A businessman and his team of engineers have come up with a bicycle which can power an entire home following just 60 minutes of cycling. 

Manoj Bhargava hopes his home fitness bike will help to transform life for the poorest people in the world and could also reduce the environmental effects of usage generated by the half that has power in abundance.

The Indian American Businessman moved to the USA aged 14 and is most well known for his energy drink company ‘5 Hour Energy’. Sales of the caffeinated drink have exceeded $1 billion this year and its creator has pledged to give away 99 per cent of his net worth to improve the well-being of the less fortunate.

“If you have wealth, it’s your duty to help those who don’t”

He says: “If you have wealth, it’s your duty to help those who don’t” and has set up a factory and campaign called ‘Billions in Change’ devoted to inventions which could help solve problems around lack of water and power for the world.

The Free Electric Bicycle is just one of a series of creations. Pedaling the bike spins a flywheel, which turns a generator, thus charging a battery.

The 62-year-old anticipates that the bicycles could be manufactured for as little as $100 each. The bikes won’t be given away for free. The entrepreneur believes that this would lead to users failing to look after them. He says initially villages will need to pool resources, buying one bike with multiple batteries that (when charged) can be swapped between homes.

Bhargava calls energy “the great equaliser” and hopes that the bike, which provides what the company call ‘Free Electric’, will have the greatest effect of any invention in the last one hundred years.

“The poor have stayed poor because they have no power, they have no energy – and that’s one of the most fundamental things.”

Calling the device “the cheapest, most practical way of getting electricity throughout the world”, he says: “the real thing is to get the poor out of poverty, and one of the basic [needs] is energy. The poor have stayed poor because they have no power, they have no energy – and that’s one of the most fundamental things.”

Here he is talking about the invention…