.::4th InnoForum 2012 ::.

.::4th InnoForum 2012 ::.

"Green Economy: Innovation & IPR", May 25, 2012, AIT, Athens, Greece

4th InnoForum 2012

Athens Information Technology (AIT) is pleased to invite you to the 4th InnoFORUM Open Workshop on "Green Economy: Innovation & Intellectual Property Rights” that will take place on May 25, 2012 in Athens, Greece, at AIT premises.

Your participation is free of charge.

"Green Economy: Innovation & Intellectual Property Rights”

In a time of financial crisis and climate change there is a profound need for an economy that simultaneously promotes sustainability and economic growth while significantly reduces environmental risks and ecological scarcities. An economy of “low carbon, resource efficient and socially inclusive” ; an economy that “generates growth, creates jobs and eradicates poverty by investing in and preserving the natural capital offers upon which the long-term survival of our planet depends”.

The InnoFORUM workshop seeks to explore the challenges and opportunities of the Green Economy. Specifically, it will examine the role of innovation in “greening the economy”, leading this way to sustainable growth, effective resource management, environmental quality and social conditions for prosperity. At the same time, it will consider the legal issues and IPR implications that are raised by the emergence of such a “green” economic development model.

InnoFORUM Overview

The InnoFORUM series of workshops seek to merge distinct communities; namely, government bodies, research communities, financial establishments, and the industry. Thus, they provides an opportunity for individual and corporate innovators in large or medium-sized companies, public organizations as well as IPR experts and Intellectual Property Offices to meet with other stakeholders in the area of IPR and innovations in order to share their views, communicate their experience and explore the "science of innovation".

4th innoFORUM 2012 - Agenda

Event organizers:  RIE Group (Research in Innovation & Entrepreneurship)
Prof. G. Yovanof
Dr X. Ziouvelou

Ενέργεια

Ενέργεια

Γεωθερμία Όπως προκύπτει από τα ηφαίστεια, τις θερμές πηγές και από μετρήσεις σε γεωτρήσεις, το εσωτερικό της γης βρίσκεται σε υψηλή θερμοκρασία, η οποία υπερβαίνει τους 5000 °C στον πυρήνα. Η θερμότητα αυτή που περιέχεται στο εσωτερικό της γης αποτελεί την γεωθερμική ενέργεια και είναι τόσο μεγάλη, ώστε μπορεί να θεωρηθεί πρακτικά ανεξάντλητη μορφή ενέργειας για τα ανθρώπινα μέτρα. Όσο προχωράμε βαθύτερα από την επιφάνεια της γης προς τον πυρήνα, παρατηρούμε αύξηση της θερμοκρασίας με το βάθος η οποία ονομάζεται γεωθερμική βαθμίδα. Κοντά στην επιφάνεια της γης η γεωθερμική βαθμίδα έχει μέση τιμή περίπου 30 °C/ k m. Σε μερικές περιοχές, είτε λόγω ηφαιστειότητας σε πρόσφατη γεωλογική περίοδο, είτε λόγω ανόδου ζεστού νερού από μεγάλα βάθη μέσω ρηγμάτων, η γεωθερμική βαθμίδα είναι σημαντικά μεγαλύτερη από τη μέση γήινη, με αποτέλεσμα σε μικρό σχετικά βάθος να απαντώνται υδροφόροι ορίζοντες που περιέχουν νερό ή ατμό υψηλής θερμοκρασίας. Οι περιοχές αυτές ονομάζονται γεωθερμικά πεδία, και εκεί η εκμετάλλευση της γεωθερμικής ενέργειας είναι εξαιρετικά συμφέρουσα. Τέτοιες περιοχές στη χώρα μας είναι τα ηφαιστειακά νησιά του Αιγαίου (Μήλος, Νίσυρος, Σαντορίνη, Λέσβος, Σαμοθράκη, κ.ά.), πολλές περιοχές στη Μακεδονία και τη Θράκη (Νιγρίτα, Σιδηρόκαστρο, Νέο Εράσμιο, Νέα Κεσσάνη, Τυχερό Έβρου κ.α), καθώς και στη γειτονιά κάθε μιας από τις 56 θερμές πηγές που υπάρχουν στη χώρα μας.

Οι εφαρμογές της γεωθερμικής ενέργειας ποικίλουν ανάλογα με τη θερμοκρασία και περιλαμβάνουν: ηλεκτροπαραγωγή (θ>90 °C), θέρμανση χώρων (με καλοριφέρ για θ>60 °C, με αερόθερμα για θ>40 °C, με ενδοδαπέδιο σύστημα (θ>25 °C), ψύξη και κλιματισμό (με αντλίες θερμότητας απορρόφησης για θ>60 °C, ή με υδρόψυκτες αντλίες θερμότητας για θ<30 °C) θέρμανση θερμοκηπίων και εδαφών επειδή τα φυτά αναπτύσσονται γρηγορότερα και γίνονται μεγαλύτερα με τη θερμότητα (θ>25 °C), ή και για αντιπαγετική προστασία ιχθυοκαλλιέργειες (θ>15 °C) επειδή τα ψάρια χρειάζονται ορισμένη θερμοκρασία για την ανάπτυξή τους βιομηχανικές εφαρμογές όπως αφαλάτωση θαλασσινού νερού (θ>60 °C), ξήρανση αγροτικών προϊόντων, κλπ θερμά λουτρά για θ = 25-40 °C Εκτός από τα γεωθερμικά πεδία, η σημερινή τεχνολογία επιτρέπει την εκμετάλλευση της θερμότητας πετρωμάτων μικρού βάθους, καθώς και υπόγειων ή και επιφανειακών υδάτων χαμηλής θερμοκρασίας για θέρμανση και κλιματισμό. Η τεχνολογία αυτή περιλαμβάνει σωλήνα μεγάλου μήκους και μικρής διαμέτρου τοποθετημένης εντός του εδάφους, είτε εντός γεωτρήσεων και η οποία αποτελεί τον υπόγειο εναλλάκτη θερμότητας, σε συνδυασμό με υδρόψυκτη αντλία θερμότητας η οποία παρέχει θέρμανση ή ψύξη στο κτήριο. Οι γεωθερμικές αντλίες θερμότητας καταναλώνουν το 1/4 του ηλεκτρικού ρεύματος από μια ηλεκτρική αντίσταση και το ½ από ένα κλιματιστικό. Εάν υπολογιστεί το κόστος ενέργειας καθόλη τη διάρκεια ζωής του συστήματος, οι γεωθερμικές αντλίες θερμότητας στοιχίζουν λιγότερο από ένα σύστημα που καταναλώνει πετρέλαιο ή φυσικό αέριο. Μελλοντικά, η εκμετάλλευση της γεωθερμικής ενέργειας θα γίνεται από θερμά ξηρά πετρώματα, τα οποία βρίσκονται παντού σε βάθη από 3-5 km, μέσω τεχνητής κυκλοφορίας νερού θερμοκρασίας έως 150 °C.

Making Carbon Neutrality Everyone’s Responsibility at Microsoft - The Official Microsoft Blog – News and Perspectives from Microsoft - Site Home - TechNet Blogs

Microsoft has a long tradition of tackling tough challenges at a global scale. We have always focused on how our technology can enrich people’s lives, build businesses, and inspire and change the world.

Working on the issues of energy use and environmental change provides another opportunity to make a difference in the world. It’s the right thing to do. And it’s also an opportunity to promote positive change, as the world transitions to new ways of using energy and managing natural resources. That’s why today, Microsoft is taking a significant step to further reduce our environmental footprint.

Beginning in fiscal year 2013 (which starts this July 1), Microsoft will be carbon neutral across all our direct operations including data centers, software development labs, air travel, and office buildings. We recognize that we are not the first company to commit to carbon neutrality, but we are hopeful that our decision will encourage other companies large and small to look at what they can do to address this important issue.

In addition to our commitment to carbon neutrality, the part I’m most excited about is our plan to infuse carbon awareness into every part of our business around the world. To achieve this goal, we have created an accountability model which will make every Microsoft business unit responsible for the carbon they generate – creating incentives for greater efficiency, increased purchases of renewable energy, better data collection and reporting, and an overall reduction of our environmental impact.

To put this into action, we’re creating a new, internal carbon fee within Microsoft, which will place a price on carbon. The price will be based on market pricing for renewable energy and carbon offsets, and will be applied to our operations in over 100 countries. The goal is to make our business divisions responsible for the cost of offsetting their own carbon emissions.

The carbon price and charge-back model is designed to provide an economic incentive for business groups across Microsoft to reduce carbon emissions through efficiency measures and increased use of renewable energy. Business operations impacted by the new carbon price include data centers, software development labs, office buildings, and business travel. For emissions not eliminated through efficiency measures, Microsoft will purchase renewable energy and carbon offsets.

The carbon fee is another step in our broader company commitment to environmental leadership, from our facilities and data centers, to our supply chain, to the efficiency of our software products and services. We are continually looking for opportunities to advance these efforts. Here are just a few examples of steps we’ve taken recently:

• A smarter buildings pilot on Microsoft’s Redmond campus that uses software solutions to make our buildings more energy efficient, projected to achieve energy savings of approximately $1.5 million dollars in fiscal year 2013, and earn back our investment in only 18 months.

• Microsoft is working with CarbonSystems to implement an Enterprise Sustainability Platform, which automatically captures and extracts environmental data from multiple sources, uncovering more opportunities to identify how we can reduce our carbon footprint.

• We are challenging ourselves and our industry to think about where energy is used and potentially wasted in IT. We have published a whitepaper which we hope will catalyze a stronger focus on the large range of opportunities throughout our industry to drive for greater efficiency.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recognized Microsoft as the third largest purchaser of green power in the U.S., purchasing more than 1.5 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually. This is enough green power to offset 46 percent of our electricity use, and is the annual equivalent to taking more than 150,000 passenger vehicles off the road.

We believe climate change is a serious challenge requiring a comprehensive and global response from all sectors of society. This carbon charge-back model is one way we seek to both reduce our impact and test new approaches which we hope are broadly useful for other organizations.

For more information on our carbon neutral strategy, read our whitepaper, “Becoming Carbon Neutral: How Microsoft is Becoming Lean, Green, and Accountable.” You can also read more about this and our other environmental efforts on Microsoft’s blog Software Enabled Earth.

Posted by Kevin Turner
Chief Operating Officer, Microsoft



Data Center, Environment, Kevin Turnerhttp://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2012/05/08/making-carbon-neutrality-everyone-s-responsibility-at-microsoft.aspxhttp://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2012/05/08/making-carbon-neutrality-everyone-s-responsibility-at-microsoft.aspx

Om Malik | May 4, 2012 Finding Nemo: How a startup turns your desktop into an ocean

When was the last time you thought of screen savers? If you answer is no, then you are not alone. But Neville Spiteri and Scott Yara want to change all that, and instead they want to take the idea of screen savers and turn it into a massively connected platform. Unlike the MMO games, they want to use this connected world to be a platform for creativity and learning. Spiteri and Yara came together when Yara started Metapa, the pre-pivot Greenplum. Metapa was started in 2000 on the idea that media would go through a digital revolution and would in turn lead to need for a new kind of a studio and content distribution mode that would allow anyone to become a creator and send content to all places. While Yara’s vision was spot on, things didn’t work out as planned. The digital media company ended up becoming a big data company which was eventually snapped up by EMC for north of $300 million dollars. Spiteri, who in the past had worked on 3D technologies, however left Greenplum in 2003, long before the sale (December 2003) and started Wemo Media, with Yara as an investor and co-founder. “We couldn’t let go of the idea we had in the beginning,” said Yara. Spiteri moved back to Los Angeles, set up shop in the funky Venice Beach and started working on what he calls “the Planet Participation Platform,” which has ability to sell individual creations from various artists, and also allows collaboration for complex projects. In many ways it does for visual and animation creation what Soundcloud does for audio. The platform already is getting a buy in from art education groups such as the: USC Film School, Carnegie Mellon’s ETC, Art Institute of Pittsburgh; SAE, Berlin, Germany; Murdoch University in Perth, Australia; Loyola Marymount -‐ Los Angeles, CA, Art Institute of California, Los Angeles; the Ex’pression College -‐ Emeryville, CA Today, the company launched theBlu, which has garnered support from some big time ocean lovers including Bill Joy (co-founder of Sun Microsystems) and Richard “The Virgin” Branson. What is theBlu? TheBlu is a downloadable app for PC and Mac and will soon be made available via the browsers and will work on the phones and tablets. It is a screensaver of “the ocean” and has many underwater habitats built into the screensaver. The application takes cues from location of the computer and changes the habitats based on location. You can buy various different species for your collection. Artists can create more species and sell them on the platform. Here is how the company describes theBlu: “TheBlu” turns the Internet into a globally connected 3D digital ocean wherein every species and habitat is an original work of art created by a worldwide community of artists, animators and developers, including Academy Award® winners Andy Jones and Kevin Mack, and students alike. Exploring “theBlu” is as easy as browsing the web and includes information about species, exploration of geo-located habitats, in-ocean tagging of fish, the purchase of species to grow your collection and customize your experience, social activity streams, event and photo sharing, and ocean life, swimming from user to user across the Internet, creating real time social interaction. At launch, “theBlu” will enable a connected social exploration across 8 ocean habitats, including over 100 life forms with new habitats and species released monthly, and 15 “ambassador” species, sponsored by non‐profit cause collaborators, to raise awareness and funds for ocean conservation. TheBlu has gotten backing of non-profit ocean-oriented groups like the Ocean Elders, Mission Blue and WildAid. Participating non-‐profit collaborators sponsor “ambassador” species and habitats in “theBlu” and users of “theBlu” are offered the opportunity to purchase these “ambassador” species and habitats for their virtual ocean environment. Twenty-five percent of the purchase price of these virtual species goes directly to the non-profit collaborators to fund projects that support their work in the real ocean environment. The program is also designed to increase awareness and reach for collaborating organizations and their conservation efforts. “The really interesting thing about theBlu is how it brings together the biology, the activism of conservation, the beauty and the artistic elements as well as the grassroots, participatory social media movement. I’m very excited about the possibilities ahead,” said Joichi Ito, director of the MIT Media Lab and advisor to Wemo Media. Why am I excited about this? I am excited about this for multiple reasons. First and most importantly, it is one of the applications that truly leverages what I have been saying for nearly a decade – hyper-connecivity. As most (if not all) computers in our life start to get connected, we are going to see emergence of these living-and-breathing applications, that take cues from location, time, weather and even our moods. I want to see more, not less of these applications. Is a desktop client the answer? Probably not. I would love to see this on my television screen, because it would turn my television into a giant aquarium. Just imagine the impact of something like this on learning: the kids could learn about various fishes and other fauna and have fun at it. Today it is oceans, but it is equally easy to create the African Savannah or Galapagos Islands and turn them into a living class-room. The possibilities – they are simply limitless! Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro: Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial. How to navigate the new world of digital advertising Social media in Q1: commerce and discovery dominated Controversy, courtrooms and the cloud in Q1 Go to original article

It's been two years since we last heard of the 98-foot-long solar-powered boat Sarah Silbert - Engadget | May 5, 2012

First solar-powered boat to circle the world pulls into home port, contemplates next move , which at the time was gearing up for its big journey around the world. Well, some 19 months and 37,286 miles after setting sail from Monaco, the MS Turanor PlanetSolar has finally made it home. The PlanetSolar broke four Guinness world records along the way, including the all-important "first circumnavigation by solar-powered boat," and it made stops on six continents to promote solar energy. Oh, and the team fended off Somalian pirates in the process, too. Now that it has a moment to catch its breath and soak up some rays at leisure, the MS Turanor could become any number of things -- from the world's largest solar battery to a "green luxury yacht." The latter option would certainly befit its chichi home port. First solar-powered boat to circle the world pulls into home port, contemplates next move originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 May 2012 20:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | | Email this | Comments Go to original article

Οικολογικό φουτουριστικό όχημα από Έλληνα σχεδιαστή: Skipee | EcoNews.gr

Οικολογικό φουτουριστικό όχημα από Έλληνα σχεδιαστή: Skipee | EcoNews.gr

Περιβάλλον Ενέργεια Οικολογία:
Το πρώτο βραβείο στο διαγωνισμό «James Dyson Awards» κέρδισε ο Ελληνοαυστραλός Δημήτριος Σκούτας σχεδιάζοντας ένα οικολογικό πρωτοποριακό όχημα, για εκείνους που δεν οδηγούν μηχανή, αλλά επιθυμούν να νοιώσουν την αίσθηση ελευθερίας που προσφέρει ο δικυκλισμός.
Το όχημα Skipee είναι κατασκευασμένο κυρίως από ανακυκλωμένα υλικά και χρησιμοποιεί ηλεκτροκινητήρα για την κίνησή του, τοποθετημένο στον πίσω τροχό.
Οι άξονες που συνδέουν τον βασικό κορμό με τους τροχούς κινούνται ανεξάρτητα ώστε να επιτρέπουν στο όχημα να λαμβάνει την απαραίτητη κλίση στις στροφές, ενώ η κεντρική άρθρωση λειτουργεί και ως ανάρτηση.
Οι δύο μπροστινοί τροχοί είναι εξοπλισμένοι με φωτιστικά σώματα ώστε το όχημα να μοιάζει με αυτοκίνητο στο δρόμο.
Το Skipee παρουσιάστηκε στη διεθνή έκθεση αυτοκινήτου της Μελβούρνης.
econews