India’s climate fluctuates between intense heat and aridity to monsoonal rains, a disparity of environmental conditions that is particularly harsh and sometimes crippling. Using new solar technologies, however, it is possible to harvest these once malevolent forces for productive ends. The “Mango” streetlamp concept by designer Adam Mikloski does just that, gathering and transferring both rain and sunlight into electricity.

The streetlight takes its form from the mango leaf, whose profile Mikloski stylized into a working diagrammatic figure. The top surface area of the leaf is broad and flat enough to install solar cells, while the tapered lower half proves well-suited to drinking in rainwater, which will be funneled into a water tank and recycled by an inbuilt turbine. The collected sunlight and water will power the LED lights on the underside of the leaf faces–a much more efficient solution to traditional street lighting models, which emit harmful vapors and consume a signifcant amount of energy. The Mango design was chosen as one of ten finalists in the India Future of Change Design Competition, which seeks to promote and foster a national creative industry to match the country’s increasing global might. India has, of course, realized the imperative to develop sustainable technologies which will not only revamp old industries and develop entirely new ones, but also quicken the pace of modernization throughout the subcontinent.

[via EcoFriend]

by Samuel Medina

posted in Uncategorized

tagged Competition, india, recycling, streetlamp, sustainability, sustainable design

more articles by Samuel Medina