Author: Jenny

I am a public health nutrition counselor with fifteen years experience in the field of prenatal and early child health and lactation education (breast feeding support). Autoimmune disease, Autism Spectrum Disorders, and genetic defects that can cause nutrient deficiencies are also research interests.
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Imagining windmills – solar sail revolving ones

Addition – The U.S. is not the only nation on the planet and the air and ocean are connected – the more nations that work towards cleaner air and more sustainable energy sources the better for everyone.

Building windmills to clean the air may be a job for Don Quixote – an impossible task or imaginary one but new creations are imaginary until they are tried in prototype and then replicated. The above images are of a windmill (VAWT) that didn’t work right, unfortunately for investors, but the memory of its design led to a new creation in my imagination for the purpose of powering a giant air filter for cleaning urban smog.

*Note my ideas are simply brainstorming ideas offered in case they might stimulate creative solutions by others working in the area of sustainable energy or clean air – the planet needs both. Inventions generally go through many stages from early brain storming, through a model size prototype or two to a fullsize prototype with revisions as needed. I grew up with a mechanical engineer discussing various ideas and drawing blueprints or showing the family finished blueprints occasionally. Family members occasionally helped with testing gadgets for wind resistance factors – ie – read the numbers on this odd gadget out loud so they can be recorded for later calculations. (a three blade windmill blueprint drawing of the finished outline)(10 nontraditionally shaped windmills/wind turbines) Our planet needs species that use resources in a sustainable way or else the environment becomes depleted and the species dies out if it cannot move to a new area.

Giant air filters/purifiers have been tried successfully and unsuccessfully in other areas.

China created a large air purifier that didn’t work well enough for the size of the problem (the sky is large) (qz.com) but an inventor there has created another one which is in the initial experimental phase of development (South China Morning Post/air purifying tower). So far the new tower air purifying system seems to be more successful at reducing urban smog levels then the previous attempt. The experimental tower is over 100 meters (328 feet) tall and seems to be reducing smog levels in the surrounding ten square kilometer (3.86 square miles) radius around the air purifying tower. It is producing an estimated 10 million cubic meters (353 million cubic feet) of clean air per day. Air is drawn into glass greenhouses that cover about half a soccer field at the base of the tower, the warming effect of the glass houses heats the air and causes it to rise within the tower which contains many layers of cleaning filters. The previous attempt at a giant air purifier did improve air quality but in a smaller radius around the unit. (qz.com)

The Dutch have developed a tube like air filter to place on top of buildings and it cleans like a vacuum cleaner, taking in smog filled air from a radius of 300 meters and from up to seven kilometers (four miles) above it and blowing clean air out the other end of the tube. (TheGuardian)

Smog is a significant problem in many areas in urban areas of China and elsewhere. The nation set more stringent standards for coal use and factory production in a five year plan that began in 2013 to try to improve air quality. The nonprofit environmental group Greenpeace review of air quality suggests that improvements have occurred in urban areas but there may be less change in other areas where factory production has led to increased ozone output. Ozone in excess quantities may increase risk for strokes and heart disease. (South China Morning Post/Greenpeace)

My tilting at windmills idea combines wind power and solar power to try to make a sustainable air purifying tree shaped unit that also helps draw in and push out air across a wide region (the sky is really large). Picture the windmill in the images as spinning with kite like or somewhat pinwheel like flexible solar fabric sails attached to the spiral shaped blades. A rotating windmill would catch breeze from any direction and convert it into power. The solar fabric on the spinning blades would catch sunshine from whatever angle it was shining and convert it into power. The power generated could help pull the smog filled air in to be cleaned at the base of the tower/tree trunk/post or push out the clean air at the top once it had been cleaned within air filter located in layers going up the tree trunk.

My idea was based on a tree as I am more familiar with botany than with windmill or air purifying technology and I hadn’t read about the Chinese attempts at giant air purifiers but have seen tree like wind power or solar power generating units with leaf like solar panels arranged on a branching tree trunk – decorative for an urban area while also generating power. In Singapore giant solar trees have various functions including generating solar energy, supporting flowering plants, and collecting air and dispersing it for reducing heat. (Wind Trees/Paris) (Israeli design Solar Tre/France) (Solar Trees/Singapore)The Chinese experimental tower with the glass houses at the base is using solar energy passively by drawing in the unclean air at the base and allowing the solar heat trapping effect of glass greenhouses to heat it and hot air naturally rises upwards which if directed into a narrow smokestack like tower would force it up through the air filters.

Air flow will also tend to move upwards when there is larger amounts flowing in at the base and a smaller opening at the top so the half a soccer field size of greenhouses moving air up through a small smokestack shaped tower are also capitalizing on that principle of air flow. The large air intake at the base and small outflow at the top increases upward flowing air pressure.  Having an upward and downward circulation of air was what I visualized in my idea, with larger intakes at the base forcing upward to a smaller opening at the top which the spinning blades of the windmill would help push out over a large region around the air filtering tree shaped solar windmill.

Creative use of natural wind and airflow patterns was used effectively in a building designed for the Manitoba, Canada area which gets windy.  See: Chapter 7 for a discussion of the creative ventilation system designed by Kawabata, KPMB Architects, for Manitoba Hydro, p157, Ch. 7, Creating Great Choices: A Leader’s Guide to Integrative Thinking, by J Riel & R. Martin. HBR.org/Creating Great Choices eBook./pdf,

The solar trees in Singapore have multiple functions that beautify and clean and cool the environment and the building design in Manitoba also supports employee and customer comfort in many ways. Citizen and employee wellness can lead to less lost time due to illness and reduce turnover rate for employees seeking better quality of life or sense of purpose. A discussion of the value of addressing many aspects of quality of life for a business started many decades ago and more recently improved for modern times while retaining some of the original goals is discussed in Chapter 9 of the same book, Creating Great Choices: Ch. 9, p 199 See the history of Mr. Polman’s work on enlightened capitalism and its effects on employee wellness-modernized as the Lever Brothers.

I pictured the air filter layers to be vertically aligned like the rings in a tree trunk. The cellulose fibers of a tree trunk are somewhat shaped like the pages of a book that can’t be opened because it is round like a doughnut. See this book for more about cellulose: S.A. Brooks, M. V. Dwek, U. Schumacher, Functional and Molecular Glycobiology, (BIOS Scientific Publishers, Ltd., 2002), Amazon.

In trees there is an up and down circulatory system somewhat similar to the arteries and veins of the human circulatory system. Nutrients and water flow up from the roots and down from the leaves, there just isn’t a heart to pump anything but tiny pores on the leaves can be more or less open for respiration exchange with the air depending on the moistness of the air.

Some types of plants naturally are good at removing toxic chemicals from the air and moisture might be part of difference in why some are better than others. Ferns tend to be good at cleaning air quality. See: B. C. Wolverton, How to Grow Fresh Air: 50 Houseplants that Purify Your Home or Office, Penguin Books, 1996, goodreads.com.

If some houseplants were kept alive in the half a soccer field of greenhouses in the tower experimental air purifier then they could be reducing ozone concentration in the air while it was also being passively warmed before rising through the air filters in the tower.

“Three common indoor houseplants, snake plant (Sansevieria trifasciata), spiderplant (Chlorophytum comosum), and golden pothos (Epipremnum aureum), were evaluated for their species effectiveness in reducing ozone concentrations in a simulated indoor environment.” – Effectiveness of Houseplants in Reducing the Indoor Air Pollutant Ozone, HortTechnology (horttech.ashspublications.org)

An innovative idea using the power of plants to clean ozone and other chemicals from the air is being used in Berlin. the design is called a CityTree even though it isn’t tree like in appearance. The  design is multi-functional for urban areas, combining WiFi capability with park benches on both sides of a vertical wall garden that is embedded with moss on both sides. The wall of moss is estimated to have the air cleaning capability of 275 trees, hence the name, the CityTree. (hyperallegic.com) As a simple and useful solution for improving urban air quality and providing residents or visitors a chance to relax or access the internet, that idea seems like a winner even if it doesn’t clean air in a wide or tall radius – just build many of the moss wall park benches.

Clean air is healthy air.

Once I start imagining I like to just keep going – it may be due to 1000s of science fiction books I’ve read in the past. Science fiction authors imagine entire new planets with different types of challenges that residents or space travelers have to cope with. Society rules and politics also can vary widely across the genre of science fiction. Fantasy and historical books or history based fiction also introduces a wide range of ideas to consider.

In our current, actual present day we as a species are at a point where we need to face the reality that our Industrial Revolution began and our expanding technology and population has escalated – our air and water and soil are all becoming polluted in more places and with a broad range of chemicals that include types that never existed until humans invented them. The repercussions on human health are becoming more apparent and plants,  animals and aquatic species are also being affected. Transitioning to more sustainable agricultural techniques is necessary to slow down the use of phosphorus. Bioactive phosphorus is in limited supply on Earth and current agricultural techniques doesn’t reuse it the way that more traditional small farm methods did for most of human existence. Only forty years worth of bioactive phosphorus is estimated to be left. Changing agricultural techniques to use less would also help protect the oceans and other waterways from the hazards of excess phosphates being washed off the land and causing overgrowth of potentially toxic algae species.

Transitioning to sustainable individual, public, and shipping transportation is also needed. Biofuel still uses agricultural or other biomass to produce and is still burnt so electrical powered vehicles that can use solar or wind power are needed. If a spinning wind/solar turbine could be created that worked it might be possible to sail the oceans in any direction using wind power from whatever direction it was blowing. Old style sailboats can move the sails somewhat but if the wind is blowing the opposite direction  or is too strong then the sails need to be taken down until the weather changes. No wind meant no movement. A combination of solar and wind power that spun could mean the ability to transport cargo across the oceans without burning fossil fuel. (Disclosure I have sailed a tiny sailboat as a hobby and as a Water Safety Instructor but do not have experience in larger sailboats besides looking at them.)

The masts of an old fashioned wooden ocean going sailboat with the sails down.
An old fashioned wooden sailboat with the sails down – it’s big but not as big as a modern cargo vessel or cruise ship.

Old fashioned sails often used hemp rope and hemp fabric for the sails. Hemp fiber is very strong and water absorbent and the plant is easy to grow and quick growing so more sustainable than some other plant materials. Currently a variety of products are being designed using hemp fiber including insulation and fiberglass like material. Solar sail fabric would need to be fairly sturdy to stand up to wind and weather conditions and a system for preventing ice buildup would also be helpful. A flexible mesh like metal chainmail-like fashion trend from the 90’s might be worth experimenting with for solar sail fabric. flat solar plates of hemp fiberglass could be linked into a chainmail flexible mesh. The small gaps between the individual pieces could allow brisk wind to blow through while the flat areas would catch the wind. The mesh-work could include electrical conductivity to collect the solar energy and allow the plates to be heated somewhat in icy weather to prevent ice buildup. Examples of metal mesh fashion:

A spinning mast that generated energy from wind or solar sources might also be useful for “sailing” across the sand dunes of large desert areas. Masts on sailboats were traditionally wood because it was available but also because it is strong and flexible. Many layers of cellulose form the rings of a tree trunk like a doughnut shaped very tall book that can’t be opened. See this book that can be opened for more information and images portraying cellulose: S.A. Brooks, M. V. Dwek, U. Schumacher, Functional and Molecular Glycobiology, (BIOS Scientific Publishers, Ltd., 2002), Amazon.

Maybe 3D printing could use hemp fiber fiberglass tech to print masts in a pasta extrusion style in the strong yet flexible many layered doughnut effect of tree trunks.

You don’t know what is possible or isn’t possible until you try it or variations of it a few thousand times. Edison and the others who preceded his work, worked on light bulb technology with many thousands of attempts before a successful model was created, and now the technology is lighting laptops and cellphones and still lighting houses and flashlights, and now we have more energy efficient LED light bulbs too.

Disclaimer: Opinions are my own and the information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes.

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Public bathing facilities was an option in Rome

Why not return to the days of public bath houses without the lead lined aqueducts of Roman times?

While traveling in warmer states I noticed that there does seem to be a larger percentage of homeless people than in colder areas and it would add to the need for housing and restrooms. Colder climates have warming rooms for the small numbers of homeless located in their areas – just spending one night at a rest stop in a warm urban area showed me that the transient sleep in the car population would overwhelm the warming room located in the rural location. Locating a camp ground style public bathing and rest room facility near areas where homeless people congregate/are allowed to congregate might support public health and the homeless person’s ability to find a job while trying to survive on limited income. It is hard to find a job when just trying to find a restroom is difficult.

Incorporating health research into the benefits of magnesium sulfate salt baths or foot-soaks for substance abuse and chronic illness or mental illness populations could be a coordinated goal that might help fund the facilities. Magnesium deficiency is associated with anxiety, paranoia and anger that can progress to rage and violence. Magnesium deficiency is also associated with many types of chronic illness conditions and is more of risk with a variety of commonly abused substances including alcohol. The advantage of providing it in a bath or foot-soak is that the intestines can become less adept at absorbing magnesium and the kidneys more prone to excreting it in favor of calcium being better absorbed by the intestines and retained by the kidneys.

Headaches and other types of chronic pain and muscle cramp conditions can also be relieved by a magnesium sulfate (Epsom salt) or magnesium chloride topical soak or hand-cream type mixture. Working with a healthcare or insurance provider to test the efficacy of simply providing easier access to topical magnesium sulfate or magnesium chloride could help subsidize a homeless bathing facility or making the facility simply a pay to use community park addition could help subsidize it. charge a small fee for use of the shower or bath stalls. Truck stops charge around $12-14 dollars for use of nice quality shower area – that would likely be too costly for a homeless/low income person to be able to use very often. It is likely that a more campground style bathing facility could be provided for a lower cost to the individual purchaser of time in the facility while supporting the goal of improved public health. Making it a fee for use facility could help support cleaning staff for maintenance of the facility.

If research goals were incorporated then more support staff would be required to educate and obtain permission from participants in the project. Ethical medical research requires full disclosure of any potential risks of a research project as well as obtaining consent from the participants. The topical use of magnesium in the form of a bath or foot-soak can become too much of a good thing if used excessively or someone fell asleep in the bath. Twenty to forty minutes every few days is a beneficial amount when about a cup of Epsom salt is used in a bath or foot-soak.

Disclaimer: Opinions are my own and the information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes.

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Group homes for mixed age groups

 

Having a goal of providing a full size/full functioning apartment even if efficiency size for homeless or low income people may be supportive of individual need for privacy and autonomy, however if the goal is to support health and improving functional living skills then a group home with private sleep accommodations and lockable areas for personal things, and group areas for cooking, daycare, and recreation might be more effective and less expensive.

In my professional career I worked with low income populations with young children or in prenatal points in time before a first child had arrived. A common complaint I heard about my job from some people not in need of help was that it was unnecessary or wasteful for the government to provide food and education for low income women and families. A common complaint also seemed to suggest that anyone receiving aid was a lazy or not trying or a user. In my experience this was not true of most participants. While some did seem to just want food benefits and seemed to feel entitled to receiving help from others with no exchange of cooperation with the larger health and education goals, most recipients were extremely grateful for the help and just wanted a job or a better job so that they wouldn’t need the external source of government aid. Some areas of the country have plenty of jobs but housing is too expensive to be able to live nearby and commutes add time and expense to get to the job, while other areas don’t have enough jobs and housing may be available nearby but it is old and inefficient for the climate (too expensive to heat or cool and dehumidify in extreme temperatures).

Current systems that provide housing aid generally provide individual living units. While that supports individual tastes in personal habits and food choices it is more expensive than group cooking facilities would cost. It is also currently very difficult to remove children from a low functioning home unless something like drug use is discovered. A group living facility with group daycare and group kitchen facilities could require a certain amount of volunteer hours from people living in the group home and additional staff could be present to provide guidance and over-site of the management of the larger goals of providing healthy variety in food and activities. Lower functioning parents would be mixing with better role models of parenting and/or at least the children would be mixing with better role models of what effective caregiving is like. Even having one positive adult role model in a child’s life can help a child become a well functioning pro-social adult instead of becoming a dysfunctional adult.

An advantage of providing group homes from the perspective of the common complaint of not wanting to give handouts to the ‘undeserving’ would be that a group home wouldn’t be the same as a regular efficiency or larger apartment. The people living in a group home might end up actually preferring the continuity and social benefits of living in a community or they might improve their skills and health and access to regular employment so that they could earn their way into their own regular type of housing.

Dormitory style housing units plans that already exist could be a starting point in designing a low income group home but they are not ideal for a mixed range of ages and interests. The group areas in college dormitories are designed for one type of age range and aren’t child friendly. A group home for mixed ages and types of families and single people might have more homelike, smaller rooms so that smaller groups could enjoy a variety of types of activities or television shows. Sleeping accommodations might be shared with lockable cupboards available such as those found at bus stations for a few personal items. Or small private sleep areas might be preferred for single people and small families. Compared to a tent or sleeping in a car, or sleeping sitting up in a public area, even a very small private room would be a luxury.

All people appreciate respect and feeling valued can improve self esteem and willingness to work towards improving. Feeling marginalized or observing others being marginalized has been associated with increased risk for violence. Experiencing child trauma or domestic violence has also been associated with increased risk for violence. Being male and having a history of binge drinking has also bee associated with increased risk for violence. if we want less violence and less mass shooting incidents in our society than instead of focusing primarily on gun control it would make sense to focus more help on providing children with safer environments and providing them with more pro-social role models in their lives. Child trauma happens and the children who have a positive adult role model in their lives are the ones who are more likely to develop resilience and pro-social habits as adults.

If we want less violence and fewer mass shooters then it seems reasonable to focus on promoting fewer people prone to violence. Targeting the underlying issues that have been associated with risk for violence makes more sense than simply trying to take away guns – there are a lot more guns and other means for violence available than there are people prone to violence. Trying to provide more effective alcohol abuse treatment could be helpful as that is a risk factor. Reducing marginalization of minorities and mental illness could help reduce the risk of observers with similar problems feeling hopeless and helpless about their own situations and reduce their risk for violence.

Group homes might be a helpful solution for low income people or veterans, homeless, low functioning, mentally ill but non-violent individuals, people trying to end addictive behavior patterns, or non-violent people with a history of a prison record. Some group homes might be focused more on people with children and some on single people or mixed ‘villages’ might be better for both groups. It takes a village to raise a child and children can be a delight and reason for hope in all age groups. Respecting and valuing elders in a community might be easier for a child who had plenty of story time with a variety of grandma and grandpa types in their lives.

Villages are small ideally, for human comfort level. Business research regarding the most effective size for individual team/facility units within a larger corporation has found that around 150 people is what works best for individual workers, and psychology research supports that our brains have comfort levels for community size. Smaller apartment buildings/group homes that seek to shelter around 150 people per unit might be most conducive to building a sense of community within the occupants then having larger units. Or within larger units small communities could be organized around smaller communal living areas, cooking and daycare facilities.

Disclaimer: Opinions are my own and the information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes.

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Phospholipid and fertility for men and women

Fertility for both men and women is also effected by having adequate but not too much cannabinoids/phospholipid. Most of the cannabinoid group of molecules do not cause euphoria as does THC, the cannabinoid that medical marijuana is known for containing. The cannabinoid that is most common within the body is more similar to the non-euphoria causing cannabinoid known by the initials CBD.

Political reasons may be the reason that medical research is being prevented by the Schedule 1 status of the marijuana /cannabis plant. Many medical advocacy groups have recommended that the plant be taken off the Scheduled list or have it changed to a lower rating that indicates medical benefit.

So a change in political environment seems necessary before the goal to help save the human race from extinction can be addressed directly with research into improving both the diet and nutrient guidelines for all age groups and address increasing infertility rates. Currently medical professionals can’t really study or recommend cannabinoids for healthcare purposes due to the Federal designation of Schedule 1 controlled substance.

Additional note: The question of legalizing marijuana is seperate from changing the Schedule from I to III. Simply changing the rating would free academic and medical research teams or businesses to work with non-euphoria producing cannabinoids or the effect of dietary sources of phospholipids on the endogenous cannabinoid systems of the body and their effect on promoting health in certain types of chronic illness or substance abuse or binge eating disorders. Ironically a synthetic version of the euphoria producing cannabinoid known as THC is already considered a Schedule III drug (accessdata.fda.gov/Marinol/dronabinol.pdf) – with medical benefits – while the plant that contains a range of cannabinoids and terpenes that all have medical benefits is rated Schedule I – with no medical benefits.

It is past time for politics to get out of the way of health care research.

Disclosure: This information is being provided for the purpose of education within the guidelines of Fair Use. While I am a Registered Dietitian, the information is not intended to be used for the purpose of individualized healthcare guidance. Please seek an individual healthcare professional for the purpose of individualized healthcare guidance.