Nightclub powered by dancing feet opens in London

Davey Winder
Thursday, 10 July 2008 17:28

Science - Climate

Claiming to be the first eco-nightclub in the UK, the Club4Climate at Bar Surya in London generates its own electricity from the dance floor and plans to donate any surplus power to local residents.

A 35 year old property developer from London, Andrew Charalambous, has some rather ambitious plans to change the face of 'clubbing' while at the same time help to save the planet. Reinventing himself as Dr Earth, head of the Club4Climate organisation, Charalambous is opening what he claims is the first eco-nightclub tonight.

Based at Bar Surya in the trendy Pentonville Road district of London, the club will feature its own wind turbine, a solar energy system, toilets that use air to flush as well as waterless urinals, and even the drinks are sold in eco-friendly polycarbon cups instead of glasses.

But the real innovation is that electricity generating dancefloor. The Daily Mail reports that the piezoelectric floor, using crystals and ceramics to create a charge as people pound on the floor, could provide as much as 60 percent of the club's energy needs. "...if you had loads of clubbers dancing vigorously" says Dr Earth.

The announcement has not gone down too well with the Sustainable Dance Club who dismiss the claim that his club is the world's first ecological nightclub. A brief statement at the SDC website says "Club WATT in Rotterdam will be first SDC when it opens on the 4th of September 2008. After that maybe London is next?"

'They are not sustainable in our rules' SDC spokesman Vera Verkooijenat told the Daily Mail "it's not only the nightclub, it's the whole organisation that should be sustainable.'

How has Dr Earth responded to this criticism, and should we take him seriously? Find out on the next page...

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