An LED light that runs on rope pulls and gravity has been developed, which could be good news for developing countries without access to stable lighting.
GravityLight, a crowdfunding campaign and product created by British designers Martin Riddiford and Jim Reeves, allows a cheap LED kit to run for up to thirty minutes -- for free -- through no more than a three-second pull on a rope.
The energy source after this? Something free that everyone has access to -- gravity.
The GravityLight was built for the purpose of supplying cheap, effective lights to remote villages and areas in developing countries that often have to go without reliable power sources. Low wages and expensive light sources means that once the sun goes down, everything goes dark.. or you have to rely on biomass fuel burning. This product aims to change that.
Burning Kerosene for lighting purposes produces 244 million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually, according to the team. In addition, using biomass fuel can result in inhaling dangerous smoke, and this can cause lung cancer, eye infections and burns if something goes wrong, as well as costing money many can ill-afford.
Each GravityLight kit includes an LED lamp which works by using the gravitational pull of a weight hanging from the lamp. Every time you lift the 9kg weight -- which is a small sack that can be filled with rocks or sand -- enough power is generated to provide thirty minutes of light.
Batteries and fuel are not required, making the light clean and potentially affordable for those on low wages. The team say that this also means users can "use the money they have saved to buy more powerful solar lighting systems in the future."
But why not use solar power to light the developing world? The team cite a number of reasons, including the need to buy batteries to store energy -- often beyond the reach of the poverty-stricken -- and they deteriorate over time, requiring replacements every few years.
The first batch of 1000 gravity-powered LED lamps are going to be given to villagers in both Africa and India to use for free, in order to test and further refine the design. Once this trial is complete, the team want to be able to mass-produce the GravityLight for less than $5.
At the time of writing, with 35 days left to go, the campaign has reached $85,020 in funding, beyond the team's original goal of $55,000.
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We give rewards for solar, wind, and other "renewables." I'm waiting for our policymakers to figure out a way to incentivize people willing to create energy from their own direct work. It's all about capturing the EXISTING stored energy from our activities. Hydro power does it, elevators do it, hybrid car brakes do it, cyclists do it, even cuckoo clocks from the dark ages do it. So let's fall in love with dynamic energy.
Very cool. Literally. The best camping light ever for industrialized nations and a real boon to undeveloped ones. Eliminating batteries is HUGE for resource reduction. No fuel, other than the less than one calorie it takes to lift and/or pull it. Can't burn down your tent or hut or whatever.
Good day. This LED is not gravity powered, but it generates its own electricity with the assistance of gravity. It is hand-powered, but you don't have to constantly crank it. You only have to lift the weight once every thirty minutes, which is a great idea! This made me revisit my hand-powered light project. It is inspiring.
You can support the project here and get one sent to you too next year. This is a self-created design project to help the needy and the 3rd World primarily but one which has created something that all could use. http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/282006
An electric generator. How novel. What will they think of next. [s]Now where is that smiley for sarcasm?[/s]
Please, please make this available in the US. This is a great device for people who want renewable lighting, the underemployed, and those who simply want off the grid, one piece at a time.
This light definitely has a place in the eco friendly lighting arena. Does anyone know who the distributor is? This light would be great for low light areas like the Arctic and not having to purchase fuel means that people can put their money to better use. Love it.
This could scale up with heavier weighs and a more rugged housing to provide light for a longer time. Reminds me of the old German Cuckoo!
The difference is that your crank radio and light (I have the same) utilize a battery. Otherwise you'd need to constantly crank it to run. With no battery to deteriorate it could run for years. Simple and brilliant.
My wife has a "pig light" flashlight, you pump the handle a few times to get light. We have a storm radio on which you turn the crank to power it. Technology that is many decades old, this doesn't seem that different.
While this light may provide cheap light through mechanical effort, it is a misrepresentation to say that it is "gravity powered." Gravity provides a means to convert potential energy into mechanical energy, but it doesnt' "generate" energy. All of the energy was already in this system. In this case, the energy is provided by pulling on the rope. Assuming that gravity is actually involved, pulling the rope will lift some weight against gravity, converting mechanical energy (the pull) into potential energy. This is released over time as the weight returns to its starting point, but gravitational potential is acting as a storage for energy, not its source.
Because sleeze-bag lib lawyers would prevent innovative solutions like this light because the rocks/sand could injure someone.
you lift this bag of rocks a few feet, once, and get half an hour of light. No storage like batteries or supercaps to replace. I too have an LED flashlight. It drains and goes out after a couple of minutes now that the battery is a little older, and it takes a considerable effort (100-200 turns of the crank) to fully charge it. If as promised, this is much better. (on rereading, quite an endorsement - I wish to assure you I have no connection to the inventors)
I think it's a very elegant solution. Imagine an entire village lighted like this. If you can remember from history classes, or classic literature, there used to be lamp lighters that walked the cities turning on and lighting the gas street lamps each night, and turning them off each morning. Give a guy the job of pulling all the village lamps on each evening. Make 8 circuits each night from 6 to 9:30 PM and let them all shut down by 10 PM. No need to get up early in the morning to turn them off. And if early morning vendors need one, they can pull the rope themselves for whereever they set up.
While I found the comment funny - lib or cons - the lawyers and government would likely kill this project with paperwork. See the recent article about US vs DE solar in the NYT. There's far too much fear mongering in the US.
What an ignorant and completely inappropriate comment.
Well the teabag lawyer would not even use science except when science benefited him or his client.