Mission
Access to electricity is a critical issue in many parts of the world, such as sub-Saharan Africa. Most villages are remote and beyond the reach of electrical infrastructure, yet close to flowing water. Our technology could open a vast number of rivers around the world for carbon-free electrical power generation ideal for remote “off grid” communities. Our debris resilient design would solve the main challenge faced by other river generator systems, debris impact and damage.
Our approach could replace fossil fuel generators by using the steady flow of rivers to generate constant power, unlike solar and wind which are intermittent and require petroleum backup systems. The replacement of a single 5 kW gasoline generator could eliminate CO2 generation by 69 metric tons annually, not including fuel delivery emissions and expense.
Emissions Impact
Our generator could eliminate reliance on gasoline and diesel generators and the tremendous resources needed to deliver fuel to remote locations. As many remote communities are located by rivers, this could be an ideal solution for small baseload power generation, with huge cumulative CO2 reduction realized over many villages and small communities.
• One gallon of gasoline can generate 9 kg of CO2 and our initial single generator device would generate 5-kW for 24 hours every day.
• A typical gasoline generator uses approximately 21 gallons of gasoline daily.
• This translates into a reduction of 7665 gallons per year, or about 69 metric tons of CO2 per device per year.
• An array of hydro generators in one community producing 20 to 40 kW could reduce CO2 by 552 metric tons per year.
• This does not include the fuel required to deliver the gasoline to the remote location.
• We also plan a double generator with a 10-kW output per unit, at about 140 metric tons per device annually.
• To meet the 500 million metric tons reduction goal, we would need to displace approximately 3.6 million 5 kW generators, which should be feasible since arrays of our generators could provide significant reductions, especially given the 24 hour per day generation due to constant river flow.