Billionaire entrepreneur Manoj Bhargava has a philanthropist side project, Billions in Change, which could well be set to change the lives of half the world’s population. Aside from giving 90% of his money to the Giving Pledge charity, he is also very heavily involved and passionate developing approaches to address issues of poverty and energy resource equity through Free Electric.
The focus of Billions in Change is “to build a better future by creating and implementing solutions to serious problems facing the world in the areas of water, energy and health.” This project has produced a series of quite remarkable innovations that aim to address these issues and increase the quality of life for the world’s poorest people.
Free Electric Bike
Billions of Change looks at three major global problems: Health, Water and Energy. To address the issue of energy – the project’s website outlines their solution as “The Free Electric machine gives people the power to generate electricity themselves – pollution free. The machine is small, light and simple. Here’s how it works: A person pedals a hybrid bicycle. The bicycle wheel drives a flywheel, which turns a generator, which charges a battery. Pedaling for one hour yields electricity for 24 hours with no utility bill, and no exhaust, no waste.”
Manoj’s company makes some impressive claims:
- They will be able to produce these bikes in India for under $200 per unit – making it much more affordable for local councils, communities, schools and NGOs in developing countries – especially if resources and finances are pooled and shared.
- 25 bikes have already been installed at no charge to a sample of energy-poor households, schools, and small businesses in Indian villages close to Lucknow, Amethi and Raebareli to assess functionality.
- Manoj has collaborated “with a local distributor and non-profit group to help with assembly and to train others on how to assemble and troubleshoot the bike. We’re also conducting pre/post surveys with recipients to learn their perspectives on the benefits of the bike, as well as to get their feedback about how we can improve it” .
- Later this year, there is a pilot plan to implement 10,000 of these bikes in India.
It is quite exciting to think that such a contraption has the potential to literally revolutionize the lives of so many people – the fact that it is not a conception or theoretical model, but has actually been manufactured – is a massive step towards production for greater practical utility and for streamlining the design for cheaper and easier implementation.
This is yet another innovation similar to the bicycle-washing machine from a previous post, which seems to show that India and bicycle innovations have a very strong affinity for each other to create positive change.
Full Documentary
There is a post on Treehugger which gives some more details about this project – and it was there that I also saw that there is a full Billions of Change documentary (45 min) which outlines Free Electric, and also details some other inventive approaches that his Lab called Stage 2 Innovations has also created, such as the Rain Maker seawater car, and the geothermal Limitless Energy resource among other designs.
When I first heard of all these fantastic plans and things to save our humans! There has not been any of the bikes available, will they be available again? And does our cost still include sending one free to a country in need? I love that! Mary