Internet giant Google has decided to offer $ 1 million (Rs.6 crores approx) to anyone who comes up with a laptop sized solution or method for transforming renewable energy into a power source that can be easily used in homes.
Google has decided to offer these 1 million dollars as prize money in a competition called 'The Little Box Challenge' which it has started along with Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE).
The competition involves designing and building a kW-scale power inverter, an inverter that can be used to convert renewable energy like solar and wind, before transforming it into suitable current to be used at homes and in vehicles. But the competition is not that simple, the challenge lays in the fact that the inverter has to be of the size of a small laptop or tablet, which is roughly 1/10th of the currently available size of the inverters.
According to the search giant, they're looking for someone who can design and build a kW-scale inverter with the highest power density of at least 50 Watts per cubic inch. The company also thinks that anyone who has a high disregard for the perceived limits of engineering will be best suitable for the job. The company believes the development of this laptop sized technology can result in changing the future of electricity.
Google believes that the inverters being currently used in houses are too big and according to it, making these inverters smaller in size would enable more efficient distributed electrical grids, more solar powered homes and it could also help in bringing electricity to the most remote parts of the world.
People interested in participating in the competition can register their team by September 30, 2014. In order to allow and help even eligible academic participate in the competition, the search giant has arranged grant funding for them. The deadline for submitting the grant application is also September 30, 2014.
The registered teams would be then required to file a technical approach and testing application by 22nd July, 2015. Based on these applications and approaches up to 18 finalists will be selected for the final testing at the testing facility. The final testing would require them to bring their inverters in person in the US by October 21, 2015. The final results would be announced sometime in January 2016.
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