NewNergy

In its first two months, Bicing, a bike-sharing program in Barcelona, Spain, garnered over 30,000 subscribers. This is good news for new bike-sharing programs in Washington D.C. and San Francisco.

Initially, locals were skeptical that Bicing would attract users, but the service has enjoyed phenomenal success and encouraged commuters to stop driving and start pedaling within the city center. One hundred bike rental stations are conveniently located near major transit hubs. Subscribers simply pick up one of Bicing’s 1500 cycles and zip past stalled traffic to pick up groceries and run other quick errands. Bikes are outfitted with a carrier, a bell and light, and are easily adjustable to match your size.

Source: Carectomy

Labels: conservation, human-powered

Professor Zhong Lin Wang of Georgia Tech has harnessed the power of nanowires to come up with materials that can convert kinetic energy into electrical current. The professor's main idea is to make clothing woven from these fibres that would allow your body's natural motion to power any electrical device you may be carrying.

His idea is for a shirt but there's no reason why it would have to be the human body's movement. Campers could harness electrical energy by the motion of the wind blowing on their tents or by trailing a kite made of these fibres.

The nanowires work on the piezoelectric effect which describes a property whereby materials create electric potential under physical stress. So far, Zhong Lin Wang has measured four millivolts from a 1cm fibre but he predicts that a metre square of such fabric could generate up to 80 milliwatts of power.

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Labels: electricity, human-powered