Off grid power
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NOTE: The contents of this page are not set in stone, and are subject to change! This page is a draft in active flux ... |
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This page is an overview and discussion of a project in progress. As such, it's virtually guaranteed to contain incomplete, rapidly changing, and possibly inaccurate information that's in the process of being revised. Keep in mind that most of the volunteers on this project are just that - volunteers - with no official connection to OLPC, just a desire to help out and a tendency to ask lots of questions of people in the OLPC office. Don't take anything on this page as fact about what OLPC the organization is doing unless you verify it with the folks who are actually employed there!
Introduction
Many of the areas that OLPC is interested in deploying into do not have a power grid to use to charge the laptop and run the school server. These sites provide interesting challenges for a successful deployment. The primary option for most of these places is to use some sort of enviroment powered renewable energy source.
Human power options exist but they are "literally" a lot of work. Recharging one of the batteries requires between 15-20 Watthours of power depending on the depth of discharge. 20Wh may not seem like much (its only 17 calories) but in practice its a surprising amount of work when coming from a human powered source.
To provide consistent power things like the school server or VSAT equipment OLPC needs to look at options like solar, wind, water or even really creative stuff like Cow Power.
We're looking for individuals and communities with grassroots groups that want to help with testing and developing non-AC charging solutions for the laptops, particularly off-grid ones. OLPC's Boston office doesn't have space for this kind of testing - there's no roof for solar panels, and they're only exposed to Bostonian weather conditions, for starters, so the grassroots community has to step up.
IMSA has offered to help set up a pilot testbed for the experiment. Once the logistics of such testing labs are worked out, other groups can - and should - follow. Initially, such test sites would gather data and make sure the right information was being collected, then monitor, log, and analyze performance for different designs under a wide variety of conditions.
Read on for more information on this project and how you can get involved.
Scenarios
- Single XO and 5W solar panel
- Multi-X0s and many 5W solar panels.
- Small school and the Multi_channel_battery_charger with no extra batteries.
- Small school and the Multi_channel_battery_charger and 2x batteries.
- Larger school with many Multi_channel_battery_chargers and 2x batteries.
How to help
This project is a collaboratively organized undertaking, so the best way to get started is to just dive in and introduce yourself. Since the physical lab is likely to be based at IMSA, discussion occasionally takes place on the #olpc-imsa IRC channel.
Help wanted
If you are interested in helping, you can help! We need people from all disciplines and experiences. If, after reading this page, you're still unsure of how to get involved, contact User:ScottSwanson or User:Ahw - both IMSA community members and non-IMSAns are welcome!
If you want help with your part of this project, you can post specific tasks below. Please detail what kind of help you are looking for here, a timeframe or expiration date for the posting, along with contact information or how people who are interested should get involved.
Improve this page!
We are looking for volunteers to help improve this project page and keep it up to date. If you see how you can make something more coherent or organized, please jump in and edit; if there's a resource you think would be useful to this project, please add it. If there's something about the project itself you have ideas about, you can add it to this page directly, or start a discussion on the talk page. You do not need to contact anyone about this job - just do it! This posting never expires.
Events
Upcoming
If you have an upcoming event (meeting, hackathon, etc.) related to this project, please list it here along with details of how to participate. Once an event is over, please move it to the Past Events section, below.
Past
Activities related to this project that have already occurred, for archival purposes.