If you don’t like tight spaces, then the Schweeb may not be your preferred mode of transportation.

Google is backing this eco-friendly monorail system in their Project 10^100 initiative, which was a call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible, selecting Shweeb as an organization with the most forward looking transportation vision. People from around the world submitted over 150,000 ideas that they wanted to bring to life.

Inhabitat writes, “The system is ‘user-powered’ it immediately gets sustainability points, but the system has also been praised for its speed. A combination between traveling in tubes à la Futurama and ‘Sky Cycling,‘ Shweeb’s bike-powered monorail currently has a 200m cycle track in Rotorua, New Zealand, where is it billed as an “adrenalin-fueled” adventure. There, users are suspended from the track in transparent pods and can ‘cycle’ around the landscape at speeds of up to 45km/h.”

Famed progressive thinker and Google co-founder Larry Page is working out the details as he plans his new 6,000-square-foot, eco-friendly house on an acre sized lot in Palo Alto. The Google house will include solar panels, materials that do not emit toxic chemicals, and paving that allows the rain to seep through, which is a major plus in California, where water planners are looking to fill up aquifers.

The exterior of the house will have zinc cladding and plenty of enormous windows, including a wall of sliding-glass doors in the back. Page is also working with an arborist to replace some trees in poor health with those that use less water.

Building this eco-house adds to Page’s forward thinking work in areas such as alternative energy companies (he was a major investor in Tesla Motors, which developed the Tesla Roadster, a 220-mile (350 km) range battery electric vehicle.) Larry Page, with the help of Google’s philanthropic arm, promotes the adoption of plug-in hybrid electric cars and other alternative energy investments.

Always at the forefront of emerging technologies (I’m a firm believer that the first established moon base will be established by these search engine legends) Google has taken a step towards helping consumers track their electricity use with some sophisticated new (and free) software tools.

Dan Reicher, Director for Climate Change and Energy Initiatives Google, is currently working with a number of major utilities companies in the United States, Europe and Asia to make this software available as soon as possible to the public. As part of its ongoing efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Google says it will use this new software for a program that will show home energy consumption in real time on a user’s computer or a telephone. Google’s research shows that access to home energy information typically saves between 5 percent and 15 percent on monthly electricity bills.

“It will get rolled out very soon to regular energy consumers,” Reicher said, “When I began getting information about my own home, I discovered that I had a 35-year electric motor running for my heating system. That was using huge amount of electricity. I did not realize that’s the change I need to make in my home, and the beauty of the tool we are developing is that is going to be an open source.”

The Jellyfish is a 36-inch-tall rooftop wind turbine that you plug right into any outlet and generate up to 40 kWh a month. The Jellyfish is currently a finalist in Google’s Project10tothe100, where people were asked to submit videos that will change the world for the better for a shot at $10 million.

“For me, so many of these [wind] systems just aren’t practical,” inventor Chad Maglaque told the Seattle Times, referring to expenses and inspections with standard wind turbines. “I should be able to go down to Costco and pick one up by a big jar of mayonnaise.”

Although the deadline for submissions is up, you can still get inspired by voting for your favorite ideas, which you can do on March 17.

We love the recent trend we’re seeing towards more advanced methods of tracking home power consumption, so we were particularly happy to see Google making a its own contribution. The Google PowerMeter, which is currently in closed beta testing, will provide households with a great tool for tracking and analyzing their energy usage.

PowerMeter will of course be a web-based application and will offer a real-time data stream on how you are using energy. By seeing what is using what amount of power it becomes easier to understand how you can save energy. According to the testimonials in the above Google video, not only will this help reduce a home’s impact on the environment it can save users thousands of dollars per year.

You will also be able to share your energy usage data and compare it with your friends and neighbors for some healthy competition.

The software will require a piece of hardware to monitor energy and Google will be producing this in the near future and working with utility companies to get it out there.

Head over to Google for more information on PowerMeter.