Slashdot Mirror
Using Gym Rats' Body Power to Generate Electricity
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "A Hong Kong health club is hoping that a car battery, some StairMasters and dozens of gym rats can help ease the world's energy problems. It is just one of a wave of projects that are trying to tap the power of the human body, the Wall Street Journal reports. The article explains the impetus behind the project: 'The human power project at California Fitness was set in motion by Doug Woodring, a 41-year-old extreme-sports fanatic and renewable-energy entrepreneur, who pitched the experiment to the gym's management last May. "I've trained my whole life, and many megawatts have been wasted," says Mr. Woodring, who has worked out at the Hong Kong gym for years. "I wanted to do something with all that sweat."'"
Yes. Try generating 200W of electrical power with your body, and see how long you can keep it up.
I see what you and the other fellow are saying. I remember that in Expo 86, there was a claptraption, where people would sit on stationary bikes, and pedal away, to light up some light bulbs. It took much effort. I'm sure that the system could have been made more efficient with flourescent lamps, and better gearing.
I do have to wonder, though, wouldn't the electrical savings eventually pay for the generators? Or maybe they could come up with some kind of system to turn a fan, so that there won't be a need for air conditioners.
testing out my trending skills
What if they started "paying" (like 1 buck per somethingsomething) people for producing energy. they could store and resell it and some people would have a psychological incentive to excersise.
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
putting a generator on a bicycle that is capable of say charging a cell phone or a laptop battery. Perfect for people such as myself who commute by bicycle anyway. Would that be feasible? How much do you think it would cost to retrofit a bike to do that?
Monstar L
been there, done that:
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/02/27/biodiesel_fr
Are you working on the assumption that treadmills require electricity? Because I can tell you from experience that they do not. My grandparents had an antique treadmill that still worked 10 years ago (I have no idea what happened to it after they died), and there was no electricity involved.
If your merely stating that treadmills are not as efficient at generating electricity (or if there is some joke I'm just not getting, which is quite possible), then I won't disagree with you on that one.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
mmm...does this sound kind of like a Matrix (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133093/) type beginning to power generation? First we go with treadmills and cycle bikes and then move on to people who are undesirable (prisons, homeless, etc) and then further the trend... Don't like it.
enjoy it while you have it - for it may be gone soon.
If you feeling a bit out of shape and bored of sitting behind a desk, you can come and help me build some massive towers out of stone blocks. If the convection towers were built from stone, it will take some up-front human labor, but in the end you can say you put together part of a megawatt renewable power station that in the worst case will leave people wondering what we were up to a few centuries from now like we do about Stonehenge.
I've been riding a bike for a living for the past 16 years, frequently hauling loads of 600 lbs or more. IMHO, human power has not been given the serious consideration it deserves. There are plenty of applications where human power could be usefully applied. For instance, there are lots of little devices, like LED task lights, digital cameras, etc., powered by 2-4 AAA batteries. A person riding on a stationary bike could easily charge four 1000 mAh batteries like these in a half-hour workout. As electronic appliances get smaller and more efficient, the number of devices that can be practically powered by human power is only going to increase. Inkjet printers, scanners, and laptops are already within the capability of being powered by a fit person. While the human body can't practically generate enough energy to do tasks that require significant amounts of heat (e.g., cooking), it is very effective at producing enough heat to keep itself warm. People often wonder how I can stand doing my job outside when the temperature is well below zero and I'm only wearing a few light layers of clothing. They forget that the human body is only about 25% efficient at converting energy to work, so hauling a heavy load produces sufficient heat to keep me comfortable.
This reminds me of a recent blog post I made...
A lot of people are driven by an inner need to do physical exertion on a regular basis. Gym memberships are full of such people. It's a rewarding pursuit to get up and do something physically active.
So there are all these people, engaging in utterly useless labour. They're picking up heavy things and putting them down over and over, running on treadmills, that sort of thing.
And I get to thinking... that we have all this stuff that could be done around here. Roads, housing, bridges, new infrastructure that could be built, that sort of thing. Stuff that benefits the community.
There are all these workplace safety people out there, specialized in making work safe, ergonomics, best practices, that sort of thing.
And there are all these physical therapists out there, designing exercise programs for people that are focused on being rewarding for the individual to participate in, where they're happily doing this labour out of a sense of enlightened self-interest.
It gets me to thinking...
If you organized community projects in a way where as many aspects of the tasks involved as possible were designed by a physical trainer to be purely beneficial to the individuals involved...
If one of the organizational mandates was that these tasks would not require specialized knowledge of workers who just showed up to get a workout...
If you made it so it would be brain dead easy for them to use the knowledge they have of their workout needs to find which tasks to do...
Could you create community projects that would be just as good for you as going to the gym?
Maybe managed by a core group of paid workers with expert knowledge?
If you had flexible time frames, if you had a complete lack of privately vested interest in the project and drove it purely at a community level so no one felt suckered when they participated but rather like they were getting an enjoyable workout first and making their neighborhood better as a nice side benefit...
Would people participate?
It would be interesting to see some people with more expert knowledge in those areas than I have give it a try...
-1 Uncomfortable Truth