The Human-Powered Home » tamara

DIY Help from Working Bikes

tamara — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 02:00:42 +0000

I’ve had the pleasure of working with the volunteers at Chicago’s Working Bikes Cooperative (WBC), an organization that collects cast-off bikes and repairs or refashions them for use in the city or in far-off countries. They also make bike machines, such as pedal generators and water pumps, for education, fun, and practical use. (And they’re featured in The Human-Powered Home.) WBC recently posted instructions for making devices they debuted at the Midwest Renewable Energy Fair this summer. Another WBC page lists instructions and videos for making a wide variety of pedal-powered devices.

Green Gym in Detroit

tamara — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 21:28:37 +0000

In January, Treehugger profiled a gym in Detroit that’s available for use by the homeless and has electricity-generating equipment. According to Cass Community Social Services, “The gym will be open daily for homeless people living in the CCSS’s transitional housing and permanent supportive housing programs, as well as staff members and volunteers.” The gym uses energy-harvesting stationary bikes made by Green Revolution.

I became aware of Green Revolution right after The Human-Powered Home was published, and I haven’t had the pleasure of talking with the folks there. But according to the article, their technology “can be installed on most brands of indoor cycling equipment. At its retrofit gym in Ridgefield, Connecticut, a typical cycling class with 20 bikes has the potential to produce up to 3.6 Megawatts (3,600,000 watts) of renewable energy a year. This is equivalent to lighting 72 homes for a month, and reduces carbon emissions by over 5,000 pounds.” (Note the word “potential” — does that mean if the bikes were constantly in use? By elite athletes? Or everyday exercisers?)

Also according to the Treehugger article, “One year of four daily classes, Cass projects that full classes of 10 have the potential to provide enough power to light three homes for a year–all of which will be redirected back to the facility’s power grid, reducing its operating costs.” That estimate seems high to me, but I suppose it depends on how many lights those homes have.

Electricity-Generating Shoe

tamara — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 21:12:06 +0000

In The Human-Powered Home I wrote about the heel-strike generator, the boot heel embedded with a material that issued current when compressed–current that could be harnessed to power batteries for portable electronics. The U.S. Military (DARPA) chose not to pursue the technology after testing showed that wearing it and generating electricity all day taxed test subjects. Now Dr. Ville Kaajakari, an assistant professor at Louisiana Tech, has come up with a similar electricity-generating shoe that he claims will work better.

Featured in this article, “the polymer-based generator developed by Dr. Kaajakari is soft and robust, allowing it to blend in with the filling of athletic shoes.” That means that unlike DARPA’s heel-strike generator, the electricity-generating material is less rigid and not limited to one area of the footwear. Still, the article doesn’t explain exactly why this newer version would be easier on the wearer.

Power from Clothing

tamara — Tue, 25 May 2010 12:29:42 +0000

Scientists are getting closer to making fashion that harvests human energy. This article in the Chicago Tribune describes UC-Berkeley professor Luwei Lin’s project to develop nanofibers that can be woven into clothing and generate electricity from the wearer’s smallest movements. These nanofibers, which make use of piezoelectricity, can be washed multiple times and not lose their energy-harvesting capabilities.

The fibers are so small that a bundle of a billion would be no bigger than a grain of sand. But that bundle could power an iPod. Lin said, “The more vigorous the motion, the more power can be harvested, making knees and elbows and other joints prime spots for the strands.

As with the heel-strike generator project described in The Human-Powered Home, one organization eager for the outcome of this project is the U.S. Dept. of Defense. Military personnel on the go could use such clothing to charge communications devices on the go or in remote places.

Pedal for Dinner

tamara — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:34:53 +0000

Recently a few articles (here and here) have described a scheme being rolled out by one Danish hotel to allow diners to pedal for dinner. The Crowne Plaza Copenhagen Towers will offer anyone who produces at least 10 watt-hours of electricity on one of its stationary bike generators a voucher for a free meal. Crowne Plaza’s parent company, IHG, said there are no plans to bring the program to hotels in the U.S.

Rustic Pedal Powered Generator

tamara — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 20:20:46 +0000

This post about a homemade bicycle generator begins: “Living in the woods there are no convenient plug sockets.” And yet laptops are still necessary tools. Authors of the blog A Walk Around Britain have created a simple bicycle-powered electrical generator using the same parts as those described in The Human-Powered Home’s plan for a homemade bicycle generator–scooter motor, pulley, cog, and an old car battery. Except that this ingenious, rustic generator uses a stand made of sticks!

It proves that human power is adaptable, portable, simple, and effective.

Inmates Pedal Power TVs

tamara — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 20:08:53 +0000

According to an article in The Arizona Republic, inmates at one AZ correctional facility can pedal power TVs to view additional channels. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said he hopes to encourage more exercise with this setup, in which one hour of pedaling allows for one hour of viewing. Oddly, the program is only available to female inmates at this time.

The Latest Example of Passively Harvesting Human Power

tamara — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:41:33 +0000

A new development in passively harvesting human power was featured in a recent NY Times article. Using piezoelectric crystals to generate electricity from human movement isn’t a novel idea. Its varied applications are described in Chapter 1 of The Human-Powered Home. But now scientists at Princeton have printed the crystals onto a flexible rubberlike material that’s also biocompatible, so it can be implanted in the body. As you move, the material could generate enough electricity to run a medical sensor. Outside of the body–for example, embedded in clothing–a flexible generator could charge your cell phone or portable music player.

RollerGen, One of the Coolest Greener Gadget Designs

tamara — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:30:21 +0000

The RollerGen, a bicycle-attached electrical generator, was recently named in a Popular Mechanics article as one of the four coolest designs in the Greener Gadgets 2010 conference. RollerGen has been featured on this site before, and High Tide Associates, the company that designed and manufactures the device, is featured in The Human-Powered Home.

New Maya Pedal Site

tamara — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 18:10:55 +0000

If you’ve read The Human-Powered Home or followed pedal-power technology a while, you probably know about Maya Pedal. This Guatemalan organization is a model for collaborative, innovative human power engineering. Now Maya Pedal has updated its Web site to include easier navigation, more photos, and best of all, detailed plans and drawings of its most popular pedal-powered machines (bicimaquinas). Through the new site you can also donate or apply to visit and help out.