Customers generate power during workouts at green gym

Daily Mail : The Green Microgym franchise in Portland, Oregon, is harnessing the energy created during its clients’ workouts and turning it back into electricity. At both of its gyms in Portland, custom-made exercise bicycles power a generator, which creates electricity. The electricity is then fed back into the building, to help power the lights, fans, stereo, and flat-screen TVs. Because gyms tend to use a lot of power, mostly for lights, heating, and cooling, the electricity-generating machines can’t power the entire gym, but they can reduce the gym’s draw from the electrical grid. Owner Adam Boesel says that the eco-machines have been garnering a lot of interest but that they’re “just the shiny wrapper on a package, which is energy efficiency.” Besides the bikes, the gym uses solar panels, renewable-source flooring, and toilet paper made from recycled materials.