Monthly Archives: November 2016

Plastic

Yes plastic is a big environmental problem. However, it is one channel where the oil we take out of the ground gets fixed as a hydrocarbon and never becomes a greenhouse gas.

http://www.designnews.com/materials-assembly/how-engineers-and-product-designers-can-help-keep-plastic-out-ocean/163088289545506?cid=nl.x.dn14.edt.aud.dn.20161118.tst004c

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Rogers Talks

Attended “Rogers Talks” in Ottawa yesterday. After a few introductions as RM Systems Integrators decided to try out “Carbon Block”. In fact I tried it out on the keynote speaker Andy Nulman.

Thinking about the elevator speech. No one denies “Fixing Global Warming” is a noble cause. Everyone is thinking what am I selling. Although I see it as a process, the only device I have now is Aquaponics. There are still bugs to work out but the system from July Maker Festival is still running growing the same tomato plants but I want to re-seed into large pots soon. Unfortunately Ottawa solar is not enough to charge the batteries. I can add more solar panels but that adds more cost.

Big benefit is the device is 100% solar. I haven’t seen any Arduino boards out there yet that skip the voltage regulator. This is a source of constant battery drain. A board with the right I/O and motor drivers could have many solar based applications.

The other item is to start publishing to the cloud. I have a Bluetooth interface but the data doesn’t get transferred anywhere that people could see what is happening. I’ll have to start that soon when regular work stops interfering with this.