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The Flying Sun 1000 is exactly what its name implies: a very powerful light source that flies. It is not as strong as the sun, but fitted with a powerful 3,333-watt light sourcethe equivalent of a typical flood lamp in a stadiumit is enough to turn night into day instantaneously.This drone is aimed at commercial and government users for the rapid deployment of industrial-level lighting solutions, such as construction and engineering jobs, area security, and disaster relief efforts that require 24-hour operation. A single operator can deploy the Flying Sun in minutes, instantly illuminating as much as 130,000 square feet.According to its manufacturer, Freefly Systems, the drone solves the problem of having to use traditional light towers for illumination. The Woodinville, Washington-based company designs and builds camera movement systems and stabilizers for cinematography. It says these are bulky, slow, and costly to set up, often leaving gaps in area coverage. But since the drone-mounted spotlight can move around, the Flying Sun can provide continuous aerial lighting that moves with work crews and rescue teams as they progress through an area. Furthermore, by eliminating the need for extensive installations of towers and cabling on the ground, the Flying Sun avoids risks in disaster areas, where theres often flooding and other potential electrical and trip hazards. The company also points at a less critical but potentially game-changing use: lighting for film and television productions, which can benefit from the drones ability to turn night into day in a split second.Not like a helicopterPerhaps a spotlight doesnt sound like a game changer for these industries. After all, you can light up the ground using a helicopter and a spotlight. But helicopters have huge associated costs and generate thundering noise and wind (not to mention that their operation time is limited). The Flying Sun can fly tethered to a power source in the grounda 5kW generator, batteries, or electric vehicle will workwhich allows it to fly virtually forever. This is a lot of power, so the drones lamps get hot. Freefly says it designed a system in which the LED light panels are kept cool by the drone operation itself. It utilizes the downwash from the Alta X drones propellers to actively cool the LED lights. This efficient cooling system is crucial for enabling the LEDs to operate at high power levels without overheating, which could damage the components or reduce their life span. This effective thermal management contributes to the manufacturers claim of thousands of hours between light service. [Image: Freefly Systems]How bright is it?The system consists of four panels of 72 LED lamps mounted on an Alta X heavy-lift quadcopter, an industrial drone platform manufactured by Freefly Systems. Thats a total of 288 high-power LED lamps that can generate an astonishing 300,000 lumens, which is a typical amount for modern LED lights used in football stadiums, baseball fields, or large concert venues.The Flying Suns lamp array offers a 60-degree spotlight, which translates into a wide coverage area even at low altitudes. At about 100 feet, the system covers approximately 14,000 square feet at 10 foot-candles, which is the typical lighting of a hallway or a mall parking lot (for comparison, urban street lighting goes from 2 to 5 foot-candles). Thats enough intensity to work seamlessly as if in daylight. As the drone gets higher, the coverage area gets wider. But that comes at the expense of light intensity: At 316 feet, the drone will light a 137,000-square-foot area but only at 1 foot-candle (more than moonlight, less than a streetlight). So while it is dim, its usable. And theres the option of combining several Flying Suns to cover more area with more intensity. Granted, at $60,000 a popincluding the tethered power cables and control systemthat wont be cheap. But it beats the cost of the installation of posts and flood lamps. While the Flying Sun 1000 drone may have higher up-front costs (10 lamps and poles cost about $20,000), it offers significant long-term savings due to lower operational expenses, reduced labor (theres no setup crew required), and minimal maintenance. The drone also provides superior coverage, instant repositioning, and enhanced safety by eliminating ground hazards. While traditional systems are cheaper for small, fixed installations, this droneor similar solutionswill be the best choice in dynamic environments like emergency response, construction, or large-scale events, where mobility, rapid deployment, and energy efficiency outweigh initial investment. Also, the drone will have a lower environmental impact, since no installation and removal are required. The more I look at the video, the more it feels to me like this is the typical how the hell didnt anyone think about this until now idea that is both brilliant and truly game-changing for a lot of industries.
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If youre searching for a job, youve probably heard about how important it is to tailor your résumé and cover letter, showcasing your measurable achievements, and incorporating relevant keywords from the job description. These elements can make a big difference in catching a hiring managers attention. But beyond these essentials, theres one powerful sentence that can truly set you apart from the rest: the one-liner. According to Sam DeMase, career expert for Zip Recruiter, this line in your cover letter is important because it highlights exactly what employers want to see. Employers are looking for relevant work experience and aligned skills. So if you’re missing that, you’re not getting called in, DeMase says. She points out that many candidates make the mistake of overemphasizing their enthusiasm for the role and company while failing to clearly communicate the value they bring. To stand out, DeMase suggests crafting a compelling one-liner that immediately grabs the hiring managers attention and highlights your unique value. What should you add to your cover letter? DeMase recommends using a direct and impactful statement in your cover letter: I will add immediate value to this role in the following ways. Then, list one concrete example from your work history for each area of expertise. To do this effectively, identify three key skills that align with both the job description and your own strengths. So if your core strengths are A, B, and C, tell the employer, here’s how I’ve executed on that in previous roles, DeMase explains. Since job postings outline the required skill sets, ensuring your experience aligns with those expectations is crucial for standing out as a candidate. When you’re looking at a job description, they will always tell you what those required skill sets are. This is where alignment comes in, DeMase says. If the job posting calls for leadership development, content creation, or live facilitationand you have those skillsbe sure to showcase them. Be warned, though, You dont want to make statements without backing it up with evidence, DeMase explains. Never say, Im really good at X, Y, and Z, and leave it there. You need to articulate specific examples from your work experience. For example, if you want to highlight your ability to craft impactful marketing campaigns that increase follower accounts, dont just state itdemonstrate it. You might write, at my last role, I was able to increase the follower count by 30% over the course of x, y, z, amount of time. DeMase advises job seekers to ask themselves: Have I executed on that in previous roles, and what was my approach? How can I highlight those things? she says. You want to be very clear on what your skill sets are, but also the results that you have achieved. Where else to use this framing Beyond your cover letter, DeMase emphasizes that this one line should also appear in your résumé. It goes in your About Me section, and you can also have elements of it in your résumé headline, as well, which are the keywords that go right underneath your name, she explains. That is the part that I find entices recruiters to continue reading. By strategically placing your one-liner throughout your résumé and cover letter, you maximize its impact, increasing the chances of catching a hiring managers attention. Focus on what you have Its important to remember that you dont need to meet every single qualification to apply for a job. Its good to apply for roles that are a little bit of a stretch, DeMase says. Instead of fixating on what you lack, she advises focusing on your strengths. Highlight the things that you do have, she says.If you have three out of the five things, focus on the three that you do have because you can learn the rest. That said, a more targeted job search makes crafting a strong one-liner easier. A narrow job search is going to yield you better results than a massive one, DeMase says. By focusing on your key strengths, tailoring your approach, and strategically positioning your one-liner across your résumé and cover letter, you can confidently stand out to hiring managers and increase your chances of landing the job.
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E-Commerce
Last Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced sweeping new tariffs that will increase the cost of building materials from roofing to appliances, making home construction more expensive in the midst of a national housing shortage. These tariffs are yet another crushing blow to housing affordability, while at the same time climate change threatens to make entire areas unlivable. In February, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell testified before the Senate that if you fast-forward 10 or 15 years, there are going to be regions of the country where you cant get a mortgage because of climate change. Climate disasters like the Los Angeles fires and North Carolinas Hurricane Helene are causing property insurance rates to skyrocket and carriers to leave markets, a finding recently confirmed by the Treasury Departments Federal Insurance Office. Without property insurance, prospective buyers of single and multifamily housing cant get mortgages, and existing owners cant refinance or take out lines of credit for repairs. When insurance markets fail, they fail not just in disaster zones but also across regions and entire states. More climate disasters will mean parts of the U.S. will be livable only to people who can afford to buy or repair their homes with cash. If theres one thing that’s going to kill the American dream, its the climate crisisand this will extend far beyond the death of homeownership. Housing and climate leaders need to work together In a period when more than half a million Americans are unhoused and Drill, baby drill is once again the slogan of the day, its time for housing and climate leaders to join forces. But most housing advocates ignore the climate crisis altogetherand I can see why. As an affordable housing developer, I experienced firsthand that exclusionary zoning, permitting delays, and even environmental and community reviews make it nearly impossible to build new ground-up housing and repurpose underutilized buildings for housing. Because its already too hard and complicated to build, housing advocates often oppose crucial codes and standards that cut emissions and improve resiliency, even those that pay for themselves by preventing storm damage and lowering energy costs. However, if housing leaders continue to ignore climate change and the emissions generated from housing, the future looks bleak: more Americans will go unhoused as insurance and mortgage markets fail and climate disasters grow in frequency and intensity. Already, rising insurance rates are hitting consumer pocketbooks nationwidewith premiums increasing 61% in the past five yearsslowing single and multifamily construction, alongside an unprecedented housing affordability crisis. Aligning the housing and climate movement requires streamlining regulations to make it easier to both build new housing and repurpose existing buildings. New and retrofitted housing must also be resilient, insurable, and low emissions. At the same time, climate leaders need to make housing affordability central to their work. Taking action at the state and local level With a president who appears hell-bent on making housing less affordable and spinning climate disasters out of control, its time to move action to our communities and states. Governments from Texas to Montana to Connecticut are already speeding up permitting and eliminating decades-old exclusionary zoning rules that make it too hard and expensive to build new housing, especially housing that lower- and middle-income people can afford. These pro-housing reforms can also be critical to the climate fight because denser neighborhoods and right-size housing release fewer emissions, are more walkable, and reuse existing infrastructure. By slowing sprawl, they can help preserve open space, which draws down emissions and serves as a buffer to extreme weather. To stabilize the insurance market and mortgages, governments need to be more proactive by requiring and incentivizing building codes and standards that make new and existing homes more resilient to climate-driven disasters. There are already standards like the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safetys Fortified certification and Wildfire Prepared Home program that policymakers can adopt. State and local governments also need to make difficult choices to prevent construction in risk-prone locations, even when private land owners push back. Los Angeles is currently grappling with whether to rebuild in high fire hazard zones after Januarys Palisades and Eaton Fires. Communities may also need to relocate existing households from areas most at risk of climate disaster. Following Vermonts devastating floods in 2023 and 2024, Vermont Emergency Management is paying hundreds of families to leave flood-prone homes, and after demolition this permanent open space will reduce future flood risk to neighboring homes. These steps will decrease the chances of catastrophic damage in new and existing homes, changing the odds of insurance risk pools in ways that stabilize the market. We are seeing these strategies also work in Alabama, which bolstered its insurance industry and made families safer by incentivizing fortified roofs to protect homes from hurricanes. Making homes more resilient and energy-efficient But more disaster-prepared housing is not enough. Unless pro-housing reforms address the root cause of climate change, well be stuck in a doom loop of disaster and repair as severe weather grows fiercer. And we can only curb the climate crisis by cutting emissions in our homes20% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions come from powering housing (not including what it takes to manufacture materials or construct buildings). The good news is, thanks to rapid advancements in efficiency and electrification, emissions-cutting improvements like insulation, heat pumps, rooftop solar, virtual power plants, and low-carbon construction materials quickly pay for themselves and make families more economically secure. omes built to todays energy codes are already 40% more efficient than homes built 15 years ago, and other standards, such as PHIUS Passive House, can double those savings, and additional construction costs quickly pay for themselves with energy savings. Energy codes also save lives in extreme heat, a crucial consideration as Las Vegas hit 120 degrees in 2024, Phoenix experienced 70 days above 110 degrees, and communities from coast to coast suffered through record-breaking temperatures. Some argue that every dollar we spend cutting home emissions and energy costs is one dollar less to spend on building new housing. This is a false choice. Tens of thousands of homes have already been built and retrofitted to climate-smart standards, because the economics of lower energy costs and resiliency work over the long run. Every $1 invested in meeting modern building codes provides $11 in savings by reducing storm damage. Investing in disaster-prepared, energy-savings construction is not slowing new housing supply, but can instead bolster it. Making these changes wont be easy, and we should expect no answers from the Trump administration as they tariff us out of affordable housing. The president and his appointees have blamed climate disasters on just about everything except fossil-fuel-driven climate change. They also repealed the Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (for the second time), the rule that says that flooded buildings that receive funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency must be rebuilt in a way that prevents future flood damage. We must also overcome the resistance of lobbyists like the National Association of Home Builders that have waged decades-long campaigns against codes and consumer protections. In North Carolina, homes were unnecessarily destroyed by Hurricane Helene because for 15 years Republican lawmakersat the bequest of lobbyistsblocked common-sense building code updates and limits on flood zone and steep slope construction. As a result, homes were unnecessarily built in harms way and werent strong enough to withstand the storm. There are examples of the home construction industry moving beyond knee-jerk opposition to regulation and climate leaders joining them to collaborate on solutions to build zero-emission resilient homes. In Louisiana, local homebuilders successfully advocated for stronger building codes that protect against disaster damage and energy codes that save people money and save lives in extreme heat. Louisiana homebuilders got behind the codes because they saw them as key to preventing insurance market failure and keeping the home construction industry afloat. If we can replicate that model nationwide, and pair climate-smart policies with pro-housing reforms, we can supercharge construction and renovations, provide housing to people who need it, while safeguarding the mortgage and property insurance industries. The American dream depends on it.
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