Sustainable OSU Corvallis

A newspaper article I read this morning told about a new thing the Oregon State University in Corvallis Oregon is doing. The OSU students in 2007 voted to tax themselves $8.50 per student per term to purchase renewable energy for the campus. Since then, 3/4 of the university's electricity is coming from renewable production using sustainable technology paid for by this tax.

Now they came up with something neat again, they figured, there are thousands of students regularly using the cardio exercise machines to stay in shape. The spent energy of the students could be used to make electricity. So they retrofitted 22 of the eliptical exercise machines in the student-fee funded Recreation center with new technology developed by a firm in Florida and are harnessing the energy of the machines to generate electricity. Student Power in the true sense of the word.
The say the workouts of the students will produce an estimated 3,500 kilowatt hours of electricity per year, which would be the equivalent to the electric needs of a small, very efficient house.
Cool, isn't it?
Students generating electricity while sweating on the exercise machine.
Just imagine, if every place using exercise machines would do that. It won't power a city, but it could power the building they are in. Every little bit counts if we want to get conserve energy.

Oregon again is the Frontier in Sustainability