Think about it, let's do a calculation on that GravityLight. With a mass of 10 kg at a height of 1 meter you have about 100 Joules of potential energy (just enough to power an LED for a few minutes), or simplified, 1 kg at 1 meter height gives you 10 Joules. 1kWh equals 3.6 MegaJoules. So, the I think my math was right - except for one thing: it's not realistic to extract 100% of this energy into electric energy; it'll be more around 50% - so you need to double the weight or the height for your 1kWh.
If you look at those numbers you realize how much energy that really represents, and how amazing it is that we can store that in a battery in the first place.
Exactly!
What do you think Romans or Egyptians would think about the work a single solar panel & battery can do today?
The guy with a hammer & chisel seeing what a power saw can do?
The guy trying to beat grain into powder between two rocks seeing a powered mill?
Half days hard labor done in 3 minutes, almost effortlessly?
When I say I power a machine shop with mostly solar, people think "No Big Deal" or don't think anything at all since they just don't know, the unlimited power from the grid being the 'Normal' and no thought about it all their lives...
Hand them a hand saw, point them at fallen timber and tell them to build a house (or even a dog or bird house) and their jaw drops open, you get 'The Look' and they throw the saw down and walk off (probably thumbing their phone to tell their 'Friends' how insane you are...)
The degree in 'Liberal Arts' is good, all education is good,
But it will never impress me like a Journeyman certification in any trade!
I'll never forget the collage professor that saw us move a house, blowing out the back of concrete blocks with a sledge hammer without caving the face in, lifting the house with levers and wedges,
He kept saying "That shouldn't be possible!"
A bunch of hillbilly grunts lifting and moving an entire house, and later we found out he used the videos to teach his classes about simple leverage, application of force, etc.
With an education, at least he didn't tell us "You Can't Do That!" Like a lot of people did, even though we were doing it right in front of them...
The 'Space Alien' types don't understand what you can do with a lever, rollers and wedges, so it MUST have been aliens! (Insert eye roll here)
I'm NOT building an 19 story building (headroom), a winch system to lift 22,050 pounds of mass, build a gear & generator system to convert motion into electrical energy, etc...
To store 1kWh of energy, I'll just get a battery and solar panel!
Running water would be better than solar, but I don't have free running water across my land.
Sunshine falls on the rich & poor alike, and being a farmer, I look at it like any other 'Crop' that can be harvested to support the homestead/farm.
If I had reasonable wind, I'd try to grab that too!