And preasured it was.
The first part of the brief was all about establishing contacts within the university. We were asked to find and chat with "an expert" in a chosen field. I spoke to Dr. Malcolm Horner and he gave me some valuable insights.
2 weeks in, and the usual 100 ideas sketchbook.
I decided to focus in on one of my ideas; to harness the energy that is generated by children at a playpark. My reasoning for this is an insight gained from Dr. Malcolm Horner. He mentioned that our attitudes towards sustainability HAD to change. He was even doing this through the SCC.
I liked the social change that this would induce; children would not consume energy to be entertained, instead they would be making it. Of course, they would not be expected to do this for free. They would be payed based directly on how much electricity they generated and it would either be stored or fed directly into streetlighting.
Playparks in their current state are not designed to generate electricity so a subtle re-design would be needed. However the playpark asthetic is an essential part of a playpark so this would need to be approached carefully. It was also important to consider such things as vandalism, and safety. I worked with a fellow student to do some initial research on 2009 playparks:
The roundabouts really interested me. It seemed the technology in wind turbines would directly translate into something that could be pushed round. With rough calculations, I calculated that if a roundabout was linked to a generator 1/50th the size of a wind turbine (10kg) and spun for 10 minutes, at an average of 20rpm, a child could earn as much as 50p. I worked on some other pieces of equiptment that also required the user to spin a generator.
I mocked up this "Energy Park" in solidworks to get the feel for it:
And our final hand in was a one great image. Mine shows a child spinning a roundabout to generate both electricity and pocket money. She is enjoying herself and excited at the prospect of earning money. The collection point for her earnings is in the foreground:
I would like to revisit this project at the end of the semester and pollish it up a bit, however I am happy at the level of finished achieved in 6 weeks.
