November 07, 2009
UTNE READER

Pretty Green Power

July - August 2008
by Staff, Utne Reader 
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Solar and wind power may be environmentally attractive, but their components—solar panels that resemble mausoleum slabs, turbines that look like fans on steroids—often draw resistance on aesthetic grounds (see Senator Ted Kennedy fighting to keep wind farms out of Nantucket Sound). According to Plenty (April-May 2008), the Grow hybrid energy system, made by a Brooklyn-based sustainable design company (smitdesign.biz) and due to hit the market in 2009, combines the environmental upside of both technologies to create an apparatus that is as attractive as it is energy efficient. Inspired by green ivy, the product’s polyethylene “leaves,” which are installed on the side of a building, use photovoltaic cells to harness sun rays and tiny generators to capture the wind. Undulating in the breeze, these leaves also ripple hypnotically—allowing onlookers to revel in both form and function.

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  • Prentice Price 8/13/2009 3:41:52 PM

    I think the wind generators should be placed in Sen. Kennedys front yard. Those green generator parts probably took more energy to build and transport than they,ll save. No one seems to take into consideration (or at least they won,t print it) all the energy that goes into building all the so called green power items. But hey! Green seems to be the going fad nowadays and almost everyone is cashing in on the governments stupidness to give away all the money they can to anybody that claims to be green. I guess I'd better get on board and get my share before it,s all gone. Maybe I can get most of all the taxes i've ever paid in.

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