Electric Bike Shop Provides Solar Charging Station!
Jun 26, 2012
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Electric Bike Solar Charging Station at the New Wheel! Sol Design Lab makes the SolarPump charging station.
Electric bike shop, The New Wheel, in San Francisco recently installed a solar charging station in the front of the store to charge the shops bikes and allow customers to charge their e-bikes, smartphones, laptops, etc.
The cool thing about electric bikes is that they don’t take very much energy to get you around town. That makes charging via solar panels very feasible!
The “SolarPump” from Sol Design Lab is the kind of solar charging station that we could see at coffee shops and restaurants in the near future!
Here is the official press release from The New Wheel and Sol Design Lab:
The New Wheel announced their partnership with Sol Design Lab today on the Summer Solstice, unveiling the installation of a solar recharging station in front of their electric bike shop in Bernal Heights. The charging station is designed to charge bikes and start a dialog on forms of transportation that are clean, green, and much more fun than automobiles. The New Wheel will be using the SolarPumpTM to charge its fleet of test ride bikes, as well as offering free solar powered outlets to the public.
SolarPump solar charging station for electric bikes at The New Wheel.
The SolarPumpTM Charging Station will be at The New Wheel at 420 Cortland Avenue throughout the summer for the general public to charge their electric bicycles and mobile electronics. We invite people to visit The New Wheel to learn more about electric pedal assist bicycles that travel up to 65 miles per charge and cost just $.03 – $.15 cents to charge in a few hours. It takes only a single panel to charge a bike with a little help from the sun.
Beth Ferguson, director of Sol Design Lab, designed the station in 2010 with the help of Dallas Swindle, Maverick Solar and SXSW. The SolarPumpTM was created to help people re-imagine the future of carbon-free cities, using the reclaimed body of a 1950’s gas pump retrofitted with solar panels. The SolarPumpTM harnesses solar energy to charge any item using a standard electric plug. This charging station has been featured at: South by Southwest, Coachella, Maker Faire, Zero1 San Jose, SF Green Festival, Bioneers and the Hayes Valley Farm.
About The New Wheel
The New Wheel was founded in 2010 to retail the finest quality electric bikes available and help to transform the way we move ourselves. The New Wheel has grown from humble beginnings as a mobile electric bike shop delivering electric bikes to customers by electric bike to become the premier electric bike dealer in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 2012 The New Wheel opened doors to its new location in Bernal Heights, offering a full service shop for all bicycles, high quality urban transportation goods, and a large selection of pedal activated electric bikes from Europe and North America.
Installation of the solar charging station for electric bikes at The New Wheel.
About Sol Design Lab
Sol Design Lab is a design studio dedicated to the development of progressive solutions for urban sustainability. As society transitions from gas powered cars to electric vehicles, solar charging stations will be crucial for providing the modern urban commuter with independent mobility. Sol Design Lab has designed and prototyped solar-powered charging stations for electric vehicles and mobile electronics for use at festivals, business districts, university campuses, and city transportation networks. These eye- catching and educational charging stations create vital infrastructure for the integration of electric vehicles and renewable energy into future green cities.
Charging Station Highlights
- Created from reclaimed gas pumps and other recycled scrap metal
- Uses three 195 W Sanyo Solar Panels.
- Contains a 1100 Watt Inverter
- Outputs 110 Volts to a standard outlet
- Has a digital read out panel to show solar energy stored in the batteries and electricity used while charging mobile devices.
Press Contacts:
Beth Ferguson (Sol Design Lab)
[email protected]
www.soldesignlab.com
(512) 228-4877
Brett Eugene Thurber (The New Wheel)
[email protected]
www.newwheel.net
(415) 524-7362
End of press release
WOW! This is the stuff that gets me excited about the possibilities with electric bikes. Solar powered transportation is available now!
What do you think? Would you like to see more solar charging stations around your town or city? Would you consider installing a solar panel at your house to power your electric bike?
Please leave your comments in the section below.
Thanks!
-Pete
P.S. Don’t forget to join the Electric Bike Report community for updates from the electric bike world, plus ebike riding and maintenance tips!
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I work at a National Fusion Research Facility, hoping to in the next few decades power the world with clean energy. But my house is solar powered, so I can already say that my bikes are powered by nuclear fusion!
That’s great Dan! Thanks for sharing that.
Great article. Have already been thinking to put solar panels to power some things at home. Hopefully next year, the sooner the better. I also want to buy an Ebike but here in Peru there are some expensives ones (+ US$ 3300). Now conecting both ebike and solar panel for recharge it, the best idea. Seems like “El Nino” will appear this year in Peru and so more sunhours available this winter down here. Its already winter here but with lots of sun hours.
Jurgen, please keep us posted on the electric bike scene in Peru!
Baby steps…
E-Bike Indonesia will make one of that!
Solar Pump! Love it! We always try to solar charge all of our ebikes here, they seem to run so much better from a solar charge!
Can I just ask there, please, how much does it cost to make a solar station like that?
Thanks a lot in advance