New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
newsroom.ucla.edu
New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
1–10 of 37 posts
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#2I'm going to take a shit on a water wheel and publish one of these papers... "Scientist finally figure out how to harvest electricity from your toilet, potential applications include powering lights with pee"
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#3100% useless but very clever nonetheless.
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#4tl;dr: Snow is positively charged and gives up electrons. Silicone is negatively charged. When falling snow contacts the surface of silicone, that produces a charge that the device captures, creating electricity.
This appears to be more useful for wearables than as a replacement for solar panels in the winter. I can't imagine the amount of power generated could be that great. It reminds me of one of those stationary bikes hooked up to a toaster.
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#5UCLA is finding ways to handle all the snow they see
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#6Despite my strong skepticism of this technology being used as a replacement or even supplement for solar panels anytime in the near future, I really admire the creative thought process that led them to get even the miniscule results they did.
I'm not a chemist or phyhsicist in any regard, so I can't say whether this could be the stepping stone to something more large scale down the line. Could anyone shed light on whether there are any physical limits given the materials used (slilcone, snow, etc.) to how much energy you could extract?
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#7tl;dr: Snow is positively charged and gives up electrons. Silicone is negatively charged. When falling snow contacts the surface of silicone, that produces a charge that the device captures, creating electricity. This appears to be more useful for wearables than as a replacement for solar panels in the winter. I can't imagine the amount of power generated could be that great. It reminds me of one of those stationary…
"This appears to be more useful for wearables than as a replacement for solar panels in the winter."
That's a degree of bullshit so high that it has me seriously questioning what otherwise sounds at least reasonable. Yeah, I know, every science paper has to connect itself to some fashionable area of research that will excite the grant writers, like renewable energy or climate change, but the idea that it would ever be practical to capture that much power from snow is absurd. This is a particularly tenuous connection. The upper bounds on this technique are tiny; any advantage it may have is in its ability to deliver tiny amounts of power to places that would otherwise have none. If snow had any significant amount of energy in it, we'd know, because we'd get shocked when we stood in it.
I think I'm going to settle on feeling bad for the scientists that they've done such interesting work and were forced by the system to spew such heavy bullshit on top of it to keep getting funded.
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#8Despite my strong skepticism of this technology being used as a replacement or even supplement for solar panels anytime in the near future, I really admire the creative thought process that led them to get even the miniscule results they did. I'm not a chemist or phyhsicist in any regard, so I can't say whether this could be the stepping stone to something more large scale down the line. Could anyone shed light on wh…
In the paper, the product produces 0.2 mW/m^2
Solar panels produce 175W/m^2 for comparison.
If this ever produced 1W/m^2 I'd be shocked.
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#9* A new device - snow-based triboelectric nanogenerator, or snow TENG - creates electricity from falling snow, among other potential uses.
* Richard Kaner (highly influential and cited scientist) and team used 3D printing to design a device that combines silicone with an electrode.
* Thanks to “the ease of fabrication and the availability of silicone” the device, which is essentially a small sheet of plastic, could be produced at low cost.
* It can work in remote areas, doesn’t need batteries, and could be used in solar panels, or self-powered wearables for tracking athletes.
PS. Yesterday posted on https://bullets.tech - I'm looking for people interested in science to help us writing summaries and selecting scientific content
Re: New scientific device creates electricity from snowfall
#10tl;dr: Snow is positively charged and gives up electrons. Silicone is negatively charged. When falling snow contacts the surface of silicone, that produces a charge that the device captures, creating electricity. This appears to be more useful for wearables than as a replacement for solar panels in the winter. I can't imagine the amount of power generated could be that great. It reminds me of one of those stationary…
>Silicone is negatively charged.
It's definitely not negatively charged, it just has a propensity for accumulating negative charge (like in the cloth and rod static electricity experiment).