Solar Tree: New Street Lighting from Ross Lovegrove
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA on 09.30.07
Welsh uber-designer Ross Lovegrove has been dabbling in solar design for awhile -- his path & garden lighting and solar car prototype are just a few we've seen -- and now he's scaling it up to light a whole street. Solar Tree takes a page from its cellulose brethren, "growing" skyward to maximize solar exposure. The project, for the Museum for Angewandte Kunst (MAK) in Vienna, will debut on October 8 at Vienna Design Week.
Hit the jump for more pics and the artists' statement. ::Ross Lovegrove via ::dezeen
SOLAR TREE.
ROSS LOVEGROVE. LONDON
A project stimulated by the MAK in Vienna that celebrates DESIGN, NATURE AND ART. Therefore it represents the DNA of our times and the need to converge the most advanced technologies with that of the beautification of our collective environment.
The SOLAR TREES communicate more than light… they communicate the trust of placing beautifully made, complex natural forms outside for the benefit of all of society becoming a museum that if folded inside out, the museum as an incubator of change in society… and with this the promotion of environmental science and the joy of the new aesthetics made possible by the digital process.
They bring nature to the grey-ness of urban environments and optimistically lift our senses towards the future and how the physicality of all the objects that surround us will inevitably change… either through need, though enlightenment or simply just the celebration of new form in industrial art that compliments the new quest for biological forms in architecture.
Ultimately this will be a fantastic collaboration between the Worlds largest producer of Solar Cells SHARP SOLAR; ARTEMIDE an leading force in the field of lighting innovation for the past 40 years, ROSS LOVEGROVE, a visionary translator of technology for the 21st Century; The MAK in Vienna supported by the Angewante, the leading school of Architecture and Design in Vienna and then ultimately the objective is to partner with other world class art/culture cities who in turn will plant the trees in equal celebration of environmental progress in the urban condition.
Air New Zealand Biofuelling Through The High Skies
|
Quote of the Day: D.H. Lawrence on the Magnificence of Whales
|
I wonder if the light pollution aspect of street lighting has been taken into account in this design. If so it would be another big plus in favour of such an idea...
Wow, a wish come true. A solar tree was what I was thinking of in my comment on an earlier post last week:
"Just curious, has anyone made solar panels shaped like leaves and placed them on structures shaped like tree trunks and branches? Leaves on a tree are nature's ultimate solar panels. They are not spread out on a wide open surface but divided into small parts on branches. We could biomimic how leaves are positioned on trees, and follow the same principles for positioning small solar panels on tree-like structures. The benefit is that such a system saves space but would it be efficient? Any comments?"
Wow, love the aesthetics of the design. Does the lighting utilize LEDs? I truly feel the marriage between solar and led will result in better efficiency and quality of output.
Absolutely breathtaking!
I think the light pollution is being handled a bit in this design...
note the solar panels on top of the light elements.
this would reduce upward scattering of the light, hence less light lost to illuminating the clouds and giving our cities that post-apocalyptic nighttime glow we all enjoy so much. ;)
I must say that this really is cool, but are we coming to the point where we will no longer have real flowers! Though these flowers are much nicer, they do sort of reminds me of the cell phone towers that are made to look like trees. On thing that has not been addressed here or other areas related to public safety are stray voltage issues which is always an issue in city infastructure systems. In New York City, for example, each year a number of people (and pets)are injured from stray voltage which can electrify manhole covers and street lamps. A woman was killed after she stepped on a manhole casement which had been accidentaly electrified. There are many other cases involving injuries, some serious. In Northern cities, this is compounded with the use of salt on the streets in the winter. One clever solution to this issue is to have a real-time stray voltage warning system. Electrified Cover Safeguard technology (www.manholesafety.com), which holds the patent for real time on site stray voltage warning systems, might offer a solution to this issue.
Wow, Eugene! I was thinking about the same thing recently! It is so obvious if you look at a tree. I hope there will be trees with embedded solar cells so we can have a private power plant in our gardens. Wish we ran out of oil tomorrow :)