Allan Savory: How to green the world's deserts and reverse climate change with livestock!

The great herds of animals that roamed the earth were an essential part of the ecosystem.  Their removal for monocropping and/or our system of limiting their movements has increased desertification. This Ted talk illustrates how proper grazing of large herds restores land.  

http://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_world_s_deserts_and_reverse_climate_change.html

Perhaps it's a good companion to the earlier post on grazing animals and growing grain in the same pasture using no till methods.  Especially in the parts of the world where they don't use giant machines to till, plant and harvest. 

See also this person's collection of articles on reversing climate change while meeting human needs that includes many of Allan Savory's articles. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r1L5uMGs3AKFRYwOhBxamHkMNcA818qxmkbn3T4o6ig/pub

MetroThermal Energy -- Parisian Building Taps Metro System as a Heat Source | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

See!  That's whatI'm talking about!

Parisian Building Taps Metro System as a Heat Source | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building:

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Container mid-rise housing

NYC is Preparing Shipping Container Homes for Future Hurricanes and Disasters Sea Box NYC – Inhabitat New York City:

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How about creating a hotel/motel like this? or small permanent housing. Some gaps between units for outdoor space would be nice.

Delhi University Students to Harness Wind Energy Produced by Metro Trains | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

Delhi University Students to Harness Wind Energy Produced by Metro Trains | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building:

With wind turbines placed along the tunnels.  Just one example of many activities that produce energy we let go to waste. We should be collecting energy byproducts of all activity. at the very least, use it to help power that activity.

(I still don't get why the fukishima nuclear power plant required  electricity from the outside grid.  It was a power plant.  And as long as the rods were hot enough to be dangerous, they were hot enough to turn a turbine and produce power.  Why would you do it any other way?)

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Raising Sheep and Grain in the Same Field

Pasture Cropping: A Regenerative Solution from Down Under | Solutions:

Since the late 1990s, Australian farmer Colin Seis has been successfully planting a cereal crop into perennial pasture on his sheep farm during the dormant period using no-till drilling, a method that uses a drill to sow seeds instead of the traditional plow. He calls it pasture cropping and he gains two crops this way from one parcel of land—a cereal crop for food or forage and wool or lamb meat from his pastures—which means its potential for feeding the world in a sustainable manner is significant.

New Spin on Concentrated PV - V3Solar's CoolSpin produces electricity at $.08/kw

An even better solar innovation that's supposed to be available in the second quarter of this year. “Using specialized lensing and a [1 meter] rotating, conical shape, the Spin Cell can concentrate the sunlight 30X onto one sun mono PV with no heat degradation. This increases the Power Density while lowering the Total Cost of Ownership and Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE), which is estimated to be $.08/kWh for the Spin Cell" This makes a very efficient cell (24%) at a fraction of the cost per kw and uses only 5% of PV of a flat panel to produce the same amount of power. They are also more efficient at all sun angles, meaning all day and all year. And in an earlier estimate from an article last May, the ROI was estimated to be less than 4 years. "The heat generated by the concentrated lens does not have enough time to transfer to the PV as it cycles out of the sunlight into the shade allowing the next piece of standard PV to go through exactly the same process, again, and again, and again. Constant cooling through dynamic spin creates higher power generation and longer life of the PV." V3Solar already has over 4 GW of requests for orders, which includes the U. S. Army. To put that into perspective, the US currently has about 7 GW of installed solar power capacity. (the 8¢/kWh figure is LCOE; and the BOM cost is 59 cents/Wp, including racking, tracking, and the inverter.) Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2013/01/24/v3solar-spin-cell-cones-cheap-solar/#l2Aqm7BhqTHEUtzL.99 This article has some very cool images of the cones mounted on light poles and other artsy installations: http://cleantechnica.com/2012/05/03/solarphasec-solar-power-meets-art/

Wave Energy - One of the many ways the Earth generates power without burning something.

The ocean produces a tremendous amount of power 24-7. Wave energy is frequently captured with buoys that rock with the waves, and also involve a great deal of steel. This is one that uses a long, rubber, under water tube called the Anaconda: As waves push against the tube, a surge of water forms and is pushed all the way to the back of the tube where it hits a turbine. http://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/giant-rubber-snake-anaconda-could-bring-cost-of-wave-power-down.html