Part 2 of this article discusses the possibilities to address the following parts with the help of electronics:

1. Remote borewell operation

Today the borewell starters sense the presence of three or single phase power and turn on the borewell pump automatically. Unless there is an operator present, to channel the water or water a different sector of the farm, water output of up to 100 to 300 liters per minute will continue to flow mostly to undesirable sectors.

Sectors: Let me explain what this is. Say you have a 3 acre of farm. This three acres will be divided into say three secto......

"Agricultural Electronics" exits in bits and pieces already throughout the world but more so in developed countries. I have few thoughts here that I am going to put down.

India is predominantly an agricultural country. Crops that are dependent on rain in my state are grown between June and November. Fruits, vegetables are all either river or deep ground water dependent. When rains become unpredictable, water source from rivers become scarce; dependency on borewells increases.

Most of the Agricultural Borewell pumps over 3 HP run on 3 phase 3 wire (Delta) 440V AC. Power crunch results in thr......

I apologize for not been able to write part 2 sooner.  I am back.

so 10W of LED lighting, 12V, 6AH lead acid battery, Panel size depending on the time within which you want your battery charged.

Solar Panel output is say 15W/Sq. Ft. 14.4 V * 6 A = 86.4W. Consider you get an average of 10W/Sq. Ft throughout the day out of a panel. So 10W or 1 Sq.FT of panel will charge your battery in approximately 8.64 or 9 Hours. 15 Watts in panel output will do it in 6 hours and so on. 

Let us start with Lead Acid Battery Charging Part. The 12V Lead Acid Battery, not considering temperature c......

The best way to understand the intricacies of a simple home lighting using solar is to make one.
Let's start with "Solar Constant" Solar constant is a misnomer for it is not really a constant. The value varies between 1350 to 1370 W/sq. meter. Solar radiation received at any given moment is solar constant times the earth's cross sectional area. Since only half the spherical area is exposed to the sun, the area is Pi * Diameter Squared / 4. Where Diameter is earth's diameter. Average solar power per unit area is 1/4 of the solar constant.
So 1350/4 =340W/m^2. Out of this amount 30% is reflected back to t......

On another note, did the folks in the power community get a chance to attend the Design Seminar held at Lalit Ashok in Bangalore on March 25th, 2009? What was your opinion?

All the older Unitrode power supply design seminars are on the web at
http://focus.ti.com/analog/docs/training.tsp?familyId=64

If you have questions on any of the power converter topologies or regarding any articles, please let me know and I will be happy to answer or get you the answers.

Ram

It’s time we try out alternative sources of energy

For emerging economies like India and China, which are hungry for power, it should be possible to add a residential wind mill generating about 200W of average power. Having lived in India, I think the proposed wind mill will have to fulfill the following criteria as a minimum but not limited to:

1. Ease of installation and service
2. Reasonable useful span of life (at least 10 years)
3. Charge the household UPS/Inverter batteries - a priority
4. Either aid in powering the homes or feed the energy back to the grid when the ho......

Worldwide, there has been a push to use CFL lighting instead of incandescent lighting. However, with CFL lighting, we will have to think of how the bulbs would be disposed off after use. Heavy metals like mercury, xenon, sodium, etc. should not contaminate the water source.
The next best alternative is LED lighting. Just like the CFLs, LED lighting needs specific powering schemes since they cannot use AC source that is routed around the house. Just to compare, 60W Incandescent is equivalent to about 14 Watts CFL and is equivalent to about 6W of white LED lighting. Though in the beginning the ini......