A team from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm developed a series of solar-powered concepts that stimulate users to produce and store their own energy.
Besides having great innovative ideas, the team implements a new marketing strategy- free electricity!
The ‘User-friendly local electricity production’ project is part of the Green Leap initiative. Funded by Vinnova in collaboration with No Picnic Design and Custom El, the project has an aim to stimulate sustainable technology developments. The industrial designers at KTH are part of this project, and their task was to develop concepts that can be materialized and attract customers to the idea of self-generation of electricity.
The idea behind all these concepts is that people are better off investing in solar cells instead of paying their utility bills. The price a customer pays upfront is probably a bit more than the monthly ‘greeting’ from the electricity company, but within a matter of 10 years the solar panels pay for themselves. Not only that, typical panels come with 25 years of warranty, so as Teo Enlund, one of the designers at KTH points out, the customer gets a minimum of 15 years of free electricity.
Of course attractive ideas would help the designers even more, hence some of the concepts that they developed are so creative, that there is no way they will not attract enough customer interest. Among the best ones are a solar garden shed, a self generation start-up kit, and even a mobile app.
The team is bidding on hassle-free installation propositions. Most of their products do not require extensve man-power, or additional permits from local municipalities. You only have to pick the desired place of your solar garden shed, sit back and watch it collect the solar rays. The guys at KTH also propose products that can be installed on public transport bus stops. The mobile app will help everyone monitor the progress towards self-generation of electricity, while a promotional video will advertise all benefits.
Enlund points out an important common belief, which usually goes against solar panels. This is the fact that people think solar cells function only when there is direct sunshine. This is really not true- even on a cloudy day, the cells would still be producing electricity.
So, why not investing in free-electricity, really? Let’s just give the guys at KTH a bit more time to turn the concepts into products.
