ESW's newest project is to host 1-2 hour workshops every month to make the organization more accessible to members who cannot commit to the bigger projects within ESW. This allows busier members to still gain a hands-on approach to sustainability.
We had a great time making solar cell phone chargers. It was even a sunny weekend so we were able to try them out after the workshop. Everyone got a little hands on experience with soldering and were at least introduced to the growing field of solar power technology. Our next step will probably be to invite all of the participants back for a followup workshop to talk more about solar technology and to add diodes to our solar chargers so they don't drain the battery of the cell phones if there is any cloud cover.
For instructions and a list of materials you can visit the instructables website where we got the idea from:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Solar-Powered-Cell-Phone-Charger/
Projects
View all as a brief list
SunEdison and ESW nationals have formed a strategic partnership to support the significant expansion of renewable energy generation, creative improvements in power storage, and integrated resource management and microgrids. One motivation for this partnership is the recognition that 1.5 billion people currently live without access to electricity, and providing access to this basic resource can help spur sustainable economic and social growth. To this end, the National Office of ESW, through a generous gift from SunEdison, has provided grants to ESW chapters to develop technologies and applications for such off-grid environments. ESW Cornell was awarded one of these grants in February of 2012.
People all over the world make a living as small individual business owners or entrepreneurs. Globally, the products and services they provide vary, but small, off-grid establishments where these entrepreneurs can conduct their daily business selling goods, food, and services is a universal need. Important aspects of this kind of infrastructure are their sustainability, economy, and portability. Specifically, food vendors are a major element of any society. It doesn’t matter if someone is wandering the streets of Mumbai, rushing for a quick lunch break in New York City, or strolling down the quiet sidewalks of Cornell – sooner or later they will pass by a vendor peddling edible wares. Our proposal serves to address the need for a portable, economically and environmentally sustainable infrastructure where food venders can prepare and sell their fares. Specifically, we propose to create a solar-powered, manually propelled kiosk that uses a hot plate to make crepes to sell as a fundraising device for our local chapter.
As a chapter of ESW our project will not only adhere to but also expand upon our national vision, mission, and goals. By investigating, experimenting, and implementing a new type of technology to serve a basic human need we will foster interest in environmental, social, and economic sustainability in our team members as well as the community our product serves. It will also provide us with an opportunity to collaborate with other chapters, professionals, and industries and encourage a sense of unity and community.
ESW acquired a diesel powered van and converted it so that it runs on vegetable oil. Although the conversion is complete, there is still maintenance work to be done on the vehicle. This includes some engine work as well as some design work, both on the interior and the exterior.
Because the van only runs off of clean oil, our current goal is to be able to filter waste oil so that the van can use waste oil ideally from the campus dining halls. With this in mind, the Veggie Van team will be designing a waste vegetable oil filtration system.
Our end goal is to use the van to take ESW members on trips, but also serve as an educational tool as to how waste vegetable oil can be used as fuel.
Our mission is to improve and optimize solar oven designs in order to provide the third world with a cheap, sustainable, easy alternative to wood fired cooking. We are partnered with Grupo Fenix, an organization at the Universidad Nacional de Ingeneria in Managua, Nicaragua, and Las Mujeres Solares de Totogalpa, a women's collective in Sabana Grande, Nicaragua. Grupo Fenix works in rural areas to develop, implement and publicize renewable, sustainable solutions to energy needs in rural Nicaragua. Las Mujeres Solares de Totogalpa has worked with Grupo Fenix building and using solar cookers and dryers and has recently opened a Solar Restaurant, in which the food is prepared with solar cookers and other alternative energy cooking methods, including use of electricity from photovoltaic solar arrays and gas from bio-digested manure. Sabana Grande is in a region suffering from deforestation. The use of Solar Ovens reduce the need for women to spend hours of their day gathering cooking fuels and helps reduce the health risks from fires used for cooking and the smoke from open fires in the cooking areas, frequently within the house. The Solar Cooker Team works to evolve the cooker design in use in Nicaragua and increase the use of Solar Ovens. The team visited Las Mujeres and Grupo Fenix this spring in Sabana Grande during spring break.
UIESW is helping to design and install rain gardens across the University of Iowa campus. The rapid development of campuses and cities across the country has caused a substantial increase in stormwater runoff from impervious surfaces. Working with the UI Office of Sustainability, UI Facilities Management, and the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, UIESW is working to develop a sustainable stormwater management plan for the University of Iowa. As part of that plan, UIESW will be designing and constructing rain gardens at several locations throughout campus. UIESW will work to identify and evaluate potential rain garden sites, design the rain gardens for each site, complete construction of the rain gardens, and develop a maintenance plan to ensure the rain gardens will continue to work properly. UIESW hopes to complete 2-3 rain gardens each semester.
The main goal of UI-ESW's K-12 Outreach Program is to get kids fired up about engineering and sustainability. We have different Learning Modules that are geared towards different age groups, and everyone in our organization is trained to use them so that when an opportunity arises anyone can grab the kit and go- confident that all the learning materials are inside. Many of our demonstrations are for Go Girls! events or STEM Days aimed at getting middle school students interested in pursuing science. Research has shown that experiences in middle school can 'make or break' a students’ desire to do so, and this is especially true in young girls. We have a strong partnership with the College of Engineering's outreach program, and are called upon often to work with students around Iowa City and Eastern Iowa. Currently, we are in the process of writing a grant to secure funding to purchase LEGO Educational Kits that include a generator, solar cells and a power meter so we can expand our library of Learning Module. And who can resist LEGOs?!
ESW - UCSD is doing a feasibility study for renewable energy in San Diego. We will be studying Wind, Ocean, Biofuels, Solar, and Nuclear and finding out how they could be applied here.
There will be 4 different sessions. Students are broken into groups by energy source and will make presentations at 3 of the sessions.
Day 1: Introduction (April 11th)
This session will be dedicated to explaining expectations, forming teams, assigning different energy sources, and giving resources to guide students throughout the workshop .
Day 2: Technology (April 25th)
The second day will be your presentations based on the science of how the particular energy source works. What arethe recent advancements in renewable energy technology?
Day 3: Energy Use (May 9th)
Students will give presentations based on how their energy source is used in San Diego and where it fits into the growing field as a whole—how much energy production is viable and what is its environmental impact?
Day 4: Business (May 23rd)
Students will give presentations on which companies are currently involved with a certain form of renewable energy and how they fit into the energy market.
ESW-Pitt students developed and taught a 6 week course (2hrs/week) on the basics of sustainability to low-income middle and high school students in an after-school program. Topics covered were the 3 pillars of sustainability, food, energy (both supply and use), water, waste, and basic design ideas.
The Human Powered Electricity Generation project is formed around an independent study course CEE3090 HPEG. The goal of the project is to design and build human powered electricity generation prototypes using a variety of mechanical inputs and generating power to be used directly and/or stored for future use. We will look into various mechanical input systems, generator/alternator combinations and batteries. The human power inputs will be a bicycle and a rowing machine; the generators will be one home made model and one manufactured model.
The idea behind the Human Powered Electricity Generator is to install kiosks of human powered generators in developing countries, specifically poor areas with high rates of unemployment and no electricity supply. People can come to the kiosks, generate electricity, and be paid according to the units of electricity they produce. The generated electricity will then be sold to surrounding households at a rate that covers the cost of paying people who generated the electricity in the first place. The HPG team is investigating how to best achieve electricity generation greater than 500 watts an hour.
The HPEG project has developed into an independent study course CEE3090 HPEG which can be taken for 1-3 credits in either the fall or spring semesters. The main objective of the new course is designing and building human powered electricity generation prototypes using a variety of mechanical inputs and generating power to be used directly and/or stored for future use. Current content includes looking into various mechanical input systems such as a bicycle and rowing machines, generator/alternator combinations (one homemade and one manufactured model) and batteries.
