abstract:

In buiding Solar Time, we hoped to create an object which would raise people's awareness to potential sustainable energy resources. It is commonplace that when one faces technical energy figures and numbers, they are difficult to grasp. What are 100W exactly? Or how much energy does a 100-Watt-Hour lightbulb take? How do you grasp an "amount" of energy? We decided that the best solution is to provide a clear and simple means of comparison. When the viewer is shown known electrical appliances instead of wattage, the energy level is much clearer and easier to grasp. Hence, the potential is substantialy made clearer. Therefore we devised a scale of electrical appliances, ranging from a mobile phone to Danny Rozin's Wooden Mirror (which was the most power consuming object on the ITP floor).

ITP owns one 80 watt solar panel located on the roof of the Tisch building. Using our Roof-Link network, we logged data regarding the amount of electricity produced by the solar panel on the roof. The Solar Time object accesses the logs and utilizes a physical display to present the accumulated amount of solar energy per time of day adjacent to the accumulated local power consumption (specifically a corner of the ITP lounge). The meters side by side provide a demonstration of the potential possibilities to integrate more renewable energy sources within our environment. They also provide a simple way for viewers to realize their daily energy-level consumption. Low-power, mechanical meters point to the amount of electricity converted from the solar panel, as well as the amount consumed in a corner of the lounge. Each minute, the meters refresh their state and physical reflect it through their movement.

presented:

ITP Spring 2007 show

angela pablo & gilad lotan

The ITP rooflink is a network extention. Even though ITP owns a solar panel situated on the rooftop of the Tisch building, there is no network or electricity plug access up there. In order to log sensor readings from the solar panel, we needed to create our own means of passing the data from the 12th floor of the Tisch building down to the 4th floor where ITP is located. Since we had no access to electricity on the 12th floor, we made use of the energy coming from the solar panel during the day.

In order to pass sensor readings from the roof to the 4th floor we built a wireless mesh network. Using Xbee radios, we passed data from the solar panel circuit, down the Tisch stairwell, to the 4th floor. Once received on the 4th floor, this data was logged into our database (via an Xport). This data is then accessed by the Solar Time clock in the ITP lounge.