In a small but incredible step forward on the road to energy independence, Swedish scientists have demonstrated that renewable resources such as water and wood can be used to generate electricity. This discovery could lead to safe and reliable access to electricity for millions of people around the world in the future.
The process developed by the researchers of the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden to generate bioelectricity it relies on transpiration. It's the movement of water through a plant, to put it briefly. If you have more time, however, I'll try to tell you more.
How does the technology that harvests electricity from wood and water work?
By altering the nanoscale composition of the wood, the researchers were able to improve its properties in terms of surface area, porosity (or density), surface charge, the rate at which water can pass through the material, and the aqueous solution itself . These are all properties that affect wood's ability to generate electricity.
The researchers compared the regular wood with the modified material. Its ability to generate electricity had increased tenfold. Furthermore, by adjusting the pH difference between the wood and the water, the researchers were able to achieve a potential of 1 volt and an output power of 1,35 microwatts per square centimeter. The wood was able to supply high voltage power for about 2-3 hours before it started to sag. Till now, the wood has managed 10 cycles with no decrease in performance.
“At the moment we can operate small devices such as an LED lamp or a calculator,” the assistant professor said Yuanyuan Li, among the authors of the study.
If we wanted to power a laptop, we'd need about a square meter of wood about a centimeter thick and about 2 liters of water.
That's not what matters at the moment
I imagine, given the results, that to provide energy for an entire family you would need a mountain of wood and a swimming pool. But who said that we have to feed our families, or that we have to do it now, at this moment? The demonstration of this possibility is already an extraordinary starting point.
This is a technology that has a significant advantage over other renewable energy sources. Once its function as an energy source has been exhausted, wood can easily be used for other purposes, such as transparent paper, wood foam and various biocomposites.
The research results were published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials, e I link them to you here.