babysitting... the list is endless.

Finally, you can arrange a social event. For example an ice hockey tournament on a lake in the woods, a snow rugby match in the moonlight with freshly baked buns and hot chocolate afterwards. Use your

imagination and the surroundings in the area nearby!

If you have the opportunity to go outside to enjoy nature, you can witness fantastic treasures. All free of charge! No artificial sources for the lighting, just pure solar energy, directly or indirectly. A star for the Christmas tree, sparkling diamonds in the snow or hazy spotlights illuminating the emerald

branches. Enjoy nature´s wonders!

Conference and new project

I just realized I haven´t written too much about the conference in New Delhi. After the presentation, Leon and I ended up in third place out of eighty contributions worldwide! So much happened both during and after the presentation, and with scarce internet connection it sort of disappeared.

Anyways: we got some great feedback and tips for improving our concept, so we´ll work a bit more on it and see where it ends.

I think it´s a great idea using current infrastructure from oil and gas production for extracting geothermal energy. It´s all about getting the right calculations, include every variable and maybe get a prototype in order.

Leon and I are now working on another project for Education Without Borders. We´re joined by two wonderful colleagues of Leon: Zak from Russia and Krispin from Canada. It´ll be great! Totally different concept this time, with combining mobile electric vehicles and artificial intelligence to organize rapid disaster relief. We´re working by the same method as before: e-mail and Facebook.

It´s been great working with them so far, and I look forward to the rest! I´m excited to see what we can achieve, and hope it will prove useful.

Tidal wave power in Lofoten

The renewable energy from tidal waves are now one step closer to being commercially available on the energy market. The world´s largest tidal wave power plant opened in Norway today! Located in Lofoten, we see a much safer and greener production of energy than fossil fuels. It´s great to see that green technology is being tested in Norway for better development of renewable energy.

The concept is a little similar to underwater windmills. Huge mills tread the water when it flows through a natural passage. The movement is transferred to a generator which provides the local grid with electricity.

The constant flow provides energy 24 hours a day, regardless of the weather! It is therefore a highly predictable and reliable energy resource.

The prototype is part of a test- project for tidal wave energy. With 5 GWh per year, meaning the power plant will provide 200 households with electricity.

For more information, you can read a (Norwegian) article here.

Green Christmas

Christmas is just around the corner, and many still need to find suitable presents. If you want a meaningful present with a green twist, I suggest buying a gift from the Rainforest Foundation!

See the Rainforest Foundation´s selection of

environment friendly presents here.

You can help protecting the rainforest by purchasing diplomas, calendars, books or photos. Or become a permanent Rainforest Guard, giving a set sum per month. It´s brilliant! You bring it closer somehow, getting a more personal relationship with the forests. It feels good to contribute, especially when you know the organization is reliable and deliver tangible results. Which is the case with the Rainforest Foundation. The Rainforest Foundation does a marvellous job to coordinate, protect and maintain the unique climate and biological diversity found in the vulnerable rainforests. Just see the cute beauty to the right, immortalized in the middle of breakfast by star photographer Thomas Marent´s lens.

Other tips for a greener Christmas

is to give away services. Give a gift card for shoveling snow, cooking, cleaning, painting, babysitting... the list is as long as imagination goes.

Finally, you can arrange a social event. For example an ice hockey tournament on a lake in the woods, a snow rugby match in the moonlight with freshly baked buns and hot chocolate afterwards. Use your

imagination and the surroundings in the area nearby!

If you have the opportunity

to go outside to enjoy nature, you can witness fantastic treasures. All free of charge! No artificial sources for the lighting, just pure solar energy, directly or indirectly. A star for the Christmas tree, sparkling diamonds in the snow or hazy spotlights illuminating the emerald

branches. Enjoy nature´s wonders!

Tesla: Electric Vehicle for change

Electric Vehicles (EV) are no longer what they used to be. Streamlined design, comfort, excellent driving range and high performance are not necessarily words giving associations to Electric Vehicles. Thanks to companies like Tesla Motors, this has changed!

The aerodynamic beauty of the sports car Tesla Roadster has pushed the limits beyond what was believed to be possible. Tesla Motors from Silicon Valley in California has challenged the entire transport sector by providing a competitive alternative to

the classical cars fuelled by petrol.

With a top speed of 209 km/h, the battery weighing half a tonne reaches it´s full potential. It makes Tesla a tough competitor on the race track! The range also beats most of the electric vehicles on the market today: during normal driving you can go as far as 340 kilometres.

The powerful engine secures excellent performance and acceleration. The lithium-ion battery is one of the most efficient o

n the market today. Only 3.9 seconds is needed to reach 100 km/h! I have experienced the amazing acceleration myself: the contact with the vehicle is fantastic! It felt like the intersection between a rollercoaster and a takeoff in a jet plane.

The feeling is hard to describe, so I would recommend actually experiencing it. In Trondheim, Lars Henrik Morset runs www.teslademo.com, were you can make appointments for test driving or hiring a Tesla for events. Morset combines the silent EV with his company Morset Akustikk, working with measuring and reducing noise in homes and at work. Too much noise is disturbing, so a good place to start is removing the source completely! The silence while driving an EV gives a wonderful feeling. It reminds you of the fact that you release zero emissions while driving.

The governmental incentives on EVs in Norway makes it possible for more and more people to afford an EV. Going electric gives several advantages: a very low annual fee, legal driving in bus lanes, free pass through car toll stations and free parking are some of them. Inexpensive or free fuel is another. The rest is pure mathematics, so depending on use you can actually finance the investment of an EV within a few years.

As the costs related to usage of Electric Vehicels are so low, the main expense is the actual price of buying the Tesla. Thanks to the governmental incentives, the price is nowhere near as deterrent or unacceptable as one might expect. Starting at 679.000 NOK, Carpoint can deliver a Tesla directly to Trondheim at short notice.

A little fun fact before finishing: the aluminum frame in Tesla is developed at the Centre for Research-based Innovation at NTNU in Trondheim. This is a huge compliment to NTNU, as top level competence at all levels is characteristic for Tesla to secure the best possibile product.

For more information about Tesla, you can check out Tesla Motor´s website.

Driving a electric equals driving into the future. If the opportunity occurs, you can help pushing the limits on the way towards a greener society based on sustainable energy.

Thanks to winmls.com.

Conference completed!

Leon and I ended in third place at the Mind Odyssey competition. It was a great experience to participate with such skilled and competent competitors! I´m impressed by their knowledge and innovative ideas.

It was a close race, where judges commented on the performance and the audience decided the outcome. We ended in third place! There were over eighty contributions worldwide.

I didn´t get to speak much with the others after the presentation. But luckily we stumbled into Adit (number three from the right) during the evening dinner!

We met so many outstanding personalities during the conference. I hope to stay in touch and meet them again!