The colour of money

Keith Hewitson reckons that in the UK alone around eight million properties require insulation of some sort. Which would be good for him. His company, Heatseekers, takes a literal approach to informing people of the amount of money they could save each year on fuel bills if they invest in cavity walls and roof lagging. Heatseekers uses real-time thermal snapshots of heat escaping from a building — the sort of multicoloured images usually seen in hostage rescue movies — to shock consumers into taking action. The surveys are carried out during winter evenings when householders crank up their heating. The colder the surrounding air, the more clearly warm walls show up on the pictures. 
Driving down a street at 16km/h, surveyors can take energy snapshots of up to 1,000 homes an hour. After the images have been recorded, energy advisers pinpoint homes they think need attention and call on them a few days later to offer a face-to-face consultation. Typically advisers will help the householders to arrange quotes and provide information on government-funded schemes such as Carbon Emissions Reduction Target, which can pay some or all of the costs for any work needed. In the three months since Heatseekers started its surveys it has grown from a one-van operation to a fleet of seven. Hewitson says that by the year-end 30—40 local councils will have signed up. 


Students union

An Israeli entrepreneur plans to apply social networking to academia by launching the first global, tuition-free internet university. Shai Reshef, says that the non-profit venture The University of the People, will have online study communities, weekly discussion topics, homework and exams. Instead of tuition fees, students will pay only a nominal sum to enrol (€10 to €35) and for exams (€7 to €75), with students from poorer countries paying less. Reshef says several universities already put courses online, available to the public, free. He says his new university will use active and retired professors, librarians, masters students and other professionals to develop the curriculum and oversee assessments. He plans to enrol 300 students when the venture launches this autumn, and initially offer bachelor’s degrees in business administration and computer science. Reshef says the university will apply for accreditation as soon as possible. The aim is to enrol 10,000 students over five years, the level at which he says the enterprise should be self-sustaining. Start-up costs will be about €3.7m, says Reshef, of which he plans to contribute €750,000. Reshef, is chairman of Cramster.com, an online study community offering help to college students.