Well, digging around online for my first post into my "Green Scene" Blog, I went looking for something that piqued my interest.  For background, I'm a firmware engineer working for venture-backed company that enables digital power meters to work over the public wireless networks.  That's right... we're trying to fire your meter reader.... and the trucks they drive around burning up gasoline just to see how much power you've used this month.  Now, the interesting thing about my job is that we are taking it several steps beyond that(as we already have had meters in the field for years... some even relying on pagers!).  That's as much as I can say about it other than we're planning on letting you be able to control the energy consumption of your house through your power meter.  Yes, it can be done...  but its taking work... hopefully it will be soon(within a year or two).

So, back to the target of my interest.  The man who runs the bareKnut.no website.  He's also got some kickass photo skills by the looks of his flicker tagged site.  The gist is that he's been able to create solar-rechargeable NiMH batteries from some prototype flexible PV Cells from researches at IFE and some spare NiMH batteries.

THIS is the type of thinking that needs to be prevelant in all green-tech tinkerers.  I'm definitely awed by the audacity and simplicity of this idea.  Major congratulations to the creater of these little gems.  If you want to see pre and post constrution pics, here are the links.  I wish I could embed them, but with no way to contact the owner of the pics, I'd feel a bit odd to do so.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/knute/3284219119/sizes/m/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/knute/3285055496/sizes/m/