Nuclear energy

Is nuclear a green energy source?

It's quite interesting to observe that a lot of debate is going on out there whether nuclear can be considered as a clean (hence green) technology or not.

It's known that nuclear power does not produce green house gases as a direct consequence of power production, which means it can possibly provide a good alternative to conventional energy sources like fossil fuels.

However, dealing with used nuclear fuel remains a major concern. So how green is nuclear technology?

Food for thought.

Vaccine fridge & rechargeable lamp

I was having a look at some of the services that can be attached to the NSN system.

The power requirement of the vaccine refrigerators I found are on the higher side of the max power available from the solar generator.

The rating of one of the small-size portable fridges is 12/24V DC - 3.1A 110V AC. Here is the link:

http://www.gemrefrigeratorcompany.com/vaccine_port_mt27.php?f=vaccine

We were thinking of rechargeable lamps also. Such appliances consume very little power and seem to be well-suited for our system. A typical rechargeable lantern with U-tube lamp that operates with just 7W is shown below -

Meeting on 22 March

I organize the main points raised in our meeting today.

• Asking our mentor Lionel about the following issues -

- How we can access the Design Factory facility

- what are the intended users of our manual

• About having a clear idea of our next move, each of the group members can address any idea disparities before we go on.
• Adding an illustrative poster or 3D design about secondary services(like water purification) supported by our system
• About creating a poster with 'real feel', more illustrative of the practical installation
• Mannual - Adding more technical detail explanation for users in need of further study about our system

-

• on contacting TAIK students for a more professional poster and video clip designs that will be used in NSN SEC...
• Pentti already took poster design using 3DMax
• After a response from our mentor Lionel, the tools in a ''a technicians' toolbox'' are enough from Design Factory.
• Testing our manual if its easy to understand for the intended users.
• on using bolt with wing nut and washer for attaching the solar panel with the sail....suggestion.

Sustainable Buildings in Finland - Eco Viiki Case

Today's, Sustainable Buildings in Finland, Eco Viiki case, showed me how sustainability projects can account for the factors related to it, directly or indirectly. He included how Motiva is working with

• individuals (in changing energy habits),
• companies,
• constructors,
• governmental ministries (though motiva is also gov't owned)
• new related technologies
• other similar instituitions

The two main points raised were of course finally explained by Marko, Time and Change. Its is not unexpected through time, pretty new technologies, cheap and more easy will come to serve in place of projects like Sustainable Building, and infact our project - Innovative Solar Power for Remote Communities. But starting with an inclusive and best design will not end up too costy for change as well.

Although most of Motiva's projects may not be achieved in short term, they have set some standards, as a success criteria - the concept of certificates, that is another good point for those working in project implementation.

Manual

Hi guys,
I found the following manual precise and informative, please take a look
http://www.omega.com/manuals/manualpdf/M4384.pdf

On user manual and Report

In addition to what Manyazewal has posted, we can add the following points

1. General Information about the product
2. Allowed(authorized applications)
3. Specifications
4. Usage instruction
5. Installation Instruction (can include illustrative figures)
6. Disclaimer
7. Reference Materials (for technical personel who want to know more about the product)

In our report we can include what issues we considered in writing our user manual, like

• for what type of users
• major tasks in installation
• the method of writing we used (for instance,IF THEN, for troubleshooting during malfunctioning)
• the number of steps
• the total estimated time
• etc

Mid-term results & user-manual tips

I just checked our midterm report card.The results we got for our project plan and the workshop are quite encouraging!

There is a note on group work which says "it's good to check that each team member has equal role, influence and workload in the group". I guess the workloads are evenly distributed among the team members and the fact that we are reviewing individual tasks every week will ensure that it will be the case till the end of the project.

On another topic, I was looking for tips on how to prepare the user manual. Here are some general guidelines -

• Make sure the instructions actually map on to the product in all respects.
• Include a one-page quick start guide.
• Present instructions as step-by-step procedures.
• Tell the user what functions there are and what they are for.
• Write the user manual in synch with the product's development timeline — not under pressure of shipping deadlines (this is an interesting point!).
• User-test the product and the user manual with real users (including disabled users) (perhaps not applicable at the moment).

We can use these tips as guidelines for shaping our user manual.

March 17th Internal meeting

Hello colleagues,

I have summarized the points we wanted to focus on (in the next few weeks) -

• monitor closely the progress of our report (pre-submission April 22nd)
• Building the prototype - contact Design Factory (Pasi will look for the options)
• Internal deadline for getting a decision on using the proposed solar sail - Next Monday
• Auto-CAD drawings - to produce the instructions for the assembly of the solar sail & fabric
• Possible types of malfunctioning & required troubleshooting? - brainstorming needed
• Posters preparation for final presentation. What about SEC? May be leaflets will be better?
• Ask Pamela to facilitate contact with TaiK for producing professional-looking posters & video-clips
• Anymore inputs for the possible types of additional services? What about the small fee to be paid by the villagers for the services they receive (like mobile phone and lamp charging)?

By the way the last point works quite well in my country. In some locations there are small kiosks offering mobile phone charging for a small fee for people on the go.

See you next Monday at our internal meeting -12:15.

VERY interesting video! and link to our "rival's" webpage!

Hi all. Just browsing web after reading some chapters from the book "Sustainability challenges and solutions at the BOP".

FIRST, here is quite interesting video about Suntrica's products and India's VNL.
http://www.telesemana.com/tv/detalle.php?id=205

THEN here are the homepages of India's VNL, PLEASE check it out - SIMILAR to our project, except the fact that they are using traditional panels!?
("Low-power — at less than 100W per Base Station, the entire system can be run on solar power. No power grid or generator necessary.")
http://www.vnl.in/ ->solutions->rural

Workshop reflections

So, the much anticipated WORKSHOPS have come & gone! Very much to everyone's relief I must say (specially the few hours just before our workshop felt like eternity:)).

The lessons learnt from our workshop will be kept in mind and they will definitely have a positive impact on our final output. I think all the teams did well in their workshops.

The two things all teams had in common were applying the practice of participatory methods and good time management.

The feedbacks we got from the audience were quite encouraging & in my view our workshop went smoothly according to plan. Well, there were a few things that could have been done like engaging the senior guests in the discussions, which could have allowed us to gather more expert views.

Overall it was a rewarding experience and hats off to all parties who contributed to the success of both workshop days!