14.6.2010

BASIC NEEDS COME FIRST

Professor Michael Grätzel himself seems modest when talking about his achievements, but during a discussion about the forthcomings of his work, Dr. Kevin Tabor from G24 Innovations and Dr. Gavin Tulloch from Dyesol International praised Grätzel’s work like they would be pitching for the Olympic Games.

After the Millennium Prize Ceremony, Dr. Tabor was a very happy man. His company, G24i uses Professor Grätzel’s idea of replicating nature’s photosynthesis and designs personalized solar power cells. Tabor is Director of Science and Research at G24i.

“We are not short of cool ideas in the world,” Dr. Tabor said. “If you go to any hardware store, you can buy almost anything for any purpose.”

What makes Grätzel’s idea stand out is a very fundamental thing: “Right now we need to solve the problems of water, fire and earth. There is no use for ARM processors or QueReaders, if you don’t have sustainable energy sources for them – or clean water and air to be healthy in the first place to be able to use anything.”

Tabor continued: “Those two others are nice and sexy innovations, but they are on the top of the pyramid. What we need to do now is to take care of the basic level, provide clean water, clean air and clean energy. We have to find ways to replace the diminishing fossil fuel supply. The sun is the answer, or light; most of the time you don’t need direct sunlight at all.”

Tabor carried a bag that can charge mobile phones and other devices while he is on the go. It is still not ready for all markets yet.

“At the moment, the flexible solar panel costs about USD 15, but we aim to bring it down to about a dollar.  On a Louis Vuitton bag, an extra 15 dollars doesn’t matter, but we aim to introduce this product for the African and Indian markets, where the power supply network is not available.” PV