Solar Powered Hat and Gloves Posted on December 1st, 2009
OK, eco-chic has officially gone nuts. I don’t mean “dresses made out of lettuce” loony, I mean totally bonkers. I’ve probably told you about when I was selling “solar powered laundry driers” on eBay. Right? It was heavy string and instructions. Get it?
Ya, well, now there are solar-powered knit hats and gloves. Really. Look at the picture. I didn’t waste hours Photoshopping that just to amuse you. Those are for real. They’re offered at a site called Ecouterre.com. Sounds French. That explains some things.
Anyway, those little black designs you see on there that look like snowflakes are tiny little solar cells. They collect sunlight and turn it into heat, which radiates through the material.
I don’t know how it is in Germany (the designer’s name is Yiran Qian from Germany), but over here, sunlight is heat. So if the sun’s out enough to power your solar panels… it’s probably out enough to warm you up on its own too. Maybe in Germany sunelichten equalen nein heaten. Oh, and yellow is a heat-reflective color. Someone should tell this guy that part too.
Or maybe things are different in Europe. I’ve never been there and every European I’ve ever met is a lunatic.
So here you go. “Endless warm” from your sun-powered heat hat and gloves. It’ll impress the others at the ski lodge, I guess.
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- Solar Powered Trash Cans in Philadelphia – The Big Belly
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- Breakthroughs in Green Energy Tech 2009 – Part 1, Solar
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:50 am
I live in Minnesota, and sun definitely does not equal heat or warms in the winters. Especially when you consider other factors like wind adding to the drop in temperatures. This is a lovely idea for people in cold climates.
Also, why do you have closed comments? Is it only so that people can’t openly disagree with you?
Lame.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:59 am
I live in Wyoming and can tell you all about wind. These are still, in my mind, useless. Regardless, you can buy some if you want.
I have moderated comments so that my blog doesn’t get stuffed with spam. If you had a blog with a fair amount of traffic, you’d understand.
December 3rd, 2009 at 2:55 pm
I had my doubts about them too when I read that–I doubt those tiny little solar panel bits are going to add enough warmth to notice.
December 5th, 2009 at 9:00 pm
Are you sure that this is for real? I interpret it as a finalist in some eco contest.
It requires a great deal of electricity running through wires to generate heat. Simply compare the area of the solar material on the hat to the size of a solar cell required to charge your cellphone, which is not enough juice to warm the gloves. You will then understand that this person didn’t even take 5 minutes to research if his idea is even remotely feasible before submitting it to the contest.
December 5th, 2009 at 9:05 pm
Actually, I don’t think they generate electricity. At least, nothing in their description said they did. I would guess they’re more like the solar collectors for thermal heating instead. That’s just a guess. They were the winner of some European contest, but the site said they’d “soon be on sale.” *shrug*