Eco-Stylish Accessories & Gadgets Fit For The Next “James Bond” Movie!

The latest installment of the James Bond film series – “Skyfall” – is now playing in American cinemas across the country with rapturous reviews. Having seen the movie myself and inspired by the newly appointed fictional character “Q”, here is a list of eco-stylish accessories and gadgets that now exist that might help James Bond out of tight situations in his next assignment as the world’s most stylish super spy!

1- Electric-Powered Car – Tesla – Model X — With its cool falcon wings and futuristic touchscreen dashboard, this car can go from zero to 60 miles in less than five seconds! http://www.teslamotors.com/modelx

2- Electric-Powered Motorcycle – Mission Motors – Mission One — Utilizing a lithium-ion battery pack that charges under two hours, this super stylish scooter is able to reach 150 miles per hour and 100 foot-pounds of torque at any point between 0 and 6500 RPM! http://www.treehugger.com/cars/mission-one-by-mission-motors-the-worlds-fastest-production-electric-motorcycle.html

3- Electric-Powered Seaplane – FlyNano  —   This Finnish designed single-seater carbon-fiber airplane can get over 80 miles per hour in the sky and land on any body of water with ease! http://www.flynano.com/

4- Electric & Solar-Powered Jet Board – Kymera – Kymera Bodyboard —   Shaped like an hourglass, this cool compact and lightweight looking surfboard can propel lifeguards and wave riders up to 18mph in the water! Due to be released in 2013! http://inhabitat.com/kymeras-solar-powered-jetboard-looks-like-a-surfboard-but-cruises-like-a-boat/

5- Solar-Powered Airplane – Solar Impulse — This Swiss designed monoplane is currently able to cruise at 43 miles per hour with a maximum altitude of 39,000 feet and an airborne endurance rate of 36 hours! http://solarimpulse.com/

6- Solar-Powered Pontoon Boat – Tamarack Lake Electric Boat Company – the Loon — This cool 22-foot long light-weight boat, capable of touring inland waterways, comes with a flexible interior configuration of removable side-rails made from bamboo, recycled plastic, and natural fibers and a retractable solar roof that can be lowered onto the rails. http://www.tamarackelectricboats.com/

7- Solar-Powered Luxury Yacht – LOMOcean Design – MS Turanor PlanetSolar — This German-built, New Zealand-designed catamaran is the world’s largest solar-powered ship ever built and the first sailing vessel to have circumnavigated the globe using solar energy exclusively. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tûranor_PlanetSolar

8- Solar-Powered Dirigible (aka Spy Satellite) – Lockheed Martin – HALE-D acronym for High Altitude Long Endurance-Demonstrator — Still being perfected, this 130 foot long blimp will afford the US Army a 600 mile view of the earth allowing alternative options of military reconnaissance, intelligence gathering, environmental monitoring, and communications. http://dvice.com/archives/2011/07/lockheeds-halo.php

9- Solar-Powered Necktie — Researchers at Iowa State University are busy working on photovoltaic textiles and have come up with a cool solar tie fashioned in such a way that it can be used to charge a cellphone. http://www.coolest-gadgets.com/20080816/solar-powered-necktie-charges-your-gadgets-on-the-sly/

10- Motion-Powered Shoes – InStep Nanopower – Human Gait Energy Scavenger — This footwear-embedded energy harvesting device converts human locomotion (the motion of walking) into electrical power up to 20 Watts which in turn can be used to power mobile electronic devices. http://www.instepnanopower.com/

11- Electric-Powered Roller Skates — These motorized electric skates can be strapped right over shoes propelling the wearer as fast as 8 miles per hour by means of two six inch rubber wheels on each skate.  The control for these skates is a handheld wireless remote which can increase speed or bring the skates to a gradual halt. http://www.hammacher.com/Product/12158

12- Solar-Powered Sunglasses – Yanko Design – SIG ( Self-Energy Converting Sunglasses) —
The lenses of these cool sunglasses have dye solar cells which turn sunlight rays into electrical energy able to power small devices through the power jack at the back of the frame. http://www.yankodesign.com/2008/12/17/solar-powered-solar-panel-sun-glasses/

13- Solar-Powered GPS Watch – Seiko Epson Corp. – Seiko Astron GPS Solar Watch
This cool Japanese-designed solar-powered watch can set itself to any of the 39 time zones on earth using a global network of GPS satellites and is accurate to within one second per 100,000 years. http://www.seiko-astron.com/

14- Solar-Powered Men’s Shaver — Weighing in at only 105 grams, this sleek and portable razor with built-in solar panel and rechargeable lithium battery is perfect for the man on the go!   http://www.envirogadget.com/solar-powered/solar-powered-electric-shaver/

15- Pedal-Powered Submarine – Scubster — This sleek 11.5 foot long French-designed one-seater submersible has a twin-propeller system which can reach a speed of 5 mph and a depth of 20 feet which is great for exploration in rivers, lakes, and shallow ocean areas. http://www.scubster.org/

16- Pedal-Powered Superbike – Aston Martin – One-77 — This superbike features a “motorsport-derived data logging system” with over a hundred channels of performance feedback options accessible from its handlebar-mounted head unit including speed, temperature, rate of climb, power, respiration rate, core body temperature and electrical activity of the heart. http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/aston-martin-launches-one-77-superbike

17- Hand-Powered Pocket Chainsaw — This pocket-sized 28 inch chainsaw in a tin can contains 124 bi-directional teeth that can cut a 3” diameter limb in ten seconds! http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/ea93/

18- Invisible Bike Helmet –the Hovding — This Swedish-designed bike helmet is a folded up air bag with sensors hidden in a stylish collar which will inflate into a protective hood around the bicyclist’s head when triggered by an accident i.e. falling off the bike.   http://www.hovding.com/

Super-Green Yachts, Electric Bamboo Bikes, Solar-Powered Roads, & Airport Wildlife Runway Zones? What Next? – a Trotting Horse-Propelled Treadmill-Driven Eco-Car?

It’s been over 20 years since I last saw the cartoon-animated sitcom, ‘The Jetsons”, about a futuristic American family living in a space-age ‘Skypad Apartment’ whose home rises and falls vertically on an adjustable column in the year 2062.  But being a kid back then growing up in a traditional cookie cutter suburban environment, what I wanted to copy most was this television show’s family ‘aerocar’ – a fast flying saucer-shaped car with a transparent bubble top that my own mother could use to drive me to school and YMCA swimming classes.  I wasn’t thinking of eco-friendly and sustainable transport back then – rather I was always thinking of excuses to get my parents to drive me to ‘fun’ places with the least amount of fuss.

Well today’s ‘fuss’ is all about new types of ‘environmentally sustainable transport’ now being developed for public consumption – transport energy based on electricity, natural gas, and biofuels rather than petroleum or a combination of the two as seen in ‘hybrid electric trains’ and ‘plug-in hybrid cars’.  Some of the really neat alternative energy vehicles include a newly tested electric bamboo bike that combines pedal power and electric power in a lightweight bamboo frame – a versatile grass that grows everywhere throughout the Philippines.   And at Yellowstone National Park, clean green snowmobiles are being tested that use biomass alternative fuels to cut hydrocarbon emissions by 90% and noise pollution by 50%. And at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics, a green airplane has just been developed which uses 70% less fuel than conventional airplanes in addition to reducing noise and nitrogen oxide emissions. But perhaps the most interesting development on the ‘leisure landscape scene’ is that of a “super-green superyacht” designed recently by Alastair Callender, a then 23 year old student at Coventry University in England.  His eco-friendly luxury yacht design utilizes solar, wind, and hybrid marine power by incorporating 600 square meters of solar panels on the exterior of the boat and giant fully automated rigid “wings” that function like solar-sails.

Not to be outdone, Italy’s newest transport construction has just been officially opened to the public on January 1, 2011 – this the world’s first solar-powered highway!  This two mile addition to Sicily’s existing 600km highway network features 80,000 photovoltaic panels to power 100% of the highway’s needs – “including tunnel fans, lights, road signs, emergency telephones, and more.”  It is expected that 10,000 tons worth of CO2 emissions and 31,000 tons of oil will be saved in one year’s time. Meanwhile the cruise ship terminal at the port of Vancouver in British Columbia, Canada (known for its famous Alaskan coastline cruises) has gone green! It is the first port in Canada and the third in the world to install an electrical ‘plug-in’ system for docked cruise ships whereby electrical shore power connections have replaced the need for diesel engines running idly.  It is estimated that during last year’s 2010 season alone, greenhouse emissions were reduced by 1500 tons.

But perhaps the most visible displays of transport infrastructure going green are at the world’s busiest airports!  Indeed seven of the twelve greenest airports in the world are right here in the USA:

1)          Bob Hope Airport in Burbank, California

2)          Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport in central Texas

3)          Denver International Airport in Denver, Colorado

4)          Logan International Airport in Boston, Massachusetts

5)          Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport in Panama City Beach, Florida

6)          San Francisco International Airport in northern California

7)          Stevens Point Airport in Stevens Point, Wisconsin

The other globally-located greenest airports in the world include: the Beijing Capital International Airport in China, the East Midlands Airport in England, the Munich Airport in Germany, the Toronto Pearson International Airport in eastern Canada and THE SUPER-GREENEST AIRPORT OF THEM ALL – the ZURICH AIRPORT IN ZURICH, SWITZERLAND!  In addition to utilizing geothermal energy for heating and cooling, rainwater for flushing airport toilets, an on-site compressed-natural-gas station that powers its airport cars, trucks, and machinery and solar cells for its daily operations, the Zurich Airport has an adjoining nature conservation zone for over 50 species of flora and fauna between two of its main runways!  So in addition to ‘planespotting’, and ‘nature gazing’, visitors to the airport can also ‘rent airport bikes’ around its 22 kilometers of bike-path-paved airfields to fill up their waiting time!

But not all green forms of transport energy and transport infrastructure are utilizing the newest technologies of today.  My favorite exception is the newly patented ‘Naturmobil’ – a vehicle run by a horse jogging on a treadmill – invented by a clever Iranian engineer. Yes, instead of using the centuries old method of having a horse pull a wagon or sleigh – the horse is inside the motor-driven vehicle working out on a treadmill which then charges the batteries that power the vehicle.  Like today’s cars, it is controlled by a human driver in the front seat with room for one passenger.  But unlike ‘George Jetsons’ aerocar, it can only cruise at about 12 miles per hour with a top speed of about 50 miles per hour and the ‘Naturmobil’ can only work on paved roads.  Now if only we can get it to fly!  Stay Tuned for Next Week’s Episode!