Multi-source mobile solar power station suitable for grasslands
As the anti-nuclear outcry grows louder, the government keeps insisting that without nuclear power Taiwan will face electricity shortages. To break the nuclear-power myth, Tainan Community University taught its students to DIY, mounting solar panels on wheeled wooden crates and a tricycle. They made their first appearance during the Sunflower Movement at Cheng Kung University's Nanrong Square, supporting students who had no electricity, and even powered a whole concert; every part can be bought online, at a cost of only 30,000 yuan.
Chao Jui-kuang, a researcher with Tainan Community University's environmental action group, said they will also promote wind and hydroelectric power in the future, hoping to give the public a more diverse imagination of electricity and not to accept Taipower's word wholesale.
Mobile solar power stations power a grassland concert
As former DPP chairman Lin Yi-hsiung's hunger strike entered its fifth day, anti-nuclear groups called on the public to sit in at Ketagalan Boulevard at 4 p.m. that day to show their determination for a nuclear phase-out. But the Ministry of Economic Affairs, which champions the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, estimated that if Taiwan does not build nuclear power, there will be a risk of power shortages within 5 years. The anti-nuclear group "Green Citizens' Action Alliance" countered with Bureau of Energy data, showing that Taiwan's average annual electricity demand growth from 2013 to 2030 is only 1.41%; with no Fourth Nuclear Power Plant and no life extensions for the First, Second and Third, alternative energy-saving solutions can still be found, and there will be no shortage.
Tainan Community University, which has long paid attention to environmental issues, was the first to respond, beginning research into alternative energy five years ago and successfully assembling three mobile solar power stations this year, while also teaching its students how to DIY.
Chao Jui-kuang, a researcher at Tainan Community University who is in charge of promoting the course, said some people may think assembling solar panels is difficult, but in fact manufacturers only need to prepare five kinds of materials: solar panels, a charge-discharge controller, a battery, a voltage converter and wires. All of them can be bought online, and manufacturers provide illustrated instructions; just follow the instructions to connect them, put them in whatever box you want according to your needs, and you can easily complete your own independent power system and achieve zero Taipower use, with a solar panel lasting as long as 20 years.
Tainan Community University mounted two solar panels on wooden crates fitted with rollers. During the Sunflower Movement in March, when students went to Cheng Kung University's Nanrong Square to give speeches, there was no power system nearby, and everything relied on these two solar stations to keep going. Rolled out from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. to soak up the sun, at night they could supply the electricity needed for 1 microphone, 4 LED lights and one small desk lamp. Another was mounted on a tricycle, intended to travel around to promote diverse electricity.
Chao Jui-kuang said that, calculating on the basis of 80% battery storage capacity, one power station converting to 110 volts of voltage delivers 1 kilowatt per hour, which is no problem for powering a printer. The community university also once successfully used a power station to hold a grassland concert. For villages and parks where electricity is inconvenient, mobile solar power is like an oasis in the desert; one community university student was so delighted upon seeing it that he said he wanted to put one in his farmland, so that when his mother came she would have an electric fan to cool herself with.
(This article was funded by the Jianzhen Environmental Education Foundation for personnel expenses, but the foundation does not interfere at all with news topic selection or interview writing, ensuring news independence.)