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^{[image courtesy Inhabitat]}

Solar power: Scientists have been mucking about with it since the ’40s (at least), but photovoltaic energy still falls into the realm of novelty. So why hasn’t solar made it out of the dark ages already? The simple answer is: money and land. Sure, sunlight itself is free — but building a solar array costs $10,000 and requires 300 square feet just to get 1 kilowatt per hour (a kilowatt-hour averages 8.6 cents in the US).

Prototypes from the SunHopes project skirt the land issue by getting vertical — with energy-capturing balloons! Taking home the “Forward Thinking” award from the Re:Vision sustainable design competition, SunHopes’ 10-foot-wide balloons produce 1 kilowatt per hour while gracefully floating up out of everyone’s way. Better still, the project aims to minimize cost, with each balloon netting a target cost of $4,000 — a considerable bargain compared to the $10,000 it currently takes to build a solar field that produces the same amount of energy.

The price tag (not to mention the visibility) is probably too high for SunHopes to start littering suburbia with towering silver saucers just yet, but a wide array of niche applications — off-the-grid living, emergencies, naval operations — make this an interesting opportunity for solar power to gain a new foothold in the sky. [via Inhabitat]

It’s hard to imagine a force strong enough to pull Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, hemp-wearing econauts and an enormous pile of processed elephant dung into the same room — but last weekend’s Going Green Expo did exactly that.

In its Boston debut last weekend, the fledgling Going Green Expo did an admirable job of demonstrating the breadth of what “going green” can mean — with over 150 exhibitors showcasing everything from industrial washing machines to clothesline advocacy; from health-promoting cookware to paper made from Sri Lankan elephant poop.

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