My Nephew (Ashwin Ramesh) is doing his final year B-Tech(Mechanical) in IIT Madras. He and his friends have won the prestigious General Electric’s “Edison Challenge”. This is a national level competition pitting science students from across the country against each other to find the best technological innovations to provide electricity in rural India.
The winning team comprising Kaushik Anand K., Midhun Salim, Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Ashwin Ramesh and Aditya Harit from IIT Madras walked away with the top prize of Rs. 5 lakh. They won the prize for an idea on power generation that involved “gasifying dehusked paddy” and distributing the power generated through the innovative concept of AC coupled micro-grid. The idea was based on the construction of community toilets keeping in mind village dynamics and using the waste generated to produce biogas and distribute it using balloon canisters.
General Electric’s “Edison Challenge