Projectors vs LED TVs: battle lines are drawn

Reaching Sustainability
In an effort to reduce her carbon footprint, Lansing resident Kiirsten Olson uses worm composting bins to efficiently dispose of her garbage.

Wanting to better the process and learn what she might not have been doing properly, Olson attended a worm composting workshop Tuesday at Michigan Energy Options, 405 Grove St., a nonprofit organization focused on helping people live more energy efficiently.

At the workshop, outreach and education manager Becky Jo Farrington and programs assistant Marissa Stern educated people about the process of red worms serving as decomposers and taught the group how to make a composting bin.

Like Olson, many people who attend the workshops — held at various times during the year — already have composting bins, but they want to confirm the best and most efficient method of composting.

“I have done worm composting already, and I do a lot of worm composting because I want to reduce my footprint and make sure I have as little trash as possible,” Olson said. “I think there’s no sense in sending it to a landfill if I can take care of it myself.”
kmp_fea_worms2_062811 Photo: Becky Jo Farrington, ...
kmp_fea_worms3_062811 Photo: Lansing residents ...
worms_sn_video Video: Worms

With many local and statewide programs — especially with an additional office in Marquette, Mich. — Michigan Energy Options, or MEO, is driven toward education and providing assistance to those who want to live more efficient lives.

In addition to the composting workshop, MEO reaches out to children. Working with the city of Lansing, the nonprofit goes to elementary schools and teaches children how to build composting bins.

“It gets kids excited about recycling garbage,” said Stern, a recent MSU graduate. “They already know how to recycle, reuse and reduce — that they get taught when they’re very young, … and it has an impact on them when they go home as well.”

Reaching out
Started in East Lansing 33 years ago, the goal of MEO — previously known as Urban Options — is to share the benefits of energy efficiency, renewable energy and sustainability and provide people with the means to implement necessary changes in their lives, executive director Dr. John A. Kinch said.

“If people begin to see the benefits of conserving energy both to their wallets and also the larger benefits to society, such as reducing climate change, they’re going to buy into it and become more of a lifelong practitioner of energy efficiency,” Kinch said.

Working with Lansing Board of Water and Light, a current MEO program is working with households struggling to pay utility bills. The free program helps people change their behavior — at little to no cost to their homes — to lower their utility bills.

Another program, in cooperation with the city of Lansing, is the energy fitness program for low-income homeowners or renters who live within the city limits.

Also a free program, Lansing has provided funding since 1989 for MEO to do home energy audits to identify areas where people could be more energy efficient and provide them with the tools to make the changes and save money.

“It’s an educational experience because we go in there and teach people how to (make energy changes) themselves as well as provide $100-worth weatherization kits they can use,” Stern said.

For people who do not qualify for the free audits, MEO still provides inexpensive audits for different income levels.

Although Lansing subsidizes MEO’s efforts, the city of East Lansing has not provided funding in more than 30 years, Farrington said.

Because of this, MEO provides the same services but for a fee to East Lansing residents, such as MSU alumnus Michael Belligan.

Following the audit through Belligan’s house, MEO provided him with a weatherization kit and demonstrations for how to apply the tools that were not self-explanatory. Since his audit in December 2010, he said he’s seen improvements with his utility bills.

“The most beneficial thing was they came through with the thermal camera and showed us parts of the house where there might be missing insulation or where we could use more,” Belligan said.

Mandatory Daytime Running Lights Could Prove Costly for Motorists in Europe

Mandatory Daytime Running Lights Could Prove Costly for Motorists in Europe
According to an exclusive interview with just-auto.com, UK aftermarket lighting specialist Astra Automotive suggests that as the European Commission has recently mandated the use of daytime running lights for newly-registered vehicles, European motorists could get stung if their LED (light emitting diode) lights fail, because they may have to stump up the cost of replacing whole lighting units.

just-auto's analyst Matthew Beecham interviewed Astra Automotive's Leon Callahan and managing director Robert Jones. The full interview appears in just-auto's newly launched QUBE automotive lighting intelligence service:

just-auto: "The European Commission recently mandated the use of daytime running lights for newly-registered vehicles. All new types of passenger cars and small delivery vans will have to be equipped with the lights, while trucks and buses will follow in August 2012. Does this spell out good news for your business?"

Astra Automotive:"The daytime running lights that we have seen are mostly LEDs, therefore this will not bring in new business for the replacement bulb market for at least three years, because in nearly all cases they will be covered under manufacturers' warranties.

"Even then, most will be fitted with LED model specific lighting systems such as the LED "Eyebrow" effect of the Audi and LED circle around the front side lights on the latest Land Rover and Range Rovers.

"These units, as we see it, will be sealed in manufacture so if a LED light was to fail, it will almost certainly be impossible to just replace the bulb. Instead the motorist will have to replace the whole light assembly, which will prove expensive in terms of replacement and garage time. The same goes for truck and bus operators who are more conscious of vehicle downtime and costs."

About QUBE's lighting intelligence

This online, real-time intelligence service is a continually-updated database of analysis and data on the global automotive lighting sector. Based on exclusive interviews, primary research and proprietary data it includes up-to-date analysis of key technologies, market size estimates, lighting market forecasts, OE market shares, profiles of the major manufacturers and coverage of all relevant sector news and announcements (in real-time). For further details and to register for a free trial, visit: http://www.just-auto.com/lightingintelligenceservice

About QUBE by just-auto

Launched in early 2011, QUBE delivers all just-auto's 40+ component and market sector intelligence services, combining breaking news, interviews and expert opinion with updated data analysis and forecasts for all key OE manufacturing component sectors, companies and markets on a single online platform. QUBE also includes active profiles of over 180 vehicle manufacturers and car component suppliers. For further details on QUBE and to register for a free trial, visit: http://www.just-auto.com/QUBE

Hella to Develop and Market LED Lighting Systems With Hubbell Lighting

Hella to Develop and Market LED Lighting Systems With Hubbell Lighting

Hella, a global automotive supplier of electronics and lighting, is partnering with Hubbell Lighting to develop and market a non-automotive application of its LED lighting technology in North America.


The strategic partnership between the two companies is defined as a traditional cross-branding relationship in which Hella designs, develops and manufactures the light module or "engine", while Hubbell Lighting markets and distributes the lighting fixture into municipal markets.

The commercial LED light engine is designed for installation into existing cobra head style roadway fixtures. The LED light engine will be manufactured at Hella's facilities in Flora, Illinois.

The Hella LED module will be integrated into Hubbell's RM series roadway fixture at the company's plant in Christiansburg, Va., and also will be marketed as a retrofit kit for existing roadway luminaires. The product is an ideal entrant into the LED roadway market and is intended to replace 150-Watt high-pressure sodium and 175-Watt mercury lamps and fixtures. Hubbell Lighting will manage product marketing and distribution through its global sales network. The companies expect to introduce the new LED product line during the third quarter of 2011.

"We see tremendous growth opportunities for LED lighting in North America," said Steve Lietaert, vice president of program management for Hella Electronics Corporation who announced the partnership during a media briefing at Pine Lake Country Club in suburban Detroit. "LED technology offers an energy-efficient, low maintenance alternative to conventional lighting."

According to Richard Abernethy, vice president of Hubbell Outdoor, Industrial and Emergency Lighting, "The opportunity to retrofit existing street lighting provides municipalities a simple, cost-effective, sustainable solution for the growing need to conserve energy and control maintenance costs."

It is estimated there is an installed base of 34 million streetlights in place in the US. 

Known as an innovator in lighting technology, Hubbell Lighting leads the industry with the first LEED? Silver certified corporate headquarters in the lighting industry, which they located in Clemson University's International Center for Automotive Research (CU-ICAR) Millennium Campus in Greenville, South Carolina.

About Hella:  Hella KGaA Hueck & Co. develops and manufactures lighting and electronics components and systems for the automotive industry. Its joint venture companies also produce complete vehicle modules, air-conditioning systems and vehicle electric systems. In addition, Hella has one of the largest automotive aftermarket organizations in the world, with its own sales companies and partners in more than 100 countries.

Hella Group sales were $4.98 billion in fiscal year 2009-2010. Hella is one of the top 50 automotive parts suppliers in the world and one of the 100 largest industrial companies in Germany. Nearly 23,000 people work at 70 locations in more than 30 countries, including more than 3,500 research and development engineers and technicians. Additional information is available at www.hella.com.

About Hubbell Lighting:  An industry leader in lighting technology since 1888, Hubbell Lighting, www.hubbelllighting.com is one of the largest lighting fixture manufacturers in North America. The company provides a full range of indoor and outdoor lighting fixture products that serve the commercial, industrial, institutional, and residential markets. Hubbell Lighting brands include Alera Lighting. Architectural Area Lighting, Beacon Products, Columbia Lighting, Compass Products, Devine Lighting, Dual-Lite, HomeStyle Lighting, Hubbell Building Automation, Hubbell Industrial Lighting, Hubbell Outdoor Lighting, Kim Lighting, Kurt Versen, Prescolite, Progress Lighting, Security Lighting, Spaulding Lighting, Sportsliter Solutions, Sterner Lighting Systems, Thomasville Lighting and Whiteway.

Green Lantern Review

It's your average evening on one of fifty two (!) Earths. Superman scorches the sky over Metropolis as he races to rescue a tree-bound cat, while Batman lurks in an alleyway, just waiting for the right moment to leap upon a delinquent and batter them into a pulp. This is the DC that the general public know and love, but elsewhere, further fighting's afoot. The Flash is playing ping-pong with himself, the Green Arrow is busy cursing the rise of Interflora, while the Green Lantern is imagining giant boxing gloves, horse shoes and jack-in-the-boxes with the help of his magical ring. Little does Hal Jordan know that he's about to be thrust centre stage.

Finding fresh faces from DC's canon to bring to the big screen now involves trickier decisions than whether the suits should have nipples (they never, ever should). We've had Batman and Superman - each with varying degrees of success - while a Wonder Woman movie still seems to be slightly too risky (and too easily risqué) for the studios to allow themselves to explore. In a world where Batgirl is re-booted to lose her spinal injury, a high-octane movie about a woman glad to kick ass whilst being happily single is probably not going to appeal to the amorphous, grey blob so beloved focus groups.

Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan in The Green LanternWith the big three out of the way for one reason or another, slightly less-well-known characters are being given their chance to shine on the big screen. While a Flash film would consist of naught but extensive bullet time sequences and a Captain Nazi film would be really, really ill-advised, The Green Lantern has the ideal combination of being vaguely-recognisible and having a great capacity for CGI trickery.

Directed by Martin Campbell, The Green Lantern stars Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, a cocksure test pilot who is chosen to become a member of the intergalactic peace-keeping force that is the Green Lantern Corps. His powers stem from a special ring, which gets its power from a lantern, which gets its power from the planet Oa and so on and so forth.

The trouble with The Green Lantern, as with the previous sentence, is that it tries to fit too much information into too small a space. With heavy-hitters like Batman, the audience is already armed with the who/what/why of it all and just needs to be shown the how. In choosing a character like The Green Lantern, Campbell has given himself the challenge of compressing decades of backstory and lore into a hundred and fourteen minutes. The film rattles from exposition to exposition in (ironically) a flash; characters and motivations are introduced in a blur and forgotten in a heartbeat. It felt at times like a child was describing their favourite hero after drinking fifteen cans of coke and necking sherbert dips for an entire afternoon.

There are, however, plenty of whizzes and bangs to enjoy throughout the film. Some of the lantern's projections are really good fun and the big bad - a being made entirely of fear who looks like an octopus made of cigarette ash and mashed pork pies - is pleasantly revolting, but there seldom feels like there is any substance behind the effects. There are also moments where the CGI suit sported by Reynolds has the unfortunate effect of making him look like his head is rapidly outgrowing his body.

Sparta's Relay for Life adds activities

SPARTA -- This weekend’s Relay for Life will add a few activities in the event’s fifth year. The Relay runs from noon June 10 to noon June 11 at Sparta High School. On June 10, a sky lantern send-off will be added to the annual luminaria ceremony after dusk.

The lanterns can be purchased at Relay and names of loved ones who died of cancer can be written on them. Another new event is a recognition of caregivers, just before dusk. Caregivers will be honored in their own lap around the track.

The annual survivors lap starts around 7 p.m. and will include a giant chain, where each link represents a year of participants’ surviving cancer. More teams than ever, 41, are signed up, with the goal of raising $120,000.

Svelato il mistero: «Quei tre punti luminosi erano lanterne volanti lanciate a una festa»

No unidentified object in the skies of Peschiera: UFO enthusiasts and lovers will be disappointed but the three luminous spheres observed on Friday night and photographed by many people are simply "flying lanterns" of oriental origin, very popular in the West that work with the same principle of the balloon. Have been used by Alice Hope in-law Claudia's birthday, celebrated on the shores of Lake Hotel Al Fiore owned by the family.

"I've bought on the Internet and we switched on during the party, "he says with amusement. "Before we turned one, around 21.30. After a while, 'we have seen that someone has sent around the campsite in the air two and so, almost like a challenge, we decided to light all three together, which were up more than usual accomplices apparently favorable air currents. And to be honest, given the height reached, "says the lady," there also were people who said "you'll see that someone will think UFOs. " It seemed to me an exaggeration but is actually just happened. "

"Sky lanterns": this is the trade name for this kind of "bags" of average size of paper coated with non-flammable material and supported by a rigid part. The base plate is placed a kind of fuel which, when lit, heats the air that fills the lantern making it fly. A flight that can last for twenty minutes and ends only when it ends the fuel and the flame goes out. Do you know the altitude limit that can achieve: to secure several hundred meters. In the Eastern tradition the lanterns are a symbol of good wishes. "But this is our meaning: you should write, " concludes Alice Hope, "their wishes on paper lanterns, bringing them in heaven, help to achieve them. " GB