The designers at New York City based Fluxxlab studio have come up with the unique idea of creating sustainable energy from otherwise wasted human energy from the revolving doors that abound in a huge number of buildings across cities. Named the Revolution Door, this project is based on the concept of a turbine spinning somewhere deep inside a hydroelectric dam or within wind turbine to generate renewable electricity.
Now for the structure and mechanism. Sustainable energy can be generated from any existing revolving door. It contains three parts – a redesigned central core replacing that of any existing or new revolving door, a mechanical/electrical system that harnesses human energy and redistributes electricity to an output, and an output device that maps the harnessed energy. By capturing the kinetic energy produced by constant use of the revolving door, free electricity can be provided to the installation site. This project has been made possible by funding from the Eyebeam art and technology center as well as support from New York University sustainability fund.
So far so good. But the effectiveness of the idea is in great doubt. First of all, not too much energy would be produced by humans using the revolving doors. Moreover, installing the generator to trap the energy would involve some amount of energy use too. We just hope that the engineers involved in this project have taken care of these.
The prototype at the Eyebeam exhibition in March might throw some more light on the feasibility of the project.
Source: Inhabitat
