Panasonic has released a range of electric rugs into the Japanese market that heat up to a toasty 114 degrees. At first glance this seems like an extravagant waste of power, but it's actually very green. If you're sitting in the living room watching a movie, then you only need to heat the rug to get warm, not the whole house. Never before has saving energy been so romantic.

The only problem I see is that people may not want an electronics manufacturer designing their home furnishings. Perhaps a heated mat that you can put under a normal rug would be a wiser move. [Treehugger]

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