Next year my boyfriend and I will be living in an apartment in Oslo. I'm going to garden indoors, since we won't have a yard and it's usually pretty cold and dark outside, anyway. We were thinking about partially powering all the necessary lighting (for my plants) with electricity generated during our daily bike commute.

He knows someone we can probably get a few old bottle dynamos from for free, and we were thinking that we could hook some of those up to a battery. I like to tinker, but I actually know very little about electricity or this kind of thing. However, I'm not looking for a kit to buy so that I can charge my mp3 player, or AA batteries. I'm looking for something a bit larger than that, and more DIY. The only information I can find on the net is about stationary bike generators. : (

To recap I want to use bottle dynamos to generate electricity during my daily commute, store this electricity, and use it to power a bunch of lights.

I'd like to know if anyone else has documented a project similar to this that I could use as a reference, what kind of battery would be best, the pros and cons of bottle dynamos(I've read the wiki but I'd like a personal opinion,) and most importantly how practical an idea this is. If it's more than a bit unpractical I can handle it, things are more fun that way. But I want to know the facts so that I don't get my hopes up.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post, and thanks in advance for any help. : )
- Diane