You wake up in the morning and hit the treadmills. After a few miles, you hit the exercise bikes. Drenched in sweat, you finally call it a morning. Sure it's a good workout, but you also have to do your part to keep the local green gym's power flowing strong.
This is exactly the kind of scene that has begun unfolding this week at the Green Microgym in Portland Oregon. The gym is the first human-powered gym in the U.S.
Adam Boesel, a personal trainer and the owner of the gym came up with the unique idea. He describes, "We're just harnessing that extra energy that they put out anyway. For people, that's a no-brainer. They say it's there, you might as well capture it."
Mr. Boesel is no mental slouch either. He helped to rig up the gyms spin bikes with weedwacker motors and truck alternators to provide juice to the gym's systems. The gym will also use solar power to offer the remainder of its electricity needed. It even uses energy-efficient treadmill motors, specially ordered.
The idea has serious potential for gyms nationwide, to provide both cost savings and environmental benefits. At the Green Microgym, the Team Dynamo and Spin Bikes can generate 0.750 kWh a piece. And Mr. Boesel is currently cooking up new gizmos to harness the power of elliptical trainers.
Some may feel that it is outlandish for a 2,800 square-foot gym to be fueled by manpower. Mr. Boesel doesn't think so. He states, "It's just going to move the human powered renewable energy technology to the next level. We're going for 100 percent. I think at the beginning, we may be 20 to 25 percent."
The gym is not the first worldwide to have dabbled in human power. In Hong Kong, there is a gym with gadgets connected to the weight machines, where athletes power up the gym with every lift. The Hong Kong gym's patrons produce enough power to fill its batteries and keep the lights burning bright. Other companies are also seeking to exploit human based kinetic energy, such as M2E Power, which is debuting a human based iPod/cell phone recharger next year.
The Green Microgym is located in downtown Portland on Northeast 13th Avenue and Alberta Street.