Cows, Technology, Climate Change and Environmental Solutions

Tech Awards 2009 recognized some pretty cool stuff last night. My favorite pick is Cows for Kilowatts.

Cows for Kilowatts solves one of the most significant sources of water pollution and greenhouse gases emissions in most developing economies - slaughterhouse waste. The anaerobic fixed film reactor featured in the Cows to Kilowatts project cleans up the waste stream and converts the collected organic waste into methane. The methane can then be used to generate electricity, or function as cheap cooking gas.

Technology as Magic

This Daily Show piece reminds me of Arthur C. Clarke's three "laws" of prediction (namely #3):

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Magic indeed...check it out.