digg

This is the reeeeally cool part - "If it proves feasible, drastically reducing the cost of solar power would only be a start. JTEC could potentially harvest waste heat from internal combustion engines and combustion turbines, perhaps even the human body."

Same principle as a Stirling engine, but more efficient - too cool!

Badass. This is one badass dude. I mean honestly he just sits around creating some incredibly imaginative and potent devices, things that well funded schools and laboratories haven't come up with yet. Wish I was as smart as he is :P

And I thought finding my Super Soaker 300 was awesome..

Another great thing is this system could, like the Stirling engine, be an external combustion engine for automobiles. If we had a fuel-neutral power system for automobiles, then using a diverse set of automotive fuels (petrol, LNG, ethanol, biodiesel) becomes more feasible, and our country has a better chance at getting off of foreign oil sooner.

Since this device is solid-state and scalable, several could be placed in a car: one for the primary power plant, a few to take waste heat from the brakes, the engine, etc.

I'm going to file this one under "hope to hell its for real."

Dugg for holy ***** I love science!

"If it proves feasible, drastically reducing the cost of solar power would only be a start. JTEC could potentially harvest waste heat from internal combustion engines and combustion turbines, perhaps even the human body."... i like where this is headed.

Dug for: "inventor of the Super Soaker squirt gun (a true technological milestone)"

From the human body huh? Talk about possibilities... A watch that never dies because it draws in heat energy from you body? I like it.

if the commercial for this is half as good as the commercials for the super soaker...

Great discovery, but don't get your hopes up yet. The 60% efficiency is not a tested reality, but a calculated value. It is going to take years before this is being used.

I hope it works out - plentiful energy is the road to freedom.

I was positive it would have to do with the pump action. "Power your TV by solar energy and new SUPER PUMP ACTION!"
Of course, depending on what your watching, you may have to pump with 2 hands.

Holy crap is this the technology the machines used to harvest energy from the fields of humans in The Matrix?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HpvEF_GIhmw

forget al gore, THIS guy should have gotten the nobel prize because the super soaker invention alone is worth an award right there...

Who cares about solar energy? Get to work on the next Super Soaker...NOW!!

Let me know when it comes to market.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
-Arthur C. Clarke

SUPER SOAK DAT HOE!... With knowledge and efficient solar-electric power

Hooray! Hot, wet energy squirting everywhere!

We really need something that will radically increase efficiency. I'm worried by "analysis" that emphasizes the idea that if solar panels tomorrow reach parity with oil, then somehow that will resolve the environmental problems. Oil will just get cheaper then, and the developing world will still buy it and burn it. The problem is not just America burning it in Hummers today at $100 a barrel, it's just as much of a problem if the West comes up with wonderful solar/wind/whatever that frees *us* from needing that $100 oil, but then the Saudis will just drop the price to whatever it takes to sell it to someone else.

In other words, solar (or wind, or whatever) can't solve the problem unless it so so *extremely* efficient that it means it is cheaper to use it than it is to run the oil well pumps. Otherwise, we just shift the burn from expensive/developed world usage today to cheaper/developing world usage tomorrow.

it's rite of passage, not right of passage

I can't wait until all the solar breakthroughs that are coming to light make it in to the hands of the consumer (i.e. me). 100% solar powered home + electric car charged at said home makes me extremely horny. Hasten the day.

The inventor of the Super Soaker and the Solar Electric engine !
http://www.blackinventor.com/pages/lonniejohnson.h ...

I'm not sure how this is a solar issue ... since this is just a heat engine and since we can already use solar heat to run heat engines but power companies choose not to because it's cheaper to run heat engines with heat generated from burning coal, why wouldn't the power companies continue to burn coal fuel and just substitute their turbines with these JTECs?

Wow, that meas that the best solar thermal technology is now more efficient than the best PV technology (42.8%). PV may yet still win out because of its potential for distributed power as opposed to centralized power.

The Matrix human harvesting is right around the corner. Now machines only need to become self-aware.

What will he call it? Johnson Engine? So original!

One a year we get.
drum roll please... a save the planet device on DIGG
except they never seem to make it to my local Home Depot for me to actually buy.

The title of this is a lie, buried.

I was looking for a super soaker in walmart the other day. couldn't find one :/ I guess its too dangerous for the pansy kiddies of tha future. They should at least still sell it in the womans white tshirt section...

Now he just has to master the elements of earth, wind, and heart, and he'll be Captain Planet!

Greatest part of all, No pumping required!

I hate when these BS theory article make the front page. Don't tell me about some douche who thinks he can do something. Show me the guy who has ***** done it.......and has figured out how to make it cheaply enough to be feasible.

dugg for "the Super Soaker squirt gun (a true technological milestone)"

i love technology, unfortunately the moment i buy a solar device, i'm going to regret doing it due to the advances in the technology, then again, all tech stuff is like that.

don't worry, it won't prevent me from getting one, i'll just have to do more research

I'd think you would also be able to ramp up the output of existing power plants by using the waste heat from them to power a collocated JTEC power plant.

I'd be curious to know how much heat actually gets converted to energy. For instance, if you have a fluid heated to 600 degrees and you circulate it against the hot side of the JTEC engine how quickly would the temperature lower to an unusable level?

Dugg for being the kind of story I used to see on Digg all the time and for being a great story. It will be INDIVIDUALS like this that get us off the oil tit. Look ma, the free market funding innovation far better than government. I can't imagine how much further along we'd be if the government didn't take money from guys like this and throw it down social rat holes.

This is very interesting. I don't immediately see any warning flags that this is baloney.... it doesn't seem to violate any laws of thermodynamics. :) Best of all, it has a reasonable efficiency potential.

I guess it really depends on how much these permeable barriers cost, and if they require frequent replacement.