Issue



Kudos to Tech Award Laureates


11/01/2008







This month, a group of individuals will receive some well deserved recognition for their work in developing technical solutions that benefit humanity and address the most critical issues facing our planet and its people. We all inherently know that semiconductors and other scientific advances have helped benefit humanity and sparked global change, but it’s always hard to know exactly who is behind the most exciting achievements. Thanks to many companies such as Intel and Applied Materials, the efforts of 25 individuals who have most notably implemented technology are recognized.

The “Tech Awards: Technology Benefiting Humanity” will be presented on November 12 at a black-tie Gala at The Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose, CA. Tech award laureates will be recognized onstage and presented with a trophy. One Laureate in each category will receive a $50,000 cash prize.

In addition, Professor Muhammad Yunus, pioneer of microcredit and founder of Grameen Bank, will receive the 2008 James C. Morgan Global Humanitarian Award, honoring individuals whose broad vision and leadership help to address humanity’s greatest challenges. This award was inspired by the Applied Material’s Chairman, Jim Morgan.

Laureates are selected by a panel of international judges organized by the Center for Science, Technology, and Society at Santa Clara University, and made up of Santa Clara University faculty as well as leaders from educational and research institutions, industry and the public sector around the world. The 2008 Laureates represent the global vision of the program, spanning countries such as Senegal, Peru, Hungary, Canada, Namibia, Germany, Egypt, India, United Kingdom, Laos, and the United States.

The selected Laureates’ projects address multiple humanitarian efforts including narrowing the digital divide, expanding renewable energy, improving multilingual education and empowering women in developing countries. Allow me to highlight those in the categories closest to my heart: environment and renewable energy.

NComputing, Inc.: NComputing, based in Redwood City, CA, taps the unused power of a standard PC and redistributes it to multiple users, helping organizations in developing countries save on deployment, maintenance, energy, and replacement costs and thereby narrowing the digital divide. www.ncomputing.com

The Portable Light Project: The Portable Light Project, based in Boston, creates new ways to provide clean energy. Portable Light textiles with embedded flexible solar materials and solid state lighting enable people in the developing world to create, own, and benefit from energy-harvesting blankets, bags and clothing in an open source integration model. www.portablelight.org

Solar Electric Light Fund: Washington D.C.-based Solar Electric Light Fund developed a solar power drip irrigation system to help farmers in rural Benin, West Africa, cultivate their crops. The technology eliminates the need for fossil fuels and battery use used in irrigation methods in developing countries. www.self.org

Nitrogen Use Efficiency (NUE) Biotechnology, Arcadia Biosciences, Inc.: Using genetic engineering, NUE technology reduces nitrogen fertilizer requirements that are among the highest-polluting components of farming, while maintaining crop yield. www.arcadiabiosciences.com

Biomass Energy Project, Cheetah Conservation Fund: Namibia-based Cheetah Conservation Fund’s Bush Project is a biomass processing plant that uses a high-pressure extrusion process to convert invasive bush into a clean and economically viable alternative to existing products such as firewood, coal, lump charcoal and charcoal briquettes used for cooking fuel and barbecues. www.cheetah.org

Renewable Energies Promotion Fund, Practical Action: Using locally manufactured and assembled equipment, The Renewable Energies Promotion Fund of the Latin American Regional Office of Practical Action in Lima, Peru, has developed a system for the construction, finance, and management of decentralized micro-hydropower in remote mountain villages that would otherwise not have electricity. www.solucionespracticas.org.pe

Sunlabob Renewable Energy Ltd: Laos-based Sunlabob rents large central solar charging stations to village entrepreneurs, who in turn rent out rechargeable exchangeable solar lamps to local villagers. These solar lamps provide not only light, but also a source of power for mobile devices such as telephones. www.sunlabob.com

Kudos to this year’s laureates for a job well done. For more information, visit www.techawards.org.

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Pete Singer
Editor-in-Chief