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How Dandelion is making geothermal heating affordable
Millions of US citizens still use oil and natural gas to heat their homes during the winter. Many would like to switch to geothermal, a cleaner and ultimately cheaper system that leverages the natural temperature of the earth. A few feet below the surface, the soil sits at a reliable 50- to 60-degree Fahrenheit all year round. Pipes known as 'ground loops' push round a special antifreeze solution that absorbs this constant temperature in winter and disperses unwanted warmth in the summer. A large indoor heat pump uses the mixture to boil a refrigerant fluid; the resulting gas is then compressed to higher temperatures and distributed around the home. Installing the necessary equipment is expensive, however. Dandelion, a company that started inside Alphabet's X division, is trying to make geothermal cheaper and easier to install. While not the most eye-catching technology, especially compared to electric cars and sea-cooled data centers, it's arguably one of the most important for the environment.
Geeks are using science to make the best chocolate ever
Rob Anderson is a geek. So he makes chocolate for other geeks, or, more accurately, "people who really like chocolate and geek out about it." What does he mean by that? If you change one step of the chocolate-making process, you change the taste of the resulting chocolate entirely. And Anderson wants to show you exactly what that means. Fresco Chocolate, his company, roasts beans four different ways and conches (aka aerates and stirs) chocolate four different ways to create totally unique bars that bring the eater into the factory with him to be part of the process. Oh, and by the way, he built most of the machines he uses himself. The thing is, Anderson isn't alone. He's part of a new movement called bean-to-bar chocolate that is revolutionizing chocolate by making it from scratch with a strong focus on flavor. This distinctly American phenomenon has expanded in the past 12 years from five bean-to-bar chocolate makers to around 200 as of this writing. Almost all of these folks construct some of their machines themselves, and a large portion of them come from the tech and engineering world. Why? It all comes back to good old geekery.
Alphabet launches a company to make geothermal heating affordable
A secret project that started in the labs of X, Alphabet's moonshot factory previously known as "Google X," is now a standalone company called "Dandelion." According to its website, Dandelion aims to make geothermal heating and cooling systems more accessible and affordable, since they're pretty expensive compared to their alternatives. In a statement about the company's launch, Dandelion chief Kathy Hannun said that they started the project, because they "knew if installing a geothermal heat pump was a simpler and more affordable process... homeowners would have access to a better product that's also better for the climate."
The Perfect Ten: Unusual MMO weapons
Swords. Staffs. Maces. Spears. Wands. Bows. Crossbows. Double-crossbows. Hammers. Wolverine claws. Daggers. Axes. Deadly? Yes. Fashionable? Not so much. I mean, really. A two-handed sword is so 1299. Now, a deep dish Chicago-style pizza with the works flung into an enemy's gullet -- that's progressive thinking! Because I'm deeply bored with the usual suspects in most MMO armories, I wanted to spend a day praising devs who said, "Screw it. We're going weird, and we're not going to regret it, even when our bosses call us into their offices demanding why such lunacy ended up in a professional game." So forget everything you think you know about weapons because your pitiful armament has yet to scratch the surface of the wild, wild universe of things that can be used to kill you in game. This Perfect Ten column is sponsored by Grizzly Bear Rocket Launchers, Ltd. after the jump.
