In an environment where the electrical grid comes alive two hours a day, deploying any electronics is a bit of a challenge. A typical mobile phone charger draws about 5 watts, while a OLPC XO-1 laptop charger pulls in 21 watts when charging an empty battery. For communal mobile phone charging, our house has a line of power sockets right outside the front door, where people can just come by and plug in their phone. For laptops, we’ll have to find a different solution.
Front verandah, where the power outlets are located. The room to the left will be used as a XO "reading room".
As for the sources of power, we have solar panels, a diesel generator (the Lister beast is awakened only when needed) and we used to have these really cool biogas digestors, but now that we don’t have any cows or buffaloes, the digestors are sitting idle. There are simple mods that can be applied to gasoline generators and then be fed biogas, but without cows, its only an idea right now.
Diesel generator powered by a Lister engine
Biodigestor aka Gobar gas plant in our backyard
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