I spotted on BBC News last week that a Danish hotel has begun to offer free meal vouchers to their guests in return for producing a minimum of 10 watt hours of electricity on the gym bikes.
Always on the lookout for incentives to get my lazy self exercising more, on first inspection, I thought Wow – this is cool, why aren’t all gyms getting members to generate their own electricity. Then I looked again at that figure, 10 watt hours of electricity – so that would be enough energy to power a 10W lightbulb for an hour.
Hmmm.. maybe Pedal Power is not quiet there in terms of making our gyms entirely green zones. On inspection I find that over the course of an hour, the average human can expect to generate about 40 or 50W on a bicycle. During the same period, someone running on a treadmill in the gym will use somewhere between 1.5 and 3 kW depending on the model of treadmill. That’s a lot of people sweating it out on bikes to make the treadmill carbon neutral.
The ‘Human Power Experiment’ illustrated just how inefficient people are at generating electricity last year when they showed it took 18 cyclists to power a hairdryer, 9 to power a toaster and 30 cyclists power pedaling to boil the kettle!
So, my earlier vision of carbon neutral, entirely self-powered gyms is still a few years away at least.
Fear not though – getting fit without the carbon consumption of treadmills and electronic gym equipment is still entirely possible and within reach of everyone!
Now that Spring is here, the evenings are brighter for longer and the temperatures are perfect for a spot of outdoor exercising. Just one hour of power walking, jogging or cycling would burn approximately 300, 590 or 530 calories (speed dependent) and require 0 watts of electricity.
If you still prefer using training machines to get fit, Outdoor gyms are now cropping up all over the place, we’ve got one in the park at the end of our road. These offer self-powered gym equipment like cross trainers and chest presses free of charge in the great outdoors.
The Big Boot Company in London offers outdoor fitness sessions across the capital or you could sign up to one of the many Green Gyms across the country. Members get involved in some rigorous work-outs via conservation or gardening work – a great alternative to the conventional gym.
Tags: calories, carbon neutral, Cycling, exercise, green gyms, gyms, jogging, outdoor gyms, outdoors, pedal power, Sport, training, treadmill