By Jennifer Kho •
January 5, 2009
Think of Björk and the Icelandic musician’s bizarre videos, eccentric clothing and eclectic music might spring to mind. Now she’s bringing a new theme to her persona: money.
Reykjavik, Iceland-based Audur Capital is raising money for its second venture-capital fund, named Björk, focused on greentech startups (via Earth2Tech and The New York Times). The singer and Audur jointly established the fund to help turn around Iceland’s economy, which was crushed by the country’s banking collapse in the fall. Audur seeded the fund, expected to close in March, with an investment of 100 million Icelandic kronur (about $816,330).
By Keith Rockmael •
August 29, 2008
This past weekend most of the swarms listened to rock and roll, rap, hip hop, and pop at the Outside Lands festival in San Francisco’s great Golden Gate Park, but we took time from the audio overload to explore the some of the green aspects of the festival.
It actually didn’t take long as a set of solar panels sat just outside the main entrance. After that, we hit the Eco Lands. The PG&E sponsored area offered up booths (organic farmer’s market), tents, exhibits (like solar education classes) that one doesn’t normally see in a rock ‘n’ roll venue. We grabbed an Eco Lands Passport, an inspiration from Jack Johnson’s All At Once Community, where green minded rockers could obtain “stamps” for doing certain activities such as recycling a cell phones, use the bike valet (we did), calculate your carbon footprint, or donate to a non-profit.
We found ourselves super impressed with the Panhandle Stage not only because we saw the politically and socially charged K’Naan here but the stage actually ran on solar. That’s right, all the amps, mikes, lights, everything off the grid. The stage utilized a 4-kilowatt solar system, and by using solar power rather than a diesel generator or grid power, they avoided emitting approximately 3,000 lbs per day (1.5 metric tons) of CO2 into the atmosphere.
