Victoria Annie Lambert
Hydro Habits Hub
The Hydro Habits Hub repurposes overlooked energy from used water in homes while fostering habits that raise awareness of water usage. Households are significant energy consumers, yet breaking unsustainable habits can be challenging. This device displays water usage data and supplies clean energy in a communal space, with added features like key hooks, blackboard paint, and a phone charging station to encourage regular interaction and boost water consumption awareness.
Project Overview
Project Brief
Produce a concept design for a new data-driven technology for the home that promotes environmentally sustainable behaviour. The digital technology should use sensors and actuators to sense and respond to the world. You must create a physical prototype that effectively communicates your concept and its intended behaviours.
Challenge
Research shows that households are major energy consumers, contributing significantly to carbon emissions. However, it’s important to recognize that shifting away from unsustainable habits can be challenging.
Duration
3 Weeks
Roles
UX Researcher/Designer
Methods
Card Sorting, Affinity Mapping and User Journey
Practices/Tools
Research, Photoshop, 3D Printing, Laser Cutting, Soldering, MicroBit, Miro, Adobe Indesign, Powerpoint, Excel, Figjam, Procreate
How might we collect and use untouched clean energy in the home while also being more mindful of our water usage?
Objective
Turn wasted potential hydro energy to use in homes to increase clean energy usage. Additionally create a regularly visited device that will encourage users to be aware of their water usage and utilize the clean energy stored from water being used.
More to come...
Page under construction
Define
Ideation
To start my ideation phase I made a list of places in the home and sustainable practices for those areas. When considering alternative energy sources for at home use, solar and wind appeared in my research most frequently. This led me to actively search for hydro powered devices or systems for the home in which I found a gap in research. It got me thinking about what kind of potential energy the water we consume has and how plausible an at home hydroelectric system would be.
Discover
Background Research
To test the validity of my hydroelectric curiosities I consulted with an Electrical Engineer student. I first questioned how much electricity could a turbine that could fit in a water pipe produce in a home, what could it power and what are the safety concerns? The key takeaways were the type of electricity generated would be decent but not enough to power your whole house. Also for safety reasons and to avoid affecting water pressure problems harvesting a smaller amount of wattage would be best. This led me to the conclusion that its uses could be to power smaller devices/appliances.
Develop
Design
My initial goal was to just provide a clean energy source for households from used water. I considered different low watt devices that could be charged using this energy and thought about which are most regularly used. Power banks, batteries and phones don’t require high wattage for charging and are commonplace in many homes. Thinking of ways to comfortably and conveniently charge these devices was at the forefront of my mind.
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However, one concern that arose was what if having this renewable electricity source effected users mentality about using water. Using consumable water as a main source for energy would not be environmentally friendly. It takes a lot of energy to clean and transport household water. The intention is not to justify using more water to power at home devices but rather getting two uses from the used water instead of one. Having the user conscious of water consumption and how it compares to the average household could help prevent the mentality of justifying using more water to harvest more energy. And it could help with another sustainability goal of reducing wasteful water consumption.
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One’s water consumption information isn’t conveniently located for most households. Water meters are traditionally in obscure areas surrounding the home and use measuring units people aren’t familiar with. Most households rather learn of their water usage from their monthly water bill. With some inspiration from different HCI sustainable home designs articles for information visualization, I added two visual cues for water usage (daily water usage amount and a LED light display with emojis). My last main concern was how to create a habit of checking the device aside from charging devices. There needed to be an element that wasn’t as monotonous as plugging and unplugging devices. If there wasn’t variety the numbers might be ignored. The blackboard space allows for communication about or around the information displayed along with other uses to make it more frequently visited.
Physical Components
The fully functional device is intended to have four parts: a turbine with coils, blackboard information panel, electronic display and generator.
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The turbine with coils could be installed in the main water line. The electric currents can be channeled through two wires that can lead to a generator that would be concealed in the wall. For this prototype, the 3D printed Turbine was used to simulate the concept of water powering the device and providing electricity for families, however the coils and generator were not built due to lack of time, materials and expertise. Without these pieces the device does not actually create electricity. The electronic bits are powered by an external battery.
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The electronic displays are: 1) four single digit number displays (only one being operational for the prototype due to lack of pins on the Micro:bit) , 2) two LED lights, 3) a Micro:Bit and 4) LED display screen. ​
1) The number display shows a user’s water usage (in liters) for the day and the electricity(in watts) harvested by the hydroelectric turbine in their water line. This component was used in place of the LED screen due to its increase of visibility from a distance.
2) A user can choose which number is being displayed by using one of the two buttons on the Micro:bit. Pressing button A will trigger a yellow light for electricity and button B a blue light for water. Above the lights are two icons, a water drop and lightning bolt for extra clarification (especially for those who are color blind).
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3) Two features of the Micro:bit are used: the buttons and LED light display. The buttons change the digit display between water usage and electricity harvested. The LED light display will react to the number being displayed with an emoji to represent how well the users are doing at not wasting their water. This will give effortless indication for users about their water consumption for the day.
4) Below the number display is a LED screen that will quantify the electricity, generated from their used water, available in terms that are easier to quantify (amount of phone charges).
All the electronic devices were fastened on the pack of a wooden board to create the blackboard information panel. The front of the board was painted with blackboard paint to create a reusable writable surface. This affords it to be used as a communication tool to write notes, lists and messages. On the bottom left corner there is a phone charger with multiple adapter tips along with a place to rest the phone. The bottom right corner has an outlet that can be used to power small appliances. At the bottom of the prototype there is a shelf to rest things like chalk and other household tools.
Deliver
Hurdles and Compromises
With each solution to a problem came yet another setback. To start, the lack of pins on the microbit wouldn’t allow for four number blocks to be set up together. A 4 in one number display was tried instead but unfortunately required more power than the microbit could offer, resulting in not all the LED segments being able to light up at once. Still determined to use the 7 segment number display, due to its better visibility than the LED screen, a single number block was wired up and three inactive blocks were tapped beside it to suggest higher numbers can be displayed.
After properly wiring everything up the electronics were not fitting up against the back of the board. The bulk of the wires and breadboard caused alignment issues. Soldering the number display and lights helped all the digital parts to fit comfortably on the back.
The biggest takeaway from building this physical prototype is the importance of getting your digital components settled before getting too far in your design and building of the vessel for your tech. The spacing of components had to be adjusted and features were thrown out due to over complication and lack of digital equipment.
