The Week (weekly Magazine); March 12, 2006
(Lalita Iyer)
Light Emitting Diode (LED) lights up lives
Dave Irvine Halliday, an Electrical Engineering teacher at University of Calgary, Canada developed a lighting system to Light up remote villages and hamlets which are away from the power grid. The system consumes negligible power and works out cheaper than kerosene lamps. Dave was on a visit to Tribhuvan University, Nepal and while on a trek to the Himalayas he found that the children in the villages were unable to study after sunset because there houses had no light. This prompted him to devise a plan to bring low-cost lighting to the villages.
Dave used LEDs of 0.1 watt rating manufactured by ?NICHIA?, a Japanese Company. About 20 such LEDs put together gave sufficient illumination. The system costs Indian Rs. 1,500/-. The lighting has a 2-watt rating and runs on a battery charged by small solar panels or manual power and lasts for 3 years. Subsequently, Dave founded the ?Light Up the World? Foundation and ventured to light up 700 homes in Nepal. The foundation, along with other environmental organizations also introduced the technology to the rural areas of the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. The women?s wing (?Mahila Sanatkar?) of Confederation of Voluntary Organizations has recruited its women to make these lamps and ready them for the rural areas.
The labourers, farmers and poor people of other occupations are now happy that their kids can sit at home and study at night and old people can walk in the house without tripping or hurting themselves.
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