Table to content

Identify and justify the problem and solution requirements.

 Egypt grand challenge.

 Problem to be solved.
 Research.
 Other solution already tried.
 Design requirements.

Generating and defending the solution.

 Selection of solution.
 Selection prototype.

Constructing and test prototype.

 Materials and methods.

 Test plan.
 Data collection.

Evolution, reflection, recommendations.

 Discussion.
 Recommendation.
 Learning transfer.

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 Identify and justify the problem and
solution requirements

2
 Egypt grand challenge
Challenge is something needing great mental in order to be done
successfully and Egypt face many problems that will make living in Egypt
is impossible because these challenges prevent the economic progress for
Egypt so as we student in Egypt stem school so we should help Egypt to
this problem and become one of the countries in the world in Economy

Grand challenge

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Improve the alternative energy

By 2050, energy will need to come

from solar, wind, and other
renewable resources. Alternative
energy refers to energy sources that

Chart 1 sources of energyy

have no undesired consequences such for example fossil fuels or nuclear
energy. Alternative energy sources are renewable and are thought to be
"free" energy sources. Wind Energy, Solar Energy, Geothermal Energy,

Hydroelectric Energy sources. Currently, 90% of Egypt‟s energy production

depends on fossil fuels, 9% on hydropower, and the remaining 1% on solar

and wind. The government is aiming to increase the share of renewables to
20% by 2020 and the figure show the sources of energy in Egypt from 2011-
2015(chart1).

Recycle garbage and waste for economic and environmental

purposes:

Egypt faces a massive problem considering garbage and waste, many

researches were made on this topic trying to solve it. One of the researches
was made by the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA). It

4
estimated the generation of Egyptian MSW with 0.3 to 0.8 kg/day/capita,
with an annual growth of 3.4%. In
addition, there is 6.2 million
ton/year industrial waste including
0.2 million ton of hazardous waste
and 23 million Ton/year of
Chart 2 national recycling rates
agricultural waste. The country report on the solid waste management in
July 2010, which has been prepared for the Region stated that Egypt is the
second most populous country in Africa, with 78.2 million inhabitants (May
2010), with the majority of MSW
Them residing along the Nile Valley and Delta. The urban population
comprises 43% of the total population. According to the country report of
2010, the total annual MSW generation in Egypt has increased more than
36% since 2000, to the current level of 20.5 million ton per year (2010).
Deal with urban congestion and its consequences:

Urban congestion in one of the most important challenges that Egypt face.
It leads to all the other grand challenges. The more numbers means more
electricity, and that mean more blackouts... Many cities in Egypt like Cairo,
Giza, and Alexandria have to deal with thousands of cars running through
their streets each day. The level of health will go down and down because
the massive number of cars which are in the streets will prevent the Public
services from doing its jobs like preventing the ambulance from reaching
5
the hospitals and this will
lead to the bad health and
prevent the Car fire from
doing its jobs. A lot of
pollution will be in the Chart 3 population in Egypt
environment due to the massive number of people who are in the streets,
the massive number of factories and the massive number of machines and
all of these will lead to many infectious diseases. The next picture explains
more.
Work to eradicate public health issues/disease:

In Egypt, we need to improve our public health system, and create new
medicines for the most common diseases in Egypt, For many decades Egypt
was trying to eliminate public health issues As a result of that, Infection
rates dropped 20% one month
after healthcare acquired infection
surveillance began, but until now
there are many issues and diseases
are affecting our public health and
Chart 4 global HCV prevalence
effect on the public health, such as hepatitis.

6
Egypt‟s health challenges disproportionately affect the rural poor and have
the potential to impact the country‟s economic prosperity more broadly
over the long term.

Increase the industrial and agricultural bases of Egypt:

There is a lot of industrial areas in %3

Egypt's land use
%1
%0

Other land
Egypt such as Al Obour industrial zone, Arable land
Permanent crops
New Damietta industrial zone and El %96 Forest

Sadat industrial zone, but compared to Chart 4 Egypt land use

European countries this is a very small number.

The lack of industrial bases in Egypt led to the lack of industrial production
and the impact on the Egyptian economy.

The Egyptian government does not look after the industrial zones, so Egypt
has a lack of industrial bases, but the European government looks after the
industrial zones so the European countries are the most advanced countries
in industry.

We suggest that the government should look after industry in Egypt by

building new industrial bases and look after them.

The agricultural land base totals about 8.4 million acres which represented
about 3.5% of the total area in 2007. The Arab League announced in 2007
7
that the area of the Decertified and reached to 166332 km2 and the area of
land threatened by desertification reached to 901800 km2. The reasons of
this are Climatic variations and Human activities. 2.6 billion People work in
agriculture, but 52% of agricultural land used is severely affected by soil
degradation. Because of desertification, each year 12 million hectares are
lost where 20 million tons of grain could have been grown. All the previous
led to the bad Agriculture in Egypt.

We suggest that the government should reclaim many parts of the dessert to
make use of it and use in the cultivation of agricultural areas

Address and reduce pollution fouling our air, water and soil:

Pollution is one of the most important challenges that Egypt face.

Nowadays our air is full of harmful gases and effects on the people in Egypt
and the air polluted because of Carbon dioxide, and greenhouse gas, is the
main pollutant that is warming Earth. Though living things emit carbon
dioxide when they breathe, carbon dioxide is widely considered to be a
pollutant when associated with cars, planes, power plants, and other
human activities that involve the burning of fossil fuels such as gasoline and
natural gas. In the past 150 years, such activities have pumped enough
carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to raise its levels higher than they have
been for hundreds of thousands of years., our water is polluted, our soil is
mostly corrupted, and the water polluted because of the factories that throw
8
the industrial trash in the Egyptian water and Around 4.5 million tons of
pollutants thrown in the water, the country loses at least 15 billion cubic
meters of water each year because of pollution. Pollution costs Egypt up to
6% of its national income through money spent on Water purification and
treating diseases and the polluted air.

Improve uses of arid areas:

Egypt is located in the top countries in the arid

land area and the first countries in the world
desert.There is in Egypt the Great Sand Sea Figure1 arid areas
Which covers an area of about 300 thousand square kilometers, stressing
that according to the division of «Madz» of arid and semi-arid Egypt is
located in the top countries in the arid area of land, which makes Egypt the
first countries in the world desert, where includes 86% barren desert and
14% desert. So the most area of Egypt is desert.

We can solve this problem by: by protecting land from becoming degraded,
in arid, semi-arid and sub-humid areas in order to offer new economic
opportunities for impoverished populations living in those areas in addition
to interesting in increasing the arid areas with services like clean water,
electricity, natural, build many housings in it. If we success to do that and
solve the problem we can make the arid areas as a town or a city.
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But if we can`t solve this problem it will: Desertification of the arid lands of
the world has been proceeding--sometimes rapidly, sometimes slowly--for
more than a thousand years. It has caused untold misery among those most
directly affected.

Also, the increasing of arid areas decrease the progress of the country and
make the crops not able to eat or reclaim so we should reclaim the arid
regions and areas to increase The field of Agriculture and build new cities
and decrease the ratios of the unemployment.

Increase the sources of clear water:

Lack of water sources in Egypt is a

serious problem, a lot of people is
suffering from water shortage and
there are whole villages that don‟t
have water. The total population of Egypt increased from 22 million in 1950
to around 85 million in 2010. This rapid increase in population growth will
continue for decades to come. This high population growth rates will
exaggerate the problems associated with
water sector allocation. The main source Total 78 000 million m3 in 2010 (FAO, 2010) chart 5

of water in Egypt is the Nile River. The Nile water agreement with Sudan
allocates 55.5 BCM/year to Egypt. This is the actual resources currently
available for use aside from northern rainfalls. While water requirements
10
for different sectors are in the order of 79.5 BCM/yr. The gap between the
needs and availability of water is about 20 BCM/yr. This gap is overcome
by recycling water. The overall efficiency of the Nile system in Egypt is
about 75%.

Improve the scientific and technological environment for all:

The scientific and technological is very

Important in any country want to have a
high economic between the countries and
Egypt work hard to achieve this point and
develop the technological by
Figure 2

The Academy of Scientific Research and Technology in Cairo is the national

body answerable for science and technology.

Egypt also has 12 expert learned societies in the fields of agriculture,

medicine, science, and technology. The National Research Center, also in
Cairo, carries out research in pure and applied sciences. The office of
Agriculture has 20 attached research institutes in Cairo and Giza. Twenty
other institutes conduct research in medicine, science, and technology. Also
develop the scientific by the museums dedicated to agriculture, geology,
railways, and marine technology. In addition to polytechnic institutes in
Cairo and Mansoura which located in Egypt also in Egypt in 1996 had 13
11
universities offering courses in basic and applied sciences. In 1987–1997,
science and engineering students accounted for 12% of college and
university enrollments. Although that Egypt has a disadvantage and weak
in scientific and technological because of:

1- Education crisis 2- Lack of interest Scholar.

Deal with population growth and its consequences:

E gypt's population is a very dangerous

problem because of Egypt's population still

grows each year by approximately 1.5 million
people or the equivalent of the population of a
country the size of Kuwait. United Nations
projections indicate that the population will
grow from 62.3 million in 1995 to 95.6 million
by 2026 and will reach 114.8 million before it Chart 6 Egypt population
stabilizes in the year 2065 an increase of approximately 84.4 percent over the current
total.

This increase will occur for two reasons: fruitfulness rates are still high in many parts
of Egypt, and momentum will cause the population to continue to increase even after
fertility rates reach replacement level.

Some details about Egypt population:

 The current population of Egypt is 94,531,515 as of Friday, February

17/2017 based on the latest United Nations estimates.
 Egypt population is equivalent 1.27% of the total world population.

 Egypt ranks number 15 in the list of countries by population.

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  The total land area is 995,560 Km2 (384,388 sq. miles)
 39.7 % of the population is urban (37,826,341 people in 2017
 The median age in Egypt is 24.8 years

Reduce and adapt to the effect of climatic change:

The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of

it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is
unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other
technological advances have
enabled scientists to see the big
picture, collecting many different
types of information about our Chart 7 climatic change in Egypt

planet and its climate on a global scale. This body of data, collected over
many years, reveals the signals of a changing climate.

Climate change in Egypt

The climatic change in Egypt is things happened because of natural

reasons and human reasons.
Egypt is a typical example of a developing country that is highly vulnerable
to climate change and faces numerous threats to its economic, social and
environmental sustainability–including energy, water, and food security.
13
This causes enormous fundamental pressures on Egypt‟s competitiveness
and presents a growing threat to national security.
There are of natural reasons and human reasons for happening the climate
change:

Natural reasons for climatic change Human reasons for climatic change
Example: Example:
• Being kinds of  Cutting trees
Contaminations And burnt it
Leaks from the spotted hall  Contaminations
And hurt our planet. Which leaks from cars and
Motorbike which causes
Acidly rains.

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 Problem to be solved
The problem which our capstone
faces is the energy .the energy is one
of the most dangerous problems in
Egypt. We chose a specific problem
in energy which is electricity .there
are big problems: we try to solve
these problems by producing more Chart 8 energy in Egypt

electricity. By little money. And this picture shows what the energy
consumption in Egypt is.

We have to work for solving these problems because they have many effects
on Egypt, if this problem hadn‟t been solved Egypt would face darkness
days with no lights or natural gas so what is the importance of the energy
and how can we get or generate it and its types.

15
Energy is very important in our life. There are many ways to generate
energy but the world is going to produce energy from alternative and
renewable sources so what is the different between them?

Renewable energy comes from a source that is naturally occurring and

replenishes naturally without the interference of human intervention. Like
solar energy, and Wind energy, geothermal and hydro resources.

Alternative energy is a term used for an energy source that is an

alternative to using fossil fuels. Generally, it indicates energies that are non-
traditional and have low environmental impact.

Kinds of renewable energy:

1. Solar power

A 1.5 kilowatt PV system will keep more than 110,000 pounds of carbon
dioxide, the chief greenhouse gas, out of the atmosphere over the next 25
years. The same solar system will also prevent the need to burn 60,000
pounds of coal. With solar, there's no acid rain, no urban smog, no pollution
of any kind.

2. Wind power

Wind power "is one of the most promising new energy sources" that can
serve as an alternative to fossil fuel-generated electricity. The cost of wind
has dropped by 15% with each doubling of installed capacity worldwide,
and capacity has doubled three times during the 1990s and 2000's.As of

16
1999, global wind energy capacity topped 10,000 megawatts, which is
approximately 16 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity

3. Geothermal energy

Geothermal energy means energy drawn or harnessed from beneath the

earth. It is completely clean and renewable. Geothermal energy has been in
used since last several years. The earth contains a molten rock called
magma. Heat is continuously produced from there. The temperature
increases about 3 degrees Celsius, for every 100 meters you go below
ground. Below, 10,000 meters the temperature is so high, that it can be used
to boil water. Water makes its way deep inside the earth and hot rock boils
that water. The boiling water then produces steam which is captured by
geothermal heat pumps. The steam turns the turbines which in turn
activates generators. Read more about working on geothermal energy here

4. Hydroelectric power

Hydroelectric power stations capture the kinetic energy of moving water

and give mechanical energy to turbines. Solar energy is produced by the
sun and wind energy is produced by moving of winds. The heat caused by
the sun drives the wind. The movement of winds is then captured by wind
turbines. Both wind and sun cause water to evaporate. The water vapor
then turns into rain or snow and flows down to sea or oceans through rivers
or streams. The energy of the moving water can then be captured and called
as hydroelectric power.

17
 5. Ocean energy

There are 3 ways. Tidal energy, Wave energy and Ocean thermal energy
conversion (OTEC) to make ocean energy harnessed

Tidal power basically involves using kinetic energy from the incoming and
outgoing tides. The difference in high tides and low tides are also important
in this respect. There is a lot of energy that can be harnessed from waves for
use. It is another form of hydropower. The rise and fall of ocean tides are
captured by tidal energy generators which turn turbines. The movement of
turbines is responsible for producing electricity. In short, tidal energy
generator captures the kinetic motion of the tides and converts them into
electrical energy

6. Hydrogen energy

Hydrogen is the most abundant element available on earth but it is rarely

alone. Even water contains two third of hydrogen. Hydrogen has
tremendous potential and can be used to power up homes, vehicles and
even space rockets. It takes a lot of energy to separate hydrogen from other
elements and therefore it proves to quite expensive to extract it.

The main benefit of hydrogen energy is that it is a clean source of fuel and
does not leave any waste elements behind except water. It is completely
renewable and can be produced over and over again on demand. Hydrogen
can also be used to make bombs. Dependency on fossil fuels still remains as
we need them to extract hydrogen from other elements.
18
What will happen if this problem is not solved?!

a) will not find sources of produce energy

b) the factories will close
c) the national income will decrease
d) the pollution will increase
e) the industrial base will be damaged

What will happen if this problem is solved?!

a) People will own clean source of energy

b) The factories will still work
c) The national Income will increase
d) We will export energy to another country
e) The pollution will decrease
f) The industrial base will increase
g) We will find energy for our usages

We may not find electricity to use it.

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 Researches
 We search about many topics, the first thing we search about is the kind of the
solar cell

 Solar cells that can give use the power to that we need to charge phone or the
battery

 The best battery that will be suitable for the solar cell

 The structure of the deep cycle battery

 A device that can regulate the current and the voltage to be suitable for the
charged device

 The structure of the buck converter

 The current solution for the alternative energy on personal scale

 The previous solutions that already tried to solve this problem

 Search about sensor to rotate the solar cell to be perpendicular in the sun

20
 1) Abouleish, H., Keitel, M., & Boes, P. M. (n. d.). Egypt, SEKEM, and
Climate Change. Retrieved March 8, from http://www.wri.org/our-
work/project/world-resources-report/egypt-sekem-and-climate-
change

2) Air Pollution. (n. d.). National geographic. Retrieved March 10, 2017
from http://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-
warming/pollution/

3) Alternative Energy. (n. d.). Retrieved March 12, 2017 from

http://www.altenergy.org/

4) Industrial zones of the governorate. (2015). Retrieved March 15, 2017

from
http://www.gafi.gov.eg/english/startabusiness/investmentzones/pa
ges/industrial-zones.aspx

5) Khalifa, M., DaVanzo, J., & Adamson, D. M. (2000). Population Growth

in Egypt. A Continuing Policy Challenge (No. IP-183 (2000)). RAND
CORP SANTA MONICA CA. Retrieved March 17, 2017 from
http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP183/index2.html

6) McKenna, p. (2011). Salty Solution for Energy Generation. Retrieved

March 20, 2017 from
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/423903/salty-solution-for-
energy-generation/

21
 7) Science Buddies Staff. (2016, August 30). Potato Battery: How to Turn
Produce into Veggie Power. Retrieved April 1, 2017 from
http://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-
projects/project_ideas/Energy_p010/energy/potato-battery.shtml

8) Solar Energy. (2017). Retrieved April 5, 2017 from

http://www.conserve-energy-
future.com/alternativeenergysources.php

Current solutions
1. Air mask

The clever piece of kit, dubbed the AIRE

mask, harnesses the wind power created
by breathing and converts it into
electricity to run anything from your iPod
Figure3
to your mobile.
The electronic mask contains tiny wind turbines and the energy created is
transferred through a cable to your electronic device.
Inventor Joco Paulo Lammoglia, from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, said the device
could be used in all situations from running to sleeping.
He said: „I hope to bring the concept into production and reduce the carbon
footprint.

22
„It can be used indoors or outdoors, while you're sleeping, walking, running
or even reading a book.
„Besides saving energy and helping environmental preservation, it also
encourages physical exercise.
„Its energy is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
„Though many of our modern gadgets offer benefits, they tend to use a high
amount of electrical energy.
„Harnessing energy from human activities and transforming it into
electricity is possible and is a great solution.‟
There is one phone that doesn‟t need the help of the AIRE mask, though –
the Spare One mobile.
And the advantages of this solution are:
 „It can be used indoors or outdoors, while you're sleeping, walking,
running or even reading a book.
 Besides saving energy and helping environmental preservation, it also
encourages physical exercise.
 „Its energy is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
And it has no disadvantages except there is one phone that doesn‟t need the
help of the AIRE mask, though – the Spare One mobile.
This invention will be a step to progress and make every Egyptian didn‟t
need to consume electricity but it makes him for getting electricity from his
breathing. And I think if we use this to charge a device or torch to light his
way or room.
23
 2. Smart shoe

Fifteen-year-old Angelo Casimiro

from the Philippines has just
invented a smart shoe insole that
produces enough electricity when
Figure4
you walk to charge small USB
devices. The gizmo consists of piezoelectric materials, which, as Angela
explains, can generate an alternating current voltage when actuated. (Solid
materials like certain ceramics and salts exhibit this effect, which was
discovered in the late 1800s). After subjecting his insole generator to tests,
he discovered that he could charge a 400 MAH Li-ion battery in full by
jogging for eight straight hours. It was also possible to charge a power bank
after playing two straight hours of basketball, although the output was a bit
faint. Some benefits

Why Not Use Dynamos?

As much as possible, I tried to avoid using dynamos. Yes, dynamos produce
more electricity but it will feel like you've stuffed a rock in your shoe. Don't
forget dynamos will create a lot of noise

And this video will explain more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc4CD1aEFwE

The advantages of smart shoe:

24
  It does not require too much resource to be spent
 Smart shoes have mechanisms that convert the energy lost during
natural human gaits into electrical energy.
 They can store this energy and even power electronic devices.
 They can offer a consistent power supply and avoid the use of batteries

The disadvantages are:

This device is powerful in producing electricity so it generates ac current so

we must installation unify circle to convert ac current to dc current avoiding
the damaging of the battery.

This invention is very useful and important step to produce electricity for
one person I think if this invention was owned by every Egyptian it can
reduce a large amount of electricity that Egypt consumed.

 Laser-made micro-supercapacitors:

Introduction to idea:-Rice University researchers

who pioneered the development of laser-induced
graphene have configured their discovery into
flexible, solid-state micro-super capacitors that Figure 5

Work idea: - work idea depends on lithium-ion batteries that take a long
time to charge and release their energy as needed. Rice's micro-super
25
capacitors charge 50 times faster than batteries, discharge more slowly than
traditional capacitors and match commercial super capacitors for both the
amount of energy stored and power delivered.
The method of work: - The micro-supercapacitors are manufactured by
burning electrode patterns into plastic sheets using a commercial laser.
Unlike the complex fabrication procedures that have limited the
widespread application of micro-supercapacitors, this process can take
place in the air, rather than a vacuum, and at room temperature.
Details about battery: - we burn the patterns, add electrolyte and cover
them with a capacitance of 934 microfarads per square centimeter and an
energy density of 3.2 mill watts per cubic centimeter, these micro-super
capacitors rival commercial lithium thin-film batteries, with a power
density two orders of magnitude higher than batteries also displayed long
life and mechanical stability when repeatedly bent 10,000 times
Disadvantage: - The energy produced from the device are DC and need
to unite the circle to be converted into an AC
3. Salty Solution for Energy Generation:
Saline solution: This device generates electricity
using differences in salinity between fresh and
salt water. The two foil-like structures serve as
positive and negative electrodes; the glass bulb
is a reference electrode. Figure6

26
As a large source of renewable energy. Energy is required to desalinate
water, and running the process in reverse can generate energy. Now a novel
continuity based on an imitative battery design that uses nanomaterial
could provide a way to harvest that energy economically.
Work idea: -The new device, developed by researchers at Stanford
University, consists of an electrode that attracts positive sodium ions and
one that attracts negative chlorine ions. When the electrodes are absorbed in
salt water, they draw sodium and chlorine ions from the water, and the
movement of the ions creates an electrical current. The electrodes are
recharged by draining the salt water, replacing it with fresh water, and
applying a relatively low voltage electrical current, which draws the ions
back out of the electrodes. When the freshwater is drained, the electrodes
are ready to attract more ions from the next batch of saltwater.
It is the opposite process of water desalination, where you put in energy
and try to generate freshwater and more centralistic saltwater, says Yi Cui, a
materials science and engineering professor at Stanford University and the
study‟s lead author. Here you start with fresh water and concentrated
saltwater, and then you generate energy.
Disadvantage: -Such wide-scale use, however, would seriously disturb
the sensitive aquatic environment. I think you would only be able to use a
very small fraction of this or it would be an ecological catastrophe, says
Menachem Elimelech, director of the Environmental Engineering Program
at Yale University.
27
 Other solutions have been tried
1. The beta Ray

It is a global sun power generator prototype.

It is a technique refers to a solution for
producing energy which can “squeeze more Figure7

juice out of the sun”. It can work even during the night hours by
the light of the moon and when there is low light.

These technologies combine spherical geometry principles with a

dual axis tracking system, allowing twice the yield of
a conventional solar panel in a much smaller surface area.

28
 Figure8

 The advantages of the Beta Ray generator:

 It can use a small amount of light and produce a big amount of light.
 It can work at night by using the light of the moon.
 What are the disadvantages of this solution:
 The beta ray generator is expensive.
 This solution is very good at producing energy. And that solution
helped greatly in saving energy.
 But there was a disadvantage which is that this solution is expensive.
2. Using a solar panel to charge phone battery

The scientists tried to charge the battery

of the phone by using a solar panel. They
invent a device with a solar cell that can
charge the battery of the phone is using a
link that emotion the electricity from the Figure 9

device to the battery of the phone. And this device also can work at night
when there is low light.

The advantages of these solutions:

1-It is easy to use and does not need a lot of attention.

29
2- It can be used to store energy, which can be used later when the sun is
not available on a wet or cloudy day.

3-It can be used to charge many types of batteries like the batteries of
laptops.

4-It can be used to select a suitable charger as per needs.

The disadvantages of this solution are:

1-It usually needs direct sun.

2-It does not work when the weather is cloudy.

3- Solar chargers have no capacity to store energy collected during the day.
They are only useful for a small amount of time.

That solution is very good and this is a renewable energy. It helps at saving
energy. This solution is very important when the battery is low when we
are outside and there is not a source of electricity. The disadvantages of that
solution are that this device is not suitable for any phone because there are
many phones and there are many batteries and every battery of phone need
different in the amount of ambers than the other to be charged.

3- Making Electricity from Salt Water:

Saltwater can serve as the electrolyte in a battery, thence generating

electricity. A battery has three parts which are electrolyte (the salt water will
replace it), an anode which is negative and a cathode which is positive.
Some of the first batteries, made by Alessandro Volta around 1880, used
30
saltwater, silver and zinc to generate electricity. This type of battery is easy
to build and experiment with.

The advantages of this solution are:

1- Saving energy since the battery need less amount of electricity to be

charged.

2- The battery work for more time than the usual battery.

3-The battery has much validity than the usual battery.

4-Low cost.

5- Non-flammable.

6- Built entirely from non-toxic materials.

The disadvantages of the solution are:

1-Very heavy per kilowatt-hour stored.

2- These batteries have Low power output.

This solution is very good at saving energy. This solution helps at

producing energy. Also, this solution is not expensive and save money
because we will replace the salt water with the electrolyte. This type of
battery is easy to build and experiment with.

4. Power pot (by boiling)

31
one of the companies invented bearing Power
name Practical pot to boil water can charge the
phone, and can this container that holds
Power Pot shipping smart phone by USB cable
through the boiling water, where this process
leads to the generation of electricity, Vahn
Figure 10
phone for 20 minutes in this pot gives him enough power to run for two
hours.

Work idea:

The Power Pot is an anodized aluminum cook pot and lid that features an
electricity-generating component. A 3-foot-long heat-resistant cord emerges
from the side of the pot and features a standard USB outlet at the end for
plugging in your electronic device of choice. Its 5-watt generating capacity
is sufficient to charge all USB-powered devices, including smart phones, UV
water purifiers, LED lights and lanterns, and headlamps.

The advantages and the disadvantages of it: I think that using

this system I was able to charge a battery pack, a phone, and a camera
battery at different times off of the system while it was fired up and found it
to be producing a great amount of electricity. The down side is it was
obviously only charging while I was cooking or heating water which tends
to not be very long. Also depending on your device a 10 minutes charge
may not go very far and to be fair I see this as more of an emergency charge

32
rather than one so that you can play movies and such on your phone.
Remember you are camping…unplug as much as possible!

5. Food energy charger

Strange and sudden discovery was

discovered by a group of technicians and
experts in the field of energy and found that
there is a way through which to use the types
of fruit to generate sufficient electrical energy
to charge the smartphone keeps it all based Figure 11

upon entirely the power supply, where it can implement this method by
using an apple, potato and a banana and orange.

Work idea: Fruits contain acids that act as salt

bridges to conduct electricity. Electricity is
conducted by transferring electrons in a chain
from one point to another to produce current.
The acids found in fruits and vegetables, such as
Figure 12
the citric acid in citrus fruit, help facilitate this electron transfer.

I think this idea is good for lighting torch or lamb For 10:20 minutes and use
it in some personal experiments and necessary need of energy like charging
the mobile phone or light a lamb.

33
But there some advantages because that the fruits can decay and damage
the use of the device because of the decreasing of including acids.

Design requirement
Safety: first design requirement and the most important one, so we took in
an account to make our project completely safe, which we can achieve by:

The way of construction and the materials of construction:

The way of construction must be safe and adaptable for any environment
which can be done by the help of the materials of construction and the
portability of leaking.

The materials needed and the materials produced:

34
By trying to avoid the bad consequences of exploitation the main materials
needed, and to avoid the bad effects of the materials produced.

Personal: we should be sure to make our project able to produce

electricity that enough one person like to produce 5 volts, 1.5 I that can
charge a mobile or light a room if the light out.

The Accuracy of the result: the accuracy is similar to the percentage

you solve the problem, you tried to raise it till you reach 100% or the nearest
value for.

Low energy consumption: this required in our prototype and we get

the way to replace using fuels by alternative energy.

Consumables: to determine our consumed material in our project and

know its advantages and disadvantages, to create new methods to treat its
disadvantages besides exploiting the internal energy within it.

Efficiency: we sees this is the second important requirement after safety,

this point depending on the applicability of the prototype and the accuracy
of the result, and to predict the final probable results in each step in our
project and to compare it with the result that can be done by another
method.

35
Ecofriendly: to determine the produced material from our project and its
effect on human and the environment, to deal with its advantages, and to
eradication its disadvantages.

Useless cost: our project should need less cost than compared with that
it safe.

36
 Generating and Defending Solution

37
 Selection of solution
After along thinking we choose the solar to be our solution because solar is
from the renewable energy resources so they don't run out the second
reason it's not from the resources that cause pollution it's very eco-friendly
and another reason solar are existing in Egypt.

First: the structure of the solar cell: Since a solar cell is the only
generator in a solar PV system, it is one of the most important parts in a
solar PV system. In the following paragraphs, a simple introduction of a
solar cell and how it operates is discussed, with reference links for better
understanding.

Solar cell: A solar cell is a solid-state electrical

device (pn junction) that converts the energy of
light directly into electricity (DC) using the
photovoltaic effect. The process of conversion first
requires a material which absorbs the solar energy (photon) and
Figure then
13 solar cell raises

an electron to a higher energy state, and then the flow of this high-energy
electron to an external circuit. Silicon is one such material that uses such
process.

38
PV cells: PV cells are most commonly made of silicon, and come in two
common varieties, crystalline and thin-film cells

A p-n junction: It is formed by joining

p-type (high concentration of hole or
deficiency of electron) and n-type (high
concentration of electron) semiconductor
material. Due to this joining, excess
electrons from n-type try to diffuse with Label 1

the holes of p-type whereas excess hole from p-type tries to diffuse with the
electrons of n-type. Movement of electrons to the p-type side exposes
positive ion cores on the n-type side, while movement of holes to the n-type
side exposes negative ion.

A light-generated current: Generation of current in a solar cell, known

as the “light generated current,” involves two important processes. An
animated ideal flow at the short circuit is shown at this link: k:
http://www.pveducation.org/pvcdrom/solar-cell-
operation/lightgenerated-current.

1. Absorption of incident photons to create electron-hole pairs. Electron-

hole pairs will generate in the solar cell provided that the incident photon
has an energy greater than that of the band gap. However, electrons (in the
p-type material), and holes (in the n-type material) are meta-stable and will
only exist, on average, for a length of time equal to the minority carrier

39
lifetime before they recombine. If the carrier recombines, then the light-
generated electron-hole pair is lost and no current or power can be
generated.

2. A Collection of these carriers by the p-n junction prevents this

recombination by using a p-n junction to spatially separate the electron and
the hole. The carriers are separated by the action of the electric field existing
at the p-n junction. If the light-generated minority carrier reaches the p-n
junction, it is swept across the junction by the electric field at the junction,
where it is now a majority carrier. If the emitter and base of the solar cell are
connected together (i.e., if the solar cell is short-circuited), then the light
generated carriers flow through the external circuit.

Buck converter.

Buck converter; is a DC-to-DC power

converter which steps down voltage (while stepping
up current) from its input (supply) to its output (load)
Figure 14 buck converter
so we use it to reduce the voltage that comes from the solar cell because the
solar cell produce 18 volts and 1.11 I so we must reduce the voltage to be
suitable for the battery because the battery is 12 volt so we use this to
prevent the damage of the battery. then we connected two wires to the buck
one of them charge the battery during the night and the other wire we use
during the day so we use it to charge the mobile or any device that didn‟t
consume much load during the day. we use the switches to cut the energy

40
that go to some wire and make all energy go to the other if we want to use
the all energy that come from the buck converter .and some time you asked
why we use the

deep cycle battery: why we didn‟t use any

battery because the deep cycle battery is a lead-acid
battery designed to be regularly deeply discharged
using most of its capacity inverse some other
Figure 15 battery
batteries consume a small part of their capacity. And this battery the most
suitable battery for the solar cell. And we will use regulator to balance the
input and output that come from the battery because if the load large than
the capacity of the device that we recharged it will be damaged.

The regulator: is designed to automatically

maintain a constant voltage level. It may be used to
the regulator one or more AC or DC voltages.

Figure 16 regulator

41
 Selection of prototype
Our design requirements for our prototype:

 Efficiency
 Cost
 High accuracy
 Safety
 Consumed materials

Our prototype depends on two main things:-

First how to get electricity from the sun (solar cell) and how to control this
energy to use in different ways

Second how to store this energy and use all energy that we stored

This two thing we chose to achieve our design requirement because we

want our prototype to achieve the previous requirements:

 High efficiency

We work hard to make our prototype have high efficiency by getting

electricity from renewable source (the sun) to save energy and not to pollute
the environment because other way to get electricity have a bad effect on
the environment like fossil fuel also we work hard to make our prototype

42
with a low cost because that electricity will use in personal used like charge
the battery of Mobile and we work] to control on the electricity that we get
from the sun by used a lot of things like regulator,deep cycle battery , buck
converter and switch because we will use That electricity in two-ways first
to store that electricity which we get from the solar cell in battery to use it
during the night by switch second way make other switch to use the same
source of electricity to charge any other thing after charge the battery
during the day also we choose special kind of battery "Deep cycle battery "
because that kind we selected have advantage more than any other kind of
battery because we can use all energy that we stored in battery that all
things we make in our prototype to make our project have high efficiency.

 The cost

When we make our prototype we take of about the cost of the prototype
because we make our prototype with simple material and that table shows
the material that we used and its cost:-

Materials Source Cost

Solar cell Magic 120 L.E

Deep cycle battery Ram electronics 50 L.E

buck converter Ram electronics 20 L.E

Regulator Ram electronics 1.5 L.E

Switch Magic 1 L.E

43
 Accuracy in design

We made a lot of calculation to be sure our prototype will achieve the design
requirement like buck converter will turn 20v, 1.11A to 12V, 5A to charge the
battery and regulator will turn 12V, 5A to 5V to charge the mobile also the
battery " Deep cycle battery " we have chosen that kind because we can charge it
and take all of the energy that we stored in it. This kind saves energy more than
any other kind also we use wire with a right thick to afford the electric current
we made all of that to make our prototype have a high efficiency.

 Safety

When we make our prototype we take a lot of steps to make our prototype have
a high safety like:-

1- Make sure everything works before you use it (buck/

regulator)
2- The wire is covered
3-wire has right thick to can afford the electric current
Figure 17
 Main material consumption

The main material of our project is the solar cell; it will not affect another
organisms, industry, or transformative process. Also, it will not harm the
environment by using in on the contrary. It will redeem the environment from its
bad impacts. Besides that we can benefit from these solar cells after period of
time as fertilizers in agriculture or turn on the machine that worked in
agriculture.
44
 Constructing and Testing a Prototype

45
Materials:

Materials Source Cost Picture

Screwdriver magic 10 pounds

Avometer school From school

Sulfuric acid school From school

(H2SO4)

Crocodile magic 5 pounds

Cables

Electric wires magic 2 pounds

Solar cell ram 120 pounds

Lead acid ram 50 pounds

46
battery
 Buck magic 20 pounds
converter

Regulator magic 3 pounds

Switch magic 2 pound

(on/off)

Capacitator magic 2 pounds

Multi turn magic 1 pound

47
Methods:

1- We faced light to the Photovoltaic cell to produce electricity and

connected it by wires to the buck converter

2- We connect the solar cell with the buck converter to turn 20V and 1.11A
to 13.5V and 5A

3- We take two wires from the other side of buck converter and connect it to
the battery to charge it

4- We take connection with switch after the buck converter to charge

anything between 1V:20V and 1.11A:5A

5- We take the two wires after the battery and connect it with buck boost
converter

6- We take two wires from the other side of buck boost converter

7- We take another connection after the buck-boost converter to use it to

charge anything at the night.

48
 Test plan
Test plan:

We choose the design requirement of our projects to make it successful like Safety, the
accuracy of the result, low energy consumption, efficiency, eco-friendly and we achieve
these design requirement.

We connected the solar cell to the buck converter then we connect the switches to the
wires that come from the buck converter .so we measured the voltage and the current on
the first wire that goes to the battery so when we measured the voltage, the Avometer
read that the buck converter produce 13.5 v after the modifications that make us sure that
the buck converter work perfectly because it must produce voltage more than the input of
the battery to charge it completely. Then when we measured the other wire that comes
from the buck converter we recognize that the buck produces voltage and current
according to the devices we charged like phone or lamp finally the buck produce power
that must be suitable for the charged device. This table shows the products of the buck
converter compared to the devices before the modifications.

Device voltage current

Phone 3± V 1.5± A

Deep cycle battery 8± V 3± A

Head phone 1.5± V 700 ± mA

Table 3
49
The project we tested was too poor in charging
the devices. The voltage and the current were
too low compared to the suitable voltage and
the current of the devices. So we change the
solar cells into cell produce 20 V and 1.11A to
produce the suitable voltage and current and
we ran the test again .the results for the test is Chart 9
found in the table(3) below.

Device voltage current

phone 5± V 3± A

Deep cycle battery 13.5± V 5± A

Head phone 3± V 1.5± A

Table 4

The project charges the devices we want

successfully at the end, achieving the
design requirement with no lake of the
suitable current or voltage. The project
didn’t face any damage or explosion
during the test. So we achieve the design
Figure 18
requirement that we specify to our project.

50
 Data collection
Based on,

 Efficiency
 Cost
 High accuracy
 Safety
 Consumed materials. test

Tool used:

 solar cell
 buck converter
 deep cycle battery
 wires
 switches
Data collected: After finishing our prototype, we collected the results, numbers
and energy product, then we measured these results on the chosen design requirements
to know if they are achieved or not.

The Solar cell produced 20v, 1.1 A.

Finally, USB wire produced at maximum 12v, 5A.

51
  At the first test plan, we noticed that there are some disadvantages during doing
devices' charging.
(As in the following table)

device voltage current

phone 3 ± 0.2 V 1.5±0.1 A

Deep cycle battery 8±0.1 V 3± 0.2A

Head phone 1.5± 0.3V 700 ± 0.2mA

Table 5

The project we tested was too poor in Device voltage current

charging the devices. The voltage and
Phone 5± V 3± A
the current were too low compared to
the suitable voltage and the current of Deep cycle 13.5±V 5± A
the devices. So we change the solar cell battery
into the cell produces 20 V and 1.11A
to produce the suitable voltage and Head phone 3± V 1.5± A

current thus, we repeated the test again. Table 6

Results for the second test changed a lot

and became better than the previous test
as shown in the table.

52 Chart 10
Our project finally charged the devices we want
successfully, achieving the design requirements with no
lake of the suitable current or voltage. In addition, it
didn’t face any damage or explosion during the test.

We also used many tools and devices to measure the

quantities of energy and the power of like:
Figure 19
ammeter
We used digital ammeter (at the end of the circuit) to make

Sure of measuring the current in it. Electric currents are measured in amperes (A),
hence the name. Instruments used to measure smaller currents, in milliampere or
microampere range, are designated as milliammeters or microammeters.

We also used AVO meter during the test plan to measure

the energy product in ampere and volt.

All of above make our second test plan at the high level of
precision due to the regular product of the energy which
we get from this project. Figure 20

53
 Evaluation, Reflection,
Recommendations

54
 Discussion
This semester’s capstone project is specially made
to lead to the vanish of pollution and the vanish of
the lack of electricity and its high cost. That was
accomplished in the presence of systems, benefits
of resources and high performances.

The Road to the solution:

We generated energy from the solar cell that generates 20 watts divided into 20 voltage
and 1 amber then the electric current goes in buck converter to Adjusts the Power
intensity in the electric wires. Then we used buck converter and buck-boost converter
to change the electrical voltage and electric current. The buck converter works as the
electron first goes to the capacitator then to the IC then go to the other carp stators
and finally, it goes to the resistor and regulated according to the charged device. That is
why we used the buck converter to regulate the voltage and current of the charged
devices. Then the electron goes in two ways the first one to the deep cycle battery we
choose this kind of batteries because they are designed to be regularly deeply
discharged using most of its capacity. All of this is used to charge the battery of the
phone and to save the battery undamaged we measured the charge of electricity by
multimeter to calculate the real charge that generated
from the cell.

Solving pollution:

55
 This project is designed in this circle pass to block any gasses or pollution that comes
out of it. If any toxic gasses or any face of pollution is produced by any system, it is
used in another place to allow full safety and vanishing of pollution. The materials used
in this project are completely eco-friendly. It doesn’t make any type of pollution. In
short words, there is completely no pollution comes out from this project which makes
it a special one in solving this problem.

Solving economic problems:

: Egypt is facing a huge problem that has many

causes, and that is the economic problem. Solving
this problem leads to the solving of too many
problems. The project is designed to solve the lack
of electricity and its high cost using resources of
nature and high performance of handy work. The
current bad economic has too many faces, one of them is caused by the lack of
electricity. Solving the high cost of electricity and blackouts that happen in factories
and industrial places means increasing in industrial production and economic.
Nowadays in Egypt, there a lot of consumption of electricity and also population
growth, to balance this, it requires a huge amount of electricity, resources and money,
but without solving or balancing, this will lead to a lot of problems in economic and a
huge decrease in the country’s economic rate which will also lead to other major
problems.

Solving transportation problem:

Transportation in all ways is bad in Egypt whether

it is made because of population growth or the
56
lack of electricity, and if you think for a while you will find that it is all connected to
each other in some way. So this means that lack of electricity leads to transportation
problems like blackouts that lead to the accident on many roads especially high roads
in the night.

Frist: the structure of the solar cell:

Since a solar cell is the only generator in a solar PV system, it is one of the most
important parts in a solar PV system. In the following paragraphs, a simple
introduction of a solar cell and how it operates is discussed, with reference links for
better understanding.

A solar cell: A solar cell is a solid-state electrical

device (pn junction) that converts the energy of light
directly into electricity (DC) using the photovoltaic
effect. The process of conversion first requires a
material which absorbs the solar energy (photon)
and then raises an electron to a higher energy state, and then the flow of this high-
energy electron to an external circuit. Silicon is one such material that uses such
process.

PV cells: PV cells are most commonly

made of silicon, and come in two common
varieties, crystalline and thin-film cells

PN junction: It is formed by joining p-

type (high concentration of hole or deficiency
of electron) and n-type (high concentration of

57
electron) semiconductor material. Due to this joining, excess electrons from n-type try
to diffuse with the holes of p-type whereas access hole from p-type tries to diffuse
with the electrons of n-type. Movement of electrons to the p-type side exposes
positive ion cores on the n-type side, while movement of holes to the n-type side
exposes negative ion cores on the p-type side, resulting in an electron field at the
junction and forming the depletion region.

A light-generated current: Generation of current in a solar cell, known as

the “light generated current,” involves two important processes. An animated ideal
flow at the short circuit is shown at this link:
http://www.pveducation.org/pvcdrom/solar-cell-operation/lightgenerated-current.

1. Absorption of incident photons to create electron-hole pairs. Electron-hole pairs

will generate in the solar cell provided that the incident photon has energy greater than
that of the band gap. However, electrons (in the p-type material), and holes (in the n-
type material) are meta-stable and will only exist, on average, for a length of time equal
to the minority carrier lifetime before they recombine. If the carrier recombines, then
the light-generated electron-hole pair is lost and no current or power can be generated.

2. A Collection of these carriers by the p-n junction prevents this recombination by

using a p-n junction to spatially separate the electron and the hole. The carriers are
separated by the action of the electric field existing at the p-n junction. If the light-
generated minority carrier reaches the p-n junction, it is swept across the junction by
the electric field at the junction, where it is now a majority carrier. If the emitter and
base of the solar cell are connected together (i.e., if the solar cell is short-circuited),
then the light generated carriers flow through the external circuit.

58
Photovoltaic effect: The collection of light-generated carriers does not by itself
give rise to power generation. In order to generate power, a voltage must be generated
as well as a current. Voltage is generated in a solar cell by a process known as the
“photovoltaic effect.” The collection of light-generated carriers by the p-n junction
causes a movement of electrons to the n-type side and holes to the p-type side of the
junction. Under short circuit conditions, the carriers exit the device as light-generated
current. With this basic idea of the operation of a solar cell, a thorough explanation of
modeling of a solar cell by using a diode with the diode ideality factor and the
operation temperature as well as the parasitic resistance (due to manufacturing defects)
will be discussed later.

The design requirements such as the first one are safety which we achieved by making
the way of construction must be safe and adaptable for any environment and trying to
avoid the bad consequences of exploitation the main materials needed and to avoid the
bad effects of the materials produced. the second one is personal which we should be
sure to make our project is able to produce electricity that enough one person like to
produce 5 volts, 1.5 I that can charge a mobile or light a room if the light out. The
third one is using less cost which our project should need less cost. To achieve this
design requirements we should measure the electricity that generated so we used
multimeter and we find the solar cell produce 20 voltage and 1.11 amber so we used a
buck converter to change the amount of voltage and amber and we used the digital
multimeter to make our measuring precision and accurate with our calculation and we
calculate the ratio of wrong in our calculation.

59
 Recommendation
1- Complete our project`s plan. We didn’t complete it because of time,
using Arduino to control the cycle of the integrated system to save an
amount of electricity automatically
2- Use green plastid responsible for photosynthesis in the structure of the
solar cell to increase the efficiency of the produced electricity.
3- Search for chemical substances that can be painted on the surface of the
solar cell to produce more energy
4- Reduce the consumption of energy of the project
5- Reduce the total cost of the project
6- Search for types of battery that have more qualifications
7- Using digital equipment to measure the electricity that produced
8- Interesting using safety as we do while construction the whole project

60
 Learning transfer
In geology: 1- We knew the concepts of the energy, its types, their advantages,
and their disadvantages.
2- We knew the advantages of the PV solar cell and also we knew the
disadvantages of it and we avoided it in our project.
3- We learned where we must place the PV solar cell.
In chemistry: 1- We knew the concepts of the electricity, voltage, and
electrical wires. We got to benefit from that to form a circuit in the prototype.

2- We learned how to calculate the voltage and the current intensity using
electrical devices like the multimeter.
In biology: We knew the relation between the solar cell and the plant since
they are both using the solar energy to produce energy so this L.O helped us to
know the working idea of the solar cell.
In math: 1- We learned the functions and equations to represent the relation
between the solar energy and the amount of the energy.

2- We made graphs so we could predict the amount of energy that we would get
according to some givens.
In physics: We learned the graphs of energy to make graphs for the energy in
our project to make a veritable circuit.
In Mechanics: We knew the concepts of mass, acceleration, net force and
friction and this helped us in our capstone since determining the mass of the
objects helped us to make our prototype.

61
62