GRAVITY
POWERED LIGHT
One of the most ranked problems in world crisis today is the
source of energy that will continue to support the limited bio fuel on Earth
which is currently used to maintain in running global works. Developing
countries in Africa and Asia depend on kerosene for lamp fuel which is costly
and recently had been found as a risk to human health according to the study in
the University of California, Berkeley and the University of Illinois. However,
science today innovates that new source that is very natural and can be found
everywhere else- gravity. The new breakthrough in technology brings gravity as
a source of energy that runs 24/7. It is developed in such way that energy is
accessible even the sun comes down where solar power is unusable. Martin
Riddiford and Jim Reeves, London based designers called it Gravity Light.
The idea of Gravity
Light was to overcome the limitations of options such as solar lamps, which
needs sunlight and have a limited battery life and kerosene lamps which are
expensive to refuel and cause indoor pollution.
The lamp converts energy from a descending weight into
light. The gravity light is an LED lamp that works by harnessing the
gravitational force exerted on a weight hanging from the lamp. As the earth pulls
the bag, gears convert the weight into energy generates enough power to provide
30 minutes of light with no need for rechargeable batteries or fuel, which
means no running costs.
Each bag could be filled with rocks or sand that weigh up to
twelve kilograms and the good news is, it requires no batteries at all. A
better explanation on physics how weight could work and convert gravitational
force into energy. For example, a 12kg bag is raised 1 metre; its equivalence
is 120 joules. That's 1/20 the energy in a standard carbon AA cell. On earth it
takes about 10 Newton-meters (N-m) of energy to raise a 1 kilogram mass to a
height of 1 meter. Since 1 N-m equals 1 Joule, that's 10 Joules. If it takes 1
second to lift the weight 1 meter, than you have converted 10 Joules of energy
to potential energy in one second. That's 10 Watts of power. If you lift a 2 kg
weight 1 meter in 1 second, then the rate of energy conversion is 2 x 10 = 20
Joules per second, or 20 Watts of power and so on.
It also has been designed that it can be used to power other
devices or recharge batteries which can be connected to terminals on the unit.
The brightness of the gravity light can be adjusted based on the task at hand
or to increase light running time.
As of now, the invention is still under study conducting
series of field tests concerning the performance of the device over time-
including the effects of varying weather conditions on internal components with
the help of local partners such as NGOs.
One thousand lights will be sent to Africa and Asia for
testing. “It doesn’t have any pollution disadvantages”, says Mary Willcox,
principal energy consultant at Practical Action. Because there are no running costs after the
initial low cost purchase, it has the potential to lift people out of poverty,
allowing them to use the money they have saved to buy more powerful solar lighting
systems in the future.
About the inventors
Martin
Riddiford and Jim Reeves are London based designers who have spent 4 years
developing GravityLight as an off-line project. They work for therefore.com,
which has over 20 years of experience in designing and developing hand held
computing and communication products for a host of pioneers including Psion,
Toshiba, NEC, TomTom, Inmarsat, ICO, Sepura, Racal Acoustics, Voller Energy,
FreePlay and SolarAid.
They
are using a tried and tested
manufacturer who has the right expertise to make GravityLight. They have some links to partner organisations in
Africa and need to do the same for India.
Sources:
www.deciwatt.org.
(February 6,2014)
http://deciwatt.org/frequently-asked-questions/
(February 6, 2014)
(Photos) http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/gravitylight-lighting-for-developing-countries
(February 11, 2014
(February12,2014)
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