As bike sharing becomes more and more popular in cities around the world, innovations in technology may make the systems a vital element of the urban landscape. Indeed, rather than simply a mobility tool, biking could become a power source — at least according to industrial designer Chi-Yu Chen, working at the Royal College of Art.
Mr. Chen’s bike design is innovative even as it uses standard technologies. By adding batteries to bikes and incorporating a dynamo in the wheel, the vehicles become mobile power stations, with electricity being created as commuters turn the wheels and apply power to the brakes. When cyclists return bikes to a station as part of a public rental scheme, the batteries would empty out their charge, moving the power into the general grid. That electricity, in turn, could be used to power sustainable transportation systems like electric hybrid buses and third rail-powered subways. Bikers would get a transit ticket price reduction immediately added to their fare smart cards based on how much electricity they contribute.
The end result? Human power for clean-running public transportation.
There are two reasons why such a system is unlikely to be implemented in the next few years: batteries are valuable, and would likely be stolen from bikes; and the amount of power generated would make a tiny dent in the power used by heavy-duty transit, making fare reductions tiny.
Yet with a well-designed system, created to be vandal-proof, such electricity-creating bikes could well serve a purpose. MIT researchers have created a “Copenhagen Wheel” that adds a motor powered by braking to bikes; with such a system, bikes become semi-electric and therefore more simple to use for people who aren’t able-bodied enough to use a normal bike at all times.
Just as important, the idea that everyday activities can aid in producing electricity doesn’t seem that far off. Already, plenty of trams and metros push electricity back into the grid when they brake through regenerative systems. Up-and-down escalators and elevators could be weighed against one another to power one another and save electricity. Short-distance transit links could use cable-car technologies to circulate energy flow in a closed-loop system, such as is already planned for the Oakland Airport Connector. These technologies would reinforce the concept that the energy system is an interconnected web, reducing electricity usage and cleaning the planet through sustainable transport.
Image above: Hybrid Squared, from Yanko Design