Continue to Site

Eng-Tips is the largest engineering community on the Internet

Intelligent Work Forums for Engineering Professionals

  • Congratulations GregLocock on being selected by the Eng-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!

Electricity from trees?

Status
Not open for further replies.

0707

Petroleum
Jun 25, 2001
3,339
Plugged in: Startup hopes to tap electricity from trees

“Lagadonis said tests have generated 0.8 volts to 1.2 volts by driving an aluminum roofing nail half an inch into a tree attached to a copper water pipe driven 7 inches into the ground. But the electricity is useless because it's unstable and fluctuates.”

e=2
 
Replies continue below

Recommended for you

Greg: if you managed to use the home itself as the cold reservoir for the steam engine, I guess you'd get the 1-.38 kW too. But a COP of 7 is pretty optimistic- it presumes a better quality heat reservoir for the heat pump to draw from than most of us have at hand. You would need to drill a lot of expensive wells to provide access to the only decent source at hand to most of us- the earth itself- to obtain such a favourable COP.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Part and Inventory Search

Sponsor