Free Electricity Out Of The Air! Did Nikola Tesla Have It Right All Along?
Preparing for the unexpected is now expected.
Nikola Tesla has a cult following. Names like Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein are inventors whose achievements are the staples of school lessons. Tesla (1856-1943), by contrast, lurks in the murky shadows of mysterious imagination, understood by no one but revered by many, including the likes of Elon Musk who has put the Tesla name in front of millions with his electric vehicles.
Many of today’s modern conveniences, ranging from remote controls to wireless transmissions to X-rays, originate with the Serbian-born inventor who spent most of his career in New York. With over 300 patents, Tesla has been called “the man who invented the 20th century.” Tesla may soon be remembered as the man who saved the 21st century as well. In the early 1900s, Tesla believed it was possible to harness energy directly from the air. Tesla devised numerous experiments to capture electrical charges from the atmosphere and turn them into electric current for humanity’s use. Basically, he was trying to put lightning in a bottle. Tesla, so far ahead of his time once more, couldn’t find the financial backing to fully develop the idea.
Today, Tesla’s idea has a name: hygroelectricity or humidity electricity. In May, a team at the University of Massachusetts (UMass )Amherst published a paper detailing how they accidentally generated a small but continuous current from the humidity in the air. The team had been working on a sensor that could measure humidity but when a student in charge of the device forgot to plug in the power, they were startled to discover that the device, mostly composed of nanotubes, was producing a charge nonetheless. Each nanotube was wide enough for an airborne water molecule to enter and when it did, the water molecule bumped around, creating a small charge. As the number of bumps increased, one end of the nanotube became differently charged than the other, effectively creating a battery with positive and negative flow. The team has now switched to using tiny nanopores arranged on a flat sheet. Stack enough of them, together and you can power an entire house.
Don’t roll your eyes and say that will never happens just yet. (I’m talking to you, Vinnie!) The Lisbon-based CATCHER project (catcherproject.eu). involving eight partners from six countries, is developing a humidity-to electricity converter using nanomaterial panels made from zirconium oxide. Right now, CATCHER has a small plate that works in 50 percent humidity and generates about half the output of a AA battery. CATCHER is developing methods to make the converter more efficient. As the converter doesn’t work in low humidity, the goal is to incorporate it into existing heating and cooling systems. One idea is that perforated water pipes in the ceiling pass over a converter panel, feeding it hot or cold water, depending upon whether the room is to be be cooled or warmed. The panel then absorbs or radiates heat as desired. A separate company (cascatachuva.eu)) is working to commercialize the project. If successful, the implications are enormous. CATCHER estimates hygroelectricity could exceed Europe’s power requirements by 500 times.
Nikola Tesla, by the way, is the subject of a chapter in my forthcoming book (August 1) called MADE IN NEW YORK, 25 Innovators Who Shaped Our World. The focus is on Tesla’s invention of the remote control which eventually morphed into death ray weapon research funded by the Soviet Union and finally into a space-based laser weapon plan by the United States. Perhaps even more strangely, there turns out to be a link between Tesla and former U.S president Donald Trump. Tesla died under mysterious circumstances during World War II and his passing triggered a national security alert. MADE IN NEW YORK is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Target and directly from the publisher, the State University of New York Press (sunypress.edu/Books/M/Made-In-New-York). You can pre-order now to guarantee a copy.