a new idea that 2 students from MIT dreamt up to harvest the power of human beings...a little close to the matrix sounding but actually a feasible idea that caught my eye so i thought i'd post it
it is a way to harness the kinetic energy of the footsteps of crowds of people in buy areas...its thought that the energy from a single step could briefly light up 2 60 watt lightbulbs and thus if u multiply it up thousands fold then the energy from 30,000 steps would b enough to power a train breifly and 84 million steps would be enough to launch a space shuttle
the idea is to replace normal concrete slabs with ones that move slightly on contact and create a dynamo effect to generate electricity
obviously in itself it couldn't be a massive source of energy but renewables need to gather power from any source available and this could contribute it a small way provided its used in busy areas such as subway/underground stations and busy shopping centres
it could b a way to offset the massive amounts of energy used at concerts whereby the crowd movement could help offset the energy used at the gig...
Not a bad idea. I'd like to see a cost/watt sort of ratio for the technology at this point (installation and labour included of course). It sounds like a funky gadget, but I don't really see it as a potential source of power, at least now.
Might work, crowd movement can transfer a respectable amount of force on a surface. Pinkpop 1998 for example, the crowd caused local eathquakes measuring 1.5 and near 2 on the scale of Richter during the performances of Primus and Rage Against the Machine.
Question remains, is the industrial process of making these dynamo-tiles 'clean' enough to make it a environmentally friendly source of energy compared to their energy output?
As Pandemoniac pointed out, the way in which this technology is built needs to be clean and the materials themselves need to be environmentally friendly. I would say that the tiles should not be too big but not too small. Maybe 1X.5 meter.(or smaller)
Also, these tiles should be rounded on the ends to keep people from tripping, depending on how deep they will let the tiles depress when stepped on.
Depending on how deep the tiles depress, it could actually be easier on the joints to walk on these tiles.
If they could make really tiny "tiles" then it would be more natural to walk on. (Just like a picture is made of pixels and he more dense the pixels are packed in, the harder it is to see actual pixels.)
Good point there. The stuff has to remain comfortable for pedestrians. Maybe it's possible to harness energy from the low frequency vibrations caused by footsteps, so the tiles themselves won't have to depress or move much at all. But that would require a very vibration-conductive material for the tiles and a very effective sort of generator/dynamo that can somehow transfer that energy.
KMC Community Forums
Oct 26th, 2007 11:35 AM
with thanks to the awesome Cresh
