Wireless power system shown off. Meet the future, Witricity.

[sarcasmo]

Snip<


Electric tech could make plugs obsolete

A system that can deliver power to devices without the need for wires has been shown off at a hi-tech conference.

The technique exploits simple physics and can be used to charge a range of electronic devices over many metres.

Eric Giler, chief executive of US firm Witricity, showed mobile phones and televisions charging wirelessly at the TED Global conference in Oxford.

He said the system could replace the miles of expensive power cables and billions of disposable batteries.

"There is something like 40 billion disposable batteries built every year for power that, generally speaking, is used within a few inches or feet of where there is very inexpensive power," he said.

Trillions of dollars, he said, had also been invested building an infrastructure of wires "to get power from where it is created to where it is used."



















http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8165928.stm

[rcrush]

1. About time

Tesla has been dead how long now?

[sarcasmo]

2. Might power our electric cars one day.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

4. no kidding.

[kimmylavin]

29. I know!

My response was going to be, "And HOW long ago did Tesla invent this technology?"

[Tindalos]

3. Finally

Rats' nests of tangled cables are one of my pet peeves.

Does anyone know if this tech would have any effect on pacemakers and other implanted medical devices?

[havocmom]

10. dunno. Want I should bring in cheney for a test?

[cabluedem]

25. Please do. And set it to maximum power too. nt

[seeviewonder]

5. I think it would wise to expand this technology.

There are so many people to sell the copper wire to!!!

[armyowalgreens]

6. Does it use microwave conversion?

[Buzz Clik]

7. It will be fascinating to learn more and watch this unfold. Pop the corn for the lawsuits --

There were the hysterical types who thought that living within 200 yards of high voltage power lines was killling them. The first time someone develops a brain tumor or ingrown toenail while living in a house with this technology will be the first lawsuit blaming the Witricity.

[imdjh]

8. I love the responses here. I also thought, "It about time."

We've had this technology in sci-fi since the 1940's, "realistically" since Star Trek.

This is what I was talking about in the NASA thread; our scientists are only catching up with our imaginations, they aren't surprising us anymore.

Long before anyone (well most people anyway) knew what an MP3 or player was, I refused to buy a CD player because, "Just as soon as I buy one, they'll come out with something the size of a credit card."

[rcrush]

9. Tesla was designing this technology in the early 1900's

Sometime around 1905 some douche named JP MORGAN shut his funding down because Tesla wanted to provide free energy for the world.

[MrScorpio]

13. Exactly

I was going to point that out myself

[keep_it_real]

24. It's a Tesla rip off; they stole his idea

[david13]

11. Spooky. Frightening. Many years ago people told me it

could and would be done. I don't like it. What if the electro goes the wrong way and fries my brain?
dc

[Occulus]

16. According to the site, it converts electrical power into a magnetic field which is then

converted back to electrical power. The receiver has to lie within the magnetic field, which is where the "several meters" limit comes into play. In other words, it's very likely perfectly harmless if your cat jumps through the field, or you touch it, or whatever. We, all of us, live inside a magnetic field, after all.

[comrade snarky]

18. If you have a brain that can be fried by a magnetic feild.

Let me be the first to welcome our new robot overlords.

I'd like to remind you that as a trusted public figure I can be useful in rounding up other humans to toil in your tungsten mines.

[jmondine]

19. If you start believing Obama was born in Kenya, we'll know it's happened.

[jmondine]

20. Then a whole bunch of Grateful Dead fans will show up at your doorstep.

[TwixVoy]

12. This tech is already available... I have such a device 10 feet away from me as I type

This tech has already started to become available. I have a wireless charger next to my bed for my Palm Pre phone. (a new generation of phone just released, and the first to support this technology)

This is the device that allows it to charge wirelessly:
http://www.palm.com/us/products/accessories/touchstone-technology.html

[Occulus]

14. Can you give us specific details on its performance?

Does it, for example, take the same amount of time (or less? or more?) to charge the device?

[TwixVoy]

15. Performance is very good

Certainly as good as the wall charger, perhaps even better honestly.

[surrealAmerican]

30. That looks pretty cool, but it's not exactly what ...

... the article is talking about. In the system they are proposing your phone could be charging while it's in your pocket, or anywhere really. The field would be all around you, not just a few inches around a "base".

[IDemo]

31. Exactly

From the Witricity website:

At first glance, WiTricity’s technology for power transfer appears to be traditional magnetic induction, such as is used in power transformers, where conductive coils transmit power to each other wirelessly, over very short distances. In a transformer, an electric current running in a sending coil (or “primary winding”) induces another current in a receiving coil (or “secondary winding”). The two coils must be very close together, and may even overlap, but the coils do not make direct electrical contact with each other. However, the efficiency of the power exchange in traditional magnetic induction systems drops by orders of magnitude when the distance between the coils becomes larger than their sizes. In addition to electric transformers, other devices based on traditional magnetic induction include rechargeable electric toothbrushes, and inductive “charging pads” which require that the object being charged be placed directly on top of, or very close to, the base or pad supplying the power.

The power exchange efficiency of some induction systems is improved by utilizing resonant circuits. These so-called resonantly enhanced induction techniques are used in certain medical implants and high-frequency RFIDs for example. However, to the best of our knowledge, WiTricity’s founding technical team was the first to discover that by specially designing the magnetic resonators, one could achieve strong coupling and highly efficient energy exchange over distances much larger than the size of the resonator coils, distances very large compared to traditional schemes.

[dysfunctional press]

17. "Trillions of dollars, he said, had also been invested building an infrastructure of wires..."

which is why it's going to be fought tooth and nail.

[formercia]

21. Any old HAM radio operator would recognize this.

Back in ancient times, before fancy equipment, HAMS would tune up their transmitters by placing a LC (Inductor, capacitor) resonant circuit with a small light bulb near the output resonant circuit (tank) of the transmitter and the brightness of the bulb would indicate how well the set was radiating radio waves.

Personally, I think this is nuts. This is recycling ancient technology and selling it as snake oil.

This can't be good for your health.

[POAS]

22. Abd probably about a efficient as rubbing two sticks together.

[wuvuj]

23. Think about it?

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2008/01/03/great-example-why-you-simply-can-t-believe-that-cell-phones-are-safe.aspx


Are You Already Suffering the Effects and Don’t Even Realize it?

Numerous studies claim there is no biological impact of RF radiation within the cell phone range. Still, researchers in different countries, in different laboratories, are finding disturbing results that point to far greater health implications than anyone is ready for.

Unfortunately, most people fail to correlate common symptoms and health problems to their exposure to cell phones and other radio frequencies, perhaps because these conditions can so easily be attributed to other causes (including so-called “unknown” causes) as well.

Take a look at these common illnesses and ailments, which have all been scientifically linked to cell phone information carrying radio waves:

*
Alzheimer’s, senility and dementia
*
Parkinson’s
*
Autism
*
Fatigue
*
Headaches
*
Sleep disruptions
*
Altered memory function, poor concentration and spatial awareness

Although cancer and brain tumors are most often cited as the potential health risks from cell phone radiation, as you can see, cancer is not the only, or most common danger that you and your cell-phone toting children face.

[comrade snarky]

33. And carrots

Almost all the people with those symptoms have eaten carrots in the past 6 months.

Wont someone save the children from the orange root vegetables?

[pipoman]

26. I read about this a couple of years ago, it was perfected at MIT

MIT team experimentally demonstrates wireless power transfer, potentially useful for powering laptops, cell phones without cords

June 7, 2007

Realizing their recent theoretical prediction, they were able to light a 60W light bulb from a power source seven feet (more than two meters) away; there was no physical connection between the source and the appliance. The MIT team refers to its concept as "WiTricity" (as in wireless electricity). The work will be reported in the June 7 issue of Science Express, the advance online publication of the journal Science.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/wireless-0607.html

[erasmia]

27. wireless? imagine thou all the x-rays above our heads..will this lead to something good or bad?

[drm604]

28. I do have some concerns (not health related)

• How efficient is this? It would seem like there has to be some loss compared to delivering power by standard copper wire. Also, is this constantly generating a field? That would be VERY wasteful. We certainly don't want to move to a less efficient way of distributing power!
  
• Can the apartment next door, or below me, steal power from me? This could be done on purpose or inadvertently.
  
• How strong are the magnetic fields? Is there any danger to hard drives, etc.?

[L0oniX]

32. Tesla would be jealous ...he tried to make A.C wireless.