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84 Comments
- bluehouse, on 07/25/2008, -6/+33This just in.... Limbaugh and O'Reilly join forces to power an entire city
- scareyShadow, on 07/25/2008, -1/+23Holy Crap... now all we need to do is come up with a battery technology that can make use of this extra power and we're set.
- briscuits, on 07/25/2008, -1/+19Throw on a parabolic mirror, it would work great out here in AZ. High for today -108 F.
- inactive, on 07/25/2008, -2/+17Terrific. Anything to break the dependence on oil.
- Yookji, on 07/25/2008, -0/+15They'll have to find a different material to do this. Some of the materials required are just too expensive for widespread use.
"The price of 99.999 % pure thallium granules is 566.70 € for 500 g."
http://www.ktf-split.hr/periodni/en/tl.html
"With an abundance in the Earth's crust even lower than platinum, tellurium is, apart from the precious metals, the rarest stable solid element in the earth's crust. Its abundance in the Earth's crust is 1 to 5 ppb, compared with 5 to 37 ppb for platinum. By comparison, even the rarest of the lanthanides have crustal abundances of 500 ppb."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tellurium#Occurrence - tailshie, on 07/25/2008, -1/+10Great news for the development of PHEV's like the Volt.
- Recluse84, on 07/25/2008, -0/+8This mean I might be able to power my house by playing Crysis for 10 minutes?
- fixty, on 07/25/2008, -2/+10It would be great if they're able to form car body panels out of material like this. Maybe they don't get hot enough though, but if they are able to double their efficiency maybe it'd work well enough even below the peak temp range?
- theotheragentm, on 07/25/2008, -0/+7If they could get this to work at lower temperatures (350-400F or so), it would be great. Pretty much every big institution in America heats steam to about this temperature at the boilers. Currently the best use of the heat coming off is to preheat the water going to the boiler. The more heat energy can be recaptured, the better.
- kdnewton, on 07/25/2008, -0/+7I'd like to convert the heat exhaust generated from my PC into an energy I can recycle. >_<
- Dougman82, on 07/25/2008, -1/+8A turbocharger does not use the heat energy per say of the exhaust, but rather the exhaust gas pressure. Don't get me wrong... that pressure exists due to the heat of the exhaust. However, it's the force of the exhaust gas that drives a turbine, which drives a compressor. That's what a turbocharger is.
Oh, and also, a turbocharger is using that energy to compress air, not to create electricity. The point of the article is that they've made a super-efficient thermoelectric material for electricity generation. - SpinozaQ, on 07/25/2008, -0/+6Fortunately, Gallium in this reaction is not consumed and can be recycled and used to decompose more Aluminum. Unfortunately, it takes a lot more energy to make the aluminum, or recycle the aluminum oxide bi-product then the hydrogen you get out of it. It's a reasonable way to create hydrogen on demand, it's just not all that efficient. There are already better ways to store and transport hydrogen... Sodium or Lithium Borohydride comes to mind.
- jkira, on 07/25/2008, -2/+7Nice design
- jdepp, on 07/25/2008, -0/+5Seebeck effect. This is interesting from the theoretical / solid state physics perspective of why this particular material performs so well, and for space and military applications where performance trumps cost, but don't expect it to be mass produced. ... + Thallium is lethally toxic ... this stuff would have to be handled and disposed of with great care.
- s0crates82, on 07/26/2008, -0/+5yes. MSI made one that's basically a stirling engine. the hotter the cpu gets, the faster the fan spins.
- TheMachine1, on 07/25/2008, -0/+4I think I have read such devices were around 3% so this device might be 6%.
Assuming waste heat from and IC gas engine is 75% and its all available at the temperature the device needs, that .06 x 75% = 4.5% maximum. So that 25% IC gas engine at most could get to 29.5% over all efficiency. Diesel engines are already 40%+ efficient. Hmm diesel electric trains sound like a potential use of this technology though. - scoottie, on 07/25/2008, -0/+4that would be great for lower electrical bills and electric cars that go farther on a full charge among other things
- FreeTalkLIve, on 07/25/2008, -1/+5Area 51 has been using this technology since the Roswell crash.
- greevar, on 07/25/2008, -1/+5Um -108 F? That's cold....
- Asianwaste, on 07/25/2008, -1/+5Just kinda curious, theoretically can you make a CPU fan powered by the processor's own heat?
- Ramble, on 07/25/2008, -1/+5Amen on that. Burn oil and use this device to create electricity, then our dependence on oil will be gone!
- ynggrsshppr, on 07/26/2008, -0/+3Not to mention that stuff will kill you.
- Astaro, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3Sigh, the description violates the laws of thermodynamics.
they've basically created a more efficient version of a peliter device, but if you coated your engine with this it would trap heat in the engine, making it less efficient, the engine would ultimately develop (1/(the effiency of the peltiers))*power taken less power. - brad3378, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3An alloy of 95% Aluminum and 5% Gallium when combined with water can produce hydrogen gas and AL203. As a side benefit, the reaction is very exothermic (it releases heat)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tvR1khXKnI
Unfortunately, Gallium is ridiculously expensive. - majordanger, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3Sounds like somebody needs a nap or a hug.
Turbochargers use the exhaust stream to drive a compressor which compresses the intake air for more power during combustion. not really designed to reduce fuel consumption. Quite the opposite. Turbochargers are used in race cars and large diesel tractor trailers for more power. but I now see a car ad trying to spin it as "recycling exhaust". - gn0stik, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3With a ten foot by 6 foot parabolic mirror you can melt steel. So... yeah.
- MasterGrief, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3Baritone bastard. I don't care what side he belongs to--he really is just as bad.
- leexy, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3Best post here so far.
- TheMachine1, on 07/26/2008, -0/+3You heard of peltier coolers?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peltier_cooler
You apply electric energy and one side gets cold and one side gets hot. If you merely cool one side and heat one side the same device makes electrical energy. - majordanger, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3No Bi-metal is used to turn a heat difference into mechanical displacement. Similar to the coil spring metal thermometers or the Thermostat in a vehicles cooling system.
Thermocouples utilize the the voltage produced when a piece of metal is exposed to two different temperatures.
This voltage effect has been used to power older thermostats and the Voyager spacecraft. This thallium-doped lead telluride is a new metal that produces much more voltage.
I hope this helps. - DifferentAngle, on 07/25/2008, -0/+3I wish they gave some actual numbers...
Like for a car, the engin oil goes through a radiator which has air blown through it. Do you have to coat this material over the radiator? Will that work? When using this stuff can we still provide sufficient cooling for the original application? What is the cost? How much electricity could we generate for a typical car theoretically?
Blah - MasterThief117, on 07/25/2008, -2/+5That's hot.
- mrmudgeon, on 07/25/2008, -0/+2Its a very long road from the lab to your garage. This technology may or may not be practicle in a real-world environment. I wish the author had talked with the inventor about that a bit more.
- diggydougie, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Why not just use the engine coolant to create steam and supplement the power with a steam turbine? The steam can be re-condensed so that no water is actually lost in the system. No exotic materials required, and the supplemental turbine can be shut off until the engine gets up to temp.
- macrymble, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Stirling engines are very efficient, but they convert heat to mechanical energy. This would have to be converted into electrical energy, at some loss. It would still be drastically more efficient than a thermoelectric device, but that isn't even the point of these devices. They benefit from being small and steady-state.
- DraxusD, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Yeah, the title should have read something like "New material twice as efficient turning heat waste into electricity."
- TJRoger, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Or build a hybrid with a tiny gas (fossil fuel, hydrogen, methane, whatever you want to burn) motor and have the electric motor drive the car.
- inactive, on 07/25/2008, -1/+3I don't think so.
- oneoverzero, on 07/25/2008, -0/+2Yes, but the more steps involved, the more energy lost through friction.
- kekemortson, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Technology advances such as this are always good news. We need to wean ourselves from a finite amount of fossil fuels and become more efficient and use renewable energy as much as possible.
- xadious, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Yep, i think the technology's been around for a long time, just this new material that's the big deal.
- HayString, on 07/25/2008, -1/+3"The lead telluride creates electric power like a conventional heat engine coupled to an electric generator, but uses electrons as the working fluid instead of water or gas. Additionally, it creates electricity directly."
Do what now? - inactive, on 07/25/2008, -0/+2Put this on the west wall of my two story texas home. That creates more heat than a car engine.
- sfour, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2Exciting possibility here. Too bad tellurium is even rarer than platinum. Then again, we're already driving around with platinum in our catalytic converters.
- knowitman, on 07/26/2008, -0/+2From the sounds of it, this stuff would be great for the coating of exhaust manifolds and even some of the catback part of the exhaust for a vehicle like the Chevy Volt.
- SoulDesigner, on 07/26/2008, -1/+2You cannot self snap dude,
- inactive, on 07/26/2008, -0/+1Nobody cares about this comment. Sad.
- TheMachine1, on 07/26/2008, -1/+2Well presumably it would be located after the catalytic converter on a car but before the muffler and it would not significantly restrict air flow. I see it theoretically replacing a cars alternator if it is cost effective but not much more than that for the foreseeable future.
- TheMachine1, on 07/26/2008, -0/+1Its the engine's exhaust that would supply the heat.
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