Cleantech Offers Post-Hurricane Solutions

For many whose eyes were glued to the news, Hurricane Irene might be remembered as the disaster that wasn’t, and certainly the deployment of communications technology played a big part in that. The government has hurricane preparedness sites, The Weather Channel can send text alerts to most cell phones, and FEMA just launched an app for Androids. The readiness to weather this storm stood head and shoulders above past natural disasters.

But when the wind and rain dies down, there’s one thing all hurricanes, major tropical storms, and most other natural disasters have in common: extensive cleanup and disaster relief. While homeowners can stock up on canned food and water in preparation to live life off the grid for anything from a few days to a few weeks, most emergency management crews require power to provide vital services, and that power typically comes from diesel generators.

But, as with many things electric, photovoltaics are providing an alternative to a 24-7 diesel generator.

A solar alternative

California’s Pure Power Distribution has created mobile solar arrays whose ability to generate reliable power has been demonstrated on, of all things, movie base camps. Their usability, however, extends far beyond the silver screen.

In addition to its Mobile Solar Power System, a purely solar array, it has developed a Solar Hybrid, an 18 kilowatt generator that includes an onboard biodiesel generator (it can also be outfitted with a regular diesel or propane generator) that automatically activates when solar power isn’t adequately charging the array’s battery. It’s a realistic option for crews working in a disaster area.

The system’s battery operates like a fuel tank, and a charge controller in the system monitors that battery to make sure it’s adequately charged. When the battery needs recharging, the charge controller first turns to solar power, and when solar isn’t adequate, the biodiesel generator kicks in to recharge the battery.

The usefulness of solar power in emergency situations isn’t particularly new.

Christopher Smith, Pure Power Distribution’s vice president of marketing, estimates that over a 12-hour period a comparable diesel generator would use 36 gallons of fuel. “Our generator will run six hours, then recharge and then run six more hours,” Smith says. That means over the course of 12 hours, the Solar Hybrid uses 1.5 gallons of fuel.

The usefulness of solar power in emergency situations isn’t particularly new. In the 1990s, the Department of Energy advocated for the inclusion of photovoltaics in disaster relief efforts, citing data about increased reports of burns and asphyxiations as a result of widespread use of generators.

After 2008’s Hurricane Ike, Houston used a grant to buy 24 mobile solar generators to be deployed in residential zones so people could power up everything from cell phones to nebulizers.

In 2009, the New York City Office of Emergency Management received a report about the potential uses of solar power during an emergency. Significantly, the report highlighted the value of a hybrid solar system to power such important structures as shelters.

Quieting the chaos

Although the reduction of air pollution and use of fossil fuels provides an obvious bonus, Smith points to another piece of pollution that often plagues disaster sites: noise pollution.

It might be a less measurable concern than safety—and its effects might not be as proven as those of, say, carbon monoxide—but when it comes to the comfort of people in shelters, medical tents, or just in the vicinity of a disaster relief crew relying on a generator, noise levels can prove emotionally toxic. Much like the Prius engine’s characteristic silence compared to similar cars, solar-based generators are relatively less noisy than their traditional counterparts.

“Solar is quiet,” Smith says. “If you’re at a disaster site, you have this silent power source, so it’s not adding to the chaos of the event.”