Many of the large companies are now joining up with the Carbon Trust to show how much carbon is used to provide products to the shop and how much energy used to cook, wash or prepare the food. The top half is the amount of greenhouse gases emitted during the products lifecycle displayed in grammes, kilogrammes or tonnes on a simple single footprint. Below this is the symbol CO2 (carbon dioxide) denoting the total amount of green house gas emissions including preparing and cooking.

Another site to look at is the carbon footprint pages with a great carbon calculator to show how much carbon is emitted during our travel, eating and lifestyles. www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx. One example is a carton of 100% pure squeezed orange juice where 91% of carbon emission value went on production and 1% on distribution leaving 8% for comsumption.

This is a great way of not only checking how much fat, salt and sugar there are in products but now a carbon value too.

Not real leaves of the ivy but new lightweight solar panels that sit on a frame attached to the side of houses. The solar panels collect energy from the sun by day and at night the small piezoelectric generators on the underside of the panel that work in wind day or night by rising up and falling down.

Designed by Teresita Cochran and her brother, Sam, as a way to help people improve and move towards a zero carbon footprint. Grow, which is their prototype ivy leaf solar and wind power wall covering is on show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York from February 19th to May 12th 2008.

They are designed to use the emerging technology of the photovoltaic and piezo industries. Composed of ‘bricks, made up of five photovoltaic leaves, linked to a very flexible piezo generator and a distribution panel.

Plans are to manufacture the ‘bricks’ on rolls so that all components can be fitted quickly and easily before being stamped and attached to their parent frame. At the end of their life cycle, the units are stripped down with the PVs and PGs being up cycled and the plastic recycled back into the manufacturing process.

This is a great addition to the ever growing, innovative, renewable way energy is harnessed. Long may it continue.

For years scientist have been working on nano-technology to help reduce carbon emissions through nano based solar panels that will be many times more powerful than existing ones. Even BMW have jumped on to the bandwagon by researching a nano product to be sprayed onto the surfaces of their cars to reduce air friction and, more importantly, reduce the need to waste water washing the car as rain and dirt will simply fall away from the car surface. One prediction is that in the future, we could walk into a car show room and rather than pick up a new car we pick up a packet of nano ‘seeds’. Simply scattered into an area the size of a car the nanos will grow, atom by atom, into a car! Well stranger things have happened in this world.

They are already used in non-stick frying pans, Tupperware products coated with antibacterial nano compounds, some clothing has non-stain coating and even sunscreen has nano modification to allow a thin coat to provide the same protection as the older, thicker products.

However, there is a down side to the rush to make nano-technology the next king of the scientific world. Whilst billions are spent on the advancement of the technology only millions have been, and will be, spent on the negative effects of nanos on the environment. Some worry that the size of the particles means they can get into the lungs with ease, enter the blood and then reach our organs where they could start to replicate the source from which they came. I have a horrible thought of waking up to find a BMW growing in the body…ouch. Whilst we must be cautious, we should also embrace new technology that has the ability to improve energy efficiency and our carbon output.

For further reading go to www.nanoproject.org www.nanowerk.com