Way to go! We can really keep the developing nations poor as hell if we relegate them to a radio and a nightlight. Can't have em 'destroying the planet' by actually developing...

drewls

WTF! What did the house lighting consist of, a single 7-1/2 watt night light?

Kingteddybear

1000 amps like the stereo Benjiman Franklin invented in Family Guy.

gizmodohomepage

Hell, lets all throw up three of them and let the electric company cut US a check every month.

XDoctor

There's also that windbelt turbine from a ways back, shame that these sort of things cant be just thrown up in the us, think every house proving 50% of its power....

Technogen

@yet_another_user: Perhaps the radio to which it refers is one like this:

bosskev

"can power a home's lighting for up to two and a half days or a radio for over a day."

That must be some radio!

My radio only needs 11 watts and I'm quite sure my homes lighting load is at least 50 times more than that depending on whats turned on.

yet_another_user

Damn. I think I'm just going to stock up on freeze dried food and a few good guns before peak oil gets worse...

johnnyabnormal

Nice science fair project, college boy. Now quit looking at me like you're disappointed.

mildretard

@drewls:

Or we can enable them to leapfrog us, so they can get a technologically advanced society while we're still cleaning the mess created by our lack of foresight.

ltethe

I'm actually quite impressed that some businesses in my field are going solar:

[news.bbc.co.uk]
[www.nickphoenix.com]
[universoulproductions.wordpress.com]

Maybe if they were using some wind as well, they wouldn't have to pull anything from the grid on cloudy days.

johnnyabnormal

I wonder how many of these turbines it would take to power my PS3?

danjuan

is it just me or does it seem like "students" keep creating several inovations for the world.

i mean maybe the future isn't so doo-

*meteor falls on house*

Neverkilled: zombiefied, in the summertime

Is that kid in smug mode or what?

Neverkilled: zombiefied, in the summertime

@Neverkilled: zombiefied, in the summertime: He's hardly a kid. He's a 22 year old university student!

LittleJon

I fail to see the revolutionary part. You can make a windmill out of some wood fins and a plastic stand with a little generator and some wires for around 40 bucks no sweat.

daftrok

I'm gonna make me one. Of course no one will care because I am old and most likely crazy.

hardtoremember

If it's a "generator", what happens after 2 1/2 days that will make the lights stop working??? Maybe the blades fall off....very confusing.

wchurchill1945

how much force does it take to turn that bike rotor? is wind really necessary? because if he's found a way to run the world with hamster power...well...that'd be something.

dave the wet sprocket

look for gm or exxon to snake the patent and bury it.

dave the wet sprocket

I think the key is "Developing nations." There is nothing short of cold fusion that would be a viable alternative to the coal, hydro, and nuclear power we use to satisfy our tremendous appetite for power. My home pulls about 3000 watts at any given time. I don't think even solar would power that. That turbine wouldn't even charge a Cloudbook.

But for LED lighting and portable radios, it'd work pretty well. Might even charge an XO.

markarian

He 'invented' something that Mother Earth News had in the magazine 30 years ago...

StarChaser Tyger

Wait, this seems wrong. Why would a wind turbine only power something for a short amount of time like that? Shouldn't it continue collecting wind power and generating electricity indefinitely?

Z4N5H1N

Seems like a weird story. What about voltage/frequency conversion? Or batteries?

And 40 dollars for something that produces 11 watts seems really crappy. I think a small $40 solar panel even produces more energy.

Knirfie

"and can power a home's lighting for up to two and a half days..."

That's a really weird way to measure electric output.

From original article: "It produces an output of 11.3 watts."
Though this is still vague (since we measure power delivery in
MWh and kWh), at least it gives us a specific number based on a standard measure.

Since this is a technology blog it would be nice to have technical details outlined within the body of the post. if further research or investigation is needed then please take they time do so.

uhm...Bob

So if you have a new bike to chop up, a machine shop, and a bunch of bike tools, it will only cost you $40 in materials to build a generator capable of powering a single CFL bulb. Huh. Where is the "invention"? It sounds like marketing to me, not inventing.

UrbanAce

I guess the guys at greentrust.org have been doing it wrong all this time...
:)
The "kid" has only reproduced what amature radio operators have been playing with for 40 years :)

higgy

looking at the pic...the gizmo that actuall converts the mechanical energy into electricity....is that round metal disk thing....

did he build that?

henhen

@Knirfie: best I could find was a 6 watt for $35

TheCapt

@bosskev: How did you ad that pic to your comment?

subsider34

Those bike components should be good for at least 150 watts of throughput power. Why such a small rotor? Double the size of the blades and he would see a significant increase in generating capacity.

UrbanAce

Yeah, there's something seriously wrong with this article.

Lev_Astov

@subsider34:
<IMAGE src="<url>" width="<width>"/>
<IMAGE src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/72/Turbine_aalborg.jpg" width="100"/>

Rabid Penguin

@johnnyabnormal:

Dude, you're SO right on that one it's scary!

tabaks

How long can it power the muscle car I built to get some action?

GeekyNerdGuy

11watts? pffft, nice try. At current solar prices, a solar equivalent would cost $33. If nanosolar ramps up, it would cost you $11 (less than this contraption even at high volume). Wind turbines aren't a bad idea, and can actually be more efficient than solar in windy areas, but this thing is horribly inefficient. I can buy a 400watt wind turbine for about $500 ($1.25/watt).

Quit your daydreaming melonhead

toyotaboy

My personal coal plant does just fine. I use the tears of children to run the turbine.

Con Seannery

3Kw? Holy crap, I assume you have electric HVAC?

daveNYC

@tabaks: What, the peak oil or green audio studios?

johnnyabnormal

The hole is too deep. Little wind generator or not.

snowninja

@henhen:
No he didn't make the generator. He just used an alternator from a car, the sprocket and chain from a bike and a propeller.
I'm guessing that he also used a car rectifier and charged a car battery. Then he figured out that the car battery would run 1 household lightbulb for 2.5 days or a radio for a day.
Seems more like an elementary school science fair entry to me.... Maybe I'm missing something.

gkoinm

For a reality check, take a look at your electric bill and note how many kilowatt hours you used last month.

If that produced 11 watts 100% of the time, over a 30 day month it would provide 7.9 kwh. At my local utility rate of 11 cents per KWH, that would save a whopping 87 cents over the month. Of course, that 11 watts is most likely the peak power, so even that savings is insane.

Not even a good science fair project.

For the record, at current prices, the government agency that advises regarding such things claims small wind (< 25KW wind plants) aren't YET cost effective - you don't install them to save money, you install them because you want cleaner energy or your property is too far from electric lines or you want to do it as a hobby.

I've looked at it myself and they're right - the numbers don't work, yet. I've also looked at solar - same song, second verse. I have a perfect location for solar - a south facing roof on a machine shed and space inside the shed for the inverters, power management gear (and batteries if I wish to have them).

I'm waiting for a significant drop in the cost, or a significant increase in electric rates, or some long term tax credits or a combination of the three before I do solar or wind.

FrankReality