Solar, peddle-powered Wi-Fi phones
Monday, September 12th, 2005Here is an inspiring story of how a handful of villages in western Uganda, which have never had phones before, are now being equipped with Wi-Fi-based wireless VoIP phone systems that… get this… are powered by a combination of solar panels and stationary bicycle peddling.
“Complete with 70-watt solar panels and a bicycle generator — which can provide power in the event of no sunlight — each installation costs only $1,800, including the outdoor Wi-Fi 802.11b antenna,” according to Wired.com. “Calls between the villages are routed by the hub, and cost nothing — like dialing another room from a hotel PBX… Calls destinated for outside the village network go over a satellite link between the hub and the main Ugandan telephone exchange.”
The company — actually, it’s a non-profit organization — that put the system together is called Inveneo Inc., which was created to “strengthen communities, bridge families and save lives in remote villages through information and communication technology.”
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Tyler Hamilton is editor-in-chief of Corporate Knights magazine and a business columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the clean technology and green energy market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper.
