Green Mosh Pits

A fun idea for sustainable energy capture: recycle the energy of people dancing. It's actually not a stupid idea. Dancing releases a lot of kinetic energy into the floor, and if you know a lot of people are going to be moving around, you can rig up induction pads to get them to, say, power the lights where they are. You could probably do something like this in lots of places - roads, maybe? You'd just have to have some method of putting the power back into circulation.

the floor will have a give of one centimeter, enough to generate 5 to 10 watts of electricity per dancer. SDC estimates the eco-club will require about 2,000 people moving at once to keep the place bright.

The move isn't one born purely of ecological altruism. Even as environmentalists are better known for tree-hugging asceticism than night club hedonism, the Dutch are -- like most Europeans these days -- anxious to do their part for the environment. A survey conducted by SDC last year found that fully 66 percent of Dutch clubbers would be willing to dig deeper into their wallets for a green night out. Enviu -- which is also helping the port in Rotterdam, Europe's largest, reduce its emissions -- could do worse than starting in the clubbing capital of the Netherlands. Over 10,000 people go out in the city each weekend.

In a more serious vein, here's a concise and sensible plan for making electric cars viable.

(via metafilter)