http://www.fastcompany.com/tag/nepal The taxonomy view with a depth of 0. en http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/ariel-schwartz/sustainability/nepalese-teen-swaps-silicon-human-hair-38-solar-panel <!--paging_filter--><p><img class="center" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2562/3903678871_266dc1cb8c_o.jpg" alt="hair solar panel" width="620" height="347" /></p> <p>Kids these days--they just keep inventing new technologies to secure our energy future. The latest comes from Milan Karki, an 18-year-old resident of a rural village in Nepal. Karki has purportedly devised a way to dramatically reduce the cost of solar panels by replacing silicon components with <em>human hair</em>. </p><p><a href="http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/ariel-schwartz/sustainability/nepalese-teen-swaps-silicon-human-hair-38-solar-panel">read more</a></p> solar power solar panels Nepal human hair conductor silicon Innovation Technology Ethonomics Wed, 09 Sep 2009 13:03:48 -0400 Ariel Schwartz 1352148 at http://www.fastcompany.com http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/131/mercy-corps-the-bank-of-banks.html <!--paging_filter--><p>In Indonesia, where 110 million people live on less than $2 a day, microfinance is a crowded, fractured field: More than 50,000 microfinance institutions (MFIs) operate there, reaching 50 million poor people. But what about the rest? The Oregon-based antipoverty group Mercy Corps ventured a bold answer in May, when it bought a struggling Balinese bank and reopened it as a wholesale outfit exclusively serving MFIs.<p><a href="http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/131/mercy-corps-the-bank-of-banks.html">read more</a></p> microfinance institutions Nepal philanthropySocial Enterprises of the Year Philippines China indonesia Neal Keny-Guyer Mercy Corps MFI Ethonomics Tue, 25 Nov 2008 05:00:18 -0500 Jennifer Vilaga 1093659 at http://www.fastcompany.com