Inna 's Profile

IBM Paves The Way

IBM signaled its Big Green Linux initiative last week when the company announced that it plans to consolidate approximately 3,900 of its own computer servers on to about 30 System z mainframes running the Linux operating system. IBM anticipates that the new server environment will consume approximately 80 percent less energy than the current set up, resulting in significant savings over five years in energy, software and system support costs.

With more than 8,000,000 square feet of data-center space for its employees and commercial workloads for clients, IBM operates the world's largest and most sophisticated data-center operations, with major locations located worldwide. The company anticipates that the new global infrastructure, supporting over 350,000 users, will serve as a powerful example of IBM's ongoing transformation toward cutting-edge data center design for large enterprises around the world. Since 1997, IBM has consolidated its strategic worldwide data centers from 155 to seven.

Cooling
with the sun

Well in demand, but not available as “ready-made” products
in Freiburg were systems for cooling with solar energy. “Solar
Cooling” is increasingly in demand in mediterranean countries,
but also in Germany. This utilisation of solar energy was the topic
of the English seminar “Solar Air-Conditioning”. The
heat generated by solar collectors is used through thermally driven
refrigerating machines to cool offices, hotels or factories. In
Europe 100 solar energy systems are already providing sufficient
energy
for cooling and air-conditioning processes. These pilot projects
required extremely thorough planning because of the complexity
of the procedure and the integration into the entire building and
regulatory
technology.

So do you foresee some sort of termite factory in our future?

No. Either we'll genetically engineer the microorganisms from termite guts to produce more energy from biomass than they need, or we'll adapt the chemistry within the microorganisms to process the biomass ourselves.

There's a lot of biomass out there. If we're ever going to raise crops for energy, it's not going to be for the oil we can extract from the corn or the sugar from the sugar cane that we can convert to ethanol, it's going to be for the entire biomass of the crop. If we could figure out a way of efficiently converting the biomass of a very rapidly growing plant — one that doesn't require much fertilizer or water, and that's suitable for our different geographies — into chemical fuel, that would be great. We may well enlist microorganisms to help with that conversion.

Type      mA/Hour   Pieces   Sunlight Hours*
      AAA(UM-4) 180mA       2        1-2
     
      AA(UM-3)  500mA       2        3-4
     
      C(UM-2)   1000mA      2        6-8
     
      D(UM-1)   1500mA      2        9-12
     
     

* Recharging time may vary according to the strength of the sun and level to which the batteries are discharged.

Voltage (VOC): 5V (maximum in full sunlight)

Current (Isc): 140 mA (maximum in full sunlight)

Dimension: 17 x 7.7 x 6cm

Weight: 230 Grams

Item # 698

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Plus $5.50 S&H within Continental US