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Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces

When a fluid comes into contact with a solid surface, charge separates at the interface. This study describes a method that harvests the gravitational energy of water—available in abundance naturally, such as in rain and rivers—through the separation of charge at the interface. Essentially, it is fo...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Sun, Yajuan, Huang, Xu, Soh, Siowling
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Royal Society of Chemistry 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5490415/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28706699
http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/c5sc00473j
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author Sun, Yajuan
Huang, Xu
Soh, Siowling
author_facet Sun, Yajuan
Huang, Xu
Soh, Siowling
author_sort Sun, Yajuan
collection PubMed
description When a fluid comes into contact with a solid surface, charge separates at the interface. This study describes a method that harvests the gravitational energy of water—available in abundance naturally, such as in rain and rivers—through the separation of charge at the interface. Essentially, it is found that water can be charged by flowing it across a solid surface under its own weight; thus, a continuous flow of water can produce a constant supply of power. After optimizing the system, a power of up to ∼170 μW (per Teflon tube of 2 mm in diameter) can be generated. The efficiency, defined as the energy generated by the system over the gravitational energy that the water losses, can reach up to ∼3–4%. In order to generate a continuous stream of positively-charged water, there should also be a constant production of negatively-charged species in the system. Experimental results suggest that the negative charge transfers constantly to the atmosphere due to dielectric breakdown of air. With regards to applications related to high electrical potential of water droplets, the amount of charge generated in a single water droplet is found to be equivalent to that produced by charging the water droplet with a high-voltage power supply operated at ∼5 kV. In general, the energy generated is clean, renewable, and technically simple and inexpensive to produce.
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spelling pubmed-54904152017-07-13 Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces Sun, Yajuan Huang, Xu Soh, Siowling Chem Sci Chemistry When a fluid comes into contact with a solid surface, charge separates at the interface. This study describes a method that harvests the gravitational energy of water—available in abundance naturally, such as in rain and rivers—through the separation of charge at the interface. Essentially, it is found that water can be charged by flowing it across a solid surface under its own weight; thus, a continuous flow of water can produce a constant supply of power. After optimizing the system, a power of up to ∼170 μW (per Teflon tube of 2 mm in diameter) can be generated. The efficiency, defined as the energy generated by the system over the gravitational energy that the water losses, can reach up to ∼3–4%. In order to generate a continuous stream of positively-charged water, there should also be a constant production of negatively-charged species in the system. Experimental results suggest that the negative charge transfers constantly to the atmosphere due to dielectric breakdown of air. With regards to applications related to high electrical potential of water droplets, the amount of charge generated in a single water droplet is found to be equivalent to that produced by charging the water droplet with a high-voltage power supply operated at ∼5 kV. In general, the energy generated is clean, renewable, and technically simple and inexpensive to produce. Royal Society of Chemistry 2015-06-01 2015-03-26 /pmc/articles/PMC5490415/ /pubmed/28706699 http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/c5sc00473j Text en This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2015 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Chemistry
Sun, Yajuan
Huang, Xu
Soh, Siowling
Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title_full Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title_fullStr Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title_full_unstemmed Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title_short Using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
title_sort using the gravitational energy of water to generate power by separation of charge at interfaces
topic Chemistry
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5490415/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28706699
http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/c5sc00473j
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