Make Energy announces a US-Mexico Innovation Challenge

WASHINGTON, DC — The United States and Mexico joined forces to address climate change through energy innovation. On November 15, 2014, we launched an online competition called "Make Energy: A US-Mexico Innovation Challenge," held on Instructables.com. Make Energy invites the DIY maker community to find creative ways to generate energy from clean and renewable sources. We want to see projects that conserve energy, store energy and harness the power of wind, sunlight and water. Makers are citizen inventors who build everything from robots to solar panels to innovations that have yet to be named. Make Energy launched at Hacedores, the first major maker festival in Mexico City.

Thanks to the Internet, makers all over the world can enter our competition. People can post their creations online, sharing ideas and learning from other inventors. "Today's maker movement is an increasingly borderless community," says Emily Parker, Future Tense fellow and digital diplomacy advisor at New America. "Partners in the United States and Mexico organized this challenge, but citizen inventors from other countries are also welcome to participate."

Make Energy is the result of an unprecedented partnership between Green Momentum, Laboratorio para la Ciudad (Mexico City Government), National Digital Strategy (Office of the Mexican Presidency), Tecnólogico de Monterrey, Arizona State University and New America.

The contest will be open to entries on November 15 at: http://www.instructables.com/contest/makeenergy/. The contest will be open for several months. Winners will receive a MacBook Pro, a Huxley RepRap kit or other great prizes.

For more information, please contact Emily Parker at: parker@newamerica.org