ENTREPRENEURS AROUND THE WORLD ARE trying to turn green tech ideas into viable businesses. Many are working with technology that has been proven to work, but is too expensive for widespread use. The challenge is finding ways to bring the costs down enough so that their solutions can be scaled up to effect real change.
Here is a collection of innovative companies and inventors who believe they are close to hitting that mark with products ranging from the world’s whitest paint to high-efficiency electric batteries made from one of the most plentiful elements on Earth.
1 _ Earth-Cooling Paint
In 2020, a team of graduate students led by Purdue University mechanical engineering professor Xiulin Ruan came up with a formula for what Guinness World Records later recognized as the world’s whitest paint. While it looks pretty similar to other white paints, the new ultra-white reflects up to 98.1 percent of sunlight, which means unlike most paints, which warm buildings, this one can cool them down.
According to a Purdue study published in the the new paint can lower surface