Sun-Powered "Green" Orbs

By Dionie

There has never been greater movement towards the protection and preservation of Mother Earth than what's happening today. Different directions have been taken towards utilization of limited natural resouces, be it towards using natural gas, bio-fuel production or harnessing wind power, hydrothermal or solar energy not only for industrial, commercial or transportation but for home use as well.

The federal government, through the initiative of the Economic Recovery bill has been a proponent for the research and development of various technologies, in fact, for pure electric vehicles, huge amounts of tax credit (not deductible) is given to encourage purchase of these vehicles. Add to that state incentives and you are looking at a possible $14,000 total tax back to you.

In our own little worlds, we can also do our share and one of the simplest and cost-non-prohibitive things we could start with is regarding our lighting needs. Most available "green" lighting right now is the use of compact flourescent lamps or CFLs. Considering that to get 100W of lighting, a CFL could only consume 23W, that's almost 80% electricity savings compared to incandescent bulbs. Since CFLs generate less heat than incandescents, you would also save on air conditioning during the hot summer days as well. Garbage disposal is the only major disadvantage of using a CFL as it contain a small amount of mercury that is toxic to Mother Nature and to us.

Best savings though could be achieved by using light-emitting diode (LED) based lamps or bulbs which pushes your savings towards 95% compared to incandescents. These lamps though are a bit pricey but considering it's lifetime, very-well makes up for the price. Do you remember those red little lights on your betamax or vhs players? Those are LEDs and they just don't seem to die. During Christmas season, we mostly use LED based series lights because we love the saturated colors they create, their being cool to the touch and low power needs.

The image in this photo diary are three colorful glass garden decorative orbs that has been fronting our abode for a few years now. Each has solar cells to capture energy from the sun during the day and use it to power the single LED inside to give the orb it's cool glow in the dark of night.

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