Imagine a world with no wall chargers. People power might just make that world a reality.
That's because our own bodies
just might be the sustainable energy sources of the near future,
generating electricity from our own body heat, physical movement and
vibrations.
Roger Highfield of the Science Museum Group
writes that scientists are already at work on a number of such devices,
with the first wave of human-powered generators hitting the market in
the next two years.
The word piezoelectricity means
to generate energy from pressure and can be derived from a number of
sources, including ceramics, crystals and even biological material, such
as DNA and bone.
Researchers have spent years
attempting to derive energy from nontraditional sources. For example,
the East Japan Railway Company has experimented with using train gates to generate electricity as commuters pass through them.
And researchers at MIT have been working on creating a "crowd farm" that would generate electricity from human movement in public spaces.University of Wisconsin-Madison associate professor Tom Krupenkin told Highfield that placing a salty liquid within the soles of shoes could generate enough electricity to power many of the devices used by millions of consumers around the world.
Still, even skeptics like Winkless see a promising future around the corner for these alternative energy generators.
"Energy harvesting pots could
mean that boiling your pasta charges your mobile phone," she said. "The
vibrations of your washing machine could power wireless sensors—or your
TV remote could be powered just by you pressing the buttons."
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