PJH Studios

Tag: solar

  • African solarpunk

    Africa is leading the way implementing solar energy based solutions for everyday life.

    This is the unlock. This is the thing that makes everything else possible.

    Here’s the model:

    1. A company (Sun King, SunCulture) installs a solar system in your home
    2. You pay ~$100 down
    3. Then $40-65/month over 24-30 months
    4. The system has a GSM chip that calls home
    5. No payment = remotely shut off
    6. Keep paying = keep power
    7. After 30 months = you own it, free power forever

    The magic is this: You’re not buying a $1,200 solar system. You’re replacing $3-5/week kerosene spending with a $0.21/day solar subscription (so with $1.5 per week half the price of kerosene) that’s cheaper AND gives you better light, phone charging, radio, and no respiratory disease.

    The default rate? 90%+ of customers repay on time.

  • A roof paint blocks 97% of sunlight and pulls water from the air

    A roof paint blocks 97% of sunlight and pulls water from the air.

    Researchers at the University of Sydney and commercial start-up Dewpoint Innovations have created a nano-engineered polymer coating that not only reflects up to 97% of the sun’s rays, but also passively collects water. In tests, it was able to keep indoors up to 6 °C (~11 °F) cooler than the air outside.

    That temperature differential results in water vapor condensing on the surface – like the fogging on a cold mirror – producing a steady trickle of droplets.

    In trials on the roof of the Sydney Nanoscience Hub, the coating captured dew more than 30% of the year, generating as much as 390 mL of water per square meter (roughly 13 fluid ounces per 10.8 square feet) daily. This might not sound like a lot, but a 12-sq-m (about 129-sq-ft) section of treated roof could produce around 4.7 L (around 1.25 US gallons) of water per day under optimal conditions.