Nuclear Battery That Runs 10 Years 689
Jenny writes "A battery with a lifespan measured in decades is in development at the University of Rochester, as scientists demonstrate a new fabrication method that in its roughest form is already 10 times more efficient than current nuclear batteries -- and has the potential to be nearly 200 times more efficient. Similar to the way solar panels work by catching photons from the sun and turning them into current, the science of betavoltaics uses silicon to capture electrons emitted from a radioactive gas, such as tritium, to form a current. As the electrons strike a special pair of layers called a 'p-n junction,' a current results. I can imagine lots of applications for this new battery including my own laptop."
Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Great... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Great... (Score:5, Funny)
All I can say: ouch.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Great... (Score:3, Insightful)
Amazing! Simply amazing!
Re:Great... (Score:5, Interesting)
The biggest concern with batteries such as this is actually cost. Radioactive materials are controlled by the government (although anyone with a license can obtain some through various online webstores) and thus have experienced little competition overall. As a result, prices have stayed high.
As I've said before, one solution to this problem is to lease the battery instead of selling it outright. Given its ten year lifespan, the costs can be spread out over that time. When the battery is exhausted, the manufacturer can then reuse the remaining materials in a new battery, thus slowly driving down the prices.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Great... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Great... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Great... (Score:3, Informative)
No, only if you're using a gamma-only geiger tube. Any alpha-capable geiger tube detects tritium fine. My pancake geiger (as well as my beta-gamma scintillation probes) goes nuts from the tritium of those glow capsule (used in compasses and keyrings) though the glass capsule it's sealed in. You're right in that you need to get the sensor so close that it's not going to be an issue on public transport, but it defin
Re:Great... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Great... (Score:3, Informative)
You have to eat huge amounts of it to get any harmful doses.
See : http://www.physics.isu.edu/radinf/tritium.htm [isu.edu]
Re:Great... (Score:4, Informative)
More details [epa.gov] on Tritium.
Given these restrictions, we probably won't have nuclear powered laptops, but it will help make space probes lighter.
Re:Great... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not a problem. They're too busy strip-searching all the banana people to worry about little old Mohammad and his suitcase nuke.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Informative)
Purity is important, of course. Your typical reactor-grade plutonium has sizable amounts of Pu-240, which is a lot more detectable. Likewise, if the uranium wasn't created with the intent of making it smuggled, it probably has contamination of U-232, which has a very high energy daughter product decay that wouldn't be realistic to shield. There have actually been proposals to deliberately contaminate all uranium produced (to the extent that international cooperation allows) with U-232 to make smuggling unrealistic.
Re:Great... (Score:4, Insightful)
Now nuclear landmines are another creature alltogether. Both the US and the USSR created substantial quantities of these little gems which, which technicaly man portable, aren't exactly the kind of thing you'd be able to stroll about New York with. (they weight a LOT).
Much as the Neo-Cons hate to hear it, the major nuclear risk to the United States the shipping system. We're not talking UPS or FedEx here, we're talking cargo containers. There's more than enough space in a cargo container to pack it full of automotive parts with a nuclear land mine in the middle. Liberaly apply some lead sheilding and you've got yourself a covert nuclear device.
Since a tiny precentage of cargo containers are inspected upon entry into the US, this is unlikely to be noticed by US authorities, who will be too busy stoping cancer patients and bananna enthusiasts.
Even more ironic is that the shipping system will allow your nuclear cargo container to be delivered to the city of your choosing in just a few days.
It's the perfect perloined letter. Mr Poe would be so proud.
The Bush administration is, as the texas expression goes, all hat and no cattle. They're beefing up security where it doesn't matter so that they can look like they're doing something. In the mean time, the real issues are going unaddressed because it's either "too expensive" or "too difficult" to do anything meaningfull.
I wonder how expensive and difficult a smoking crater in the middle of Chicago would be? Don't think it could happen? Every bomb dropped in Iraq and Afghanistan has left mothers, daughters, sons, fathers, brothers and sisters weaping for loved ones. Eventualy, one of these people we've pissed off is going to have the resources and know how to strike back.
Re:Great... (Score:3, Informative)
Here's a link to the Davy Crockett [brook.edu] recoilless rocket launched artillery, at 0.01 kilotons it's not a big nuke. But sure as hell would raise the hackles of the US Govt. and scare the crud out of whole states full of people (aside from the ones killed outright).
This was back in 1961. Since then, there is probably little point in making it much smaller, rather making it have a higher yield.
Re:Great... (Score:3, Insightful)
We did, but being alive is enough to piss them off. Bin Laden wanted to kill us (all of us) for walking on his turf.
In the U.S. we call that bigotry (because we're not muslim). Unless you're from some culture we don't understand that is.
Do you honestly think that half of these folks are after us because of our doings in Iraq? Come on. Iraq is high profile, but if you want to look at things that the government is doing wrong, there are
Re:Great... (Score:4, Insightful)
Right you are - like displacing millions of Palestinians to make way for Israel.
Worst.Mistake.Ever.
Thanks to the colonizing British and the foresight impaired judgement of Truman. Nothing like killing thousands and making millions homeless to piss a people off.
Yes, the holocaust was likely one of the most tragic events ever.
Yes, the displaced jews needed a place to go after WW11.
No, Zionism was/is never the answer and now we see the results. Why did Osama send his henchmen? In his own words, to gain attention to the death America and the west is responsible for in the middle east. I'm a proud American Veteran of the first Gulf War, and I by no means condone any slaughter, but I CAN understand the motivation. If only Bush understood that by killing more we are only fanning the flames.
If only Republicans could accept critism instead of the policy of: "Deny everything, accuse your accuser". Why wasn't the reaction to 911 "Why are these people so pissed?" instead of "Oh yeah? well we'll kill all ya'll - U.S.A U.S.A U.S.A U.S.A U.S.A!!
Re:Great... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm a peaceful person overall. There have been a few times in my life when people have picked fights with me, and, for the most part, I have been able to talk down the matter.
That said, if someone pulled a gun on me, I would kill them. I wouldn't ask them to put the gun down. I wouldn't ask them why they drew it. I would make every attempt in my power to kill them.
Bin Laden does not deserve my sympathy, compassion, or understanding. Bin Laden wants to see me dead.
As for Palestinians, they are an entirely different matter than this. The Palestinians have their own leaders. They don't need Bin Laden starting wars for them.
All of that aside, do you really think that recent U.S. involvement has made matters worse for the Palestinians? Think about peace talks from the past 20 years. Think about the Israeli army, and what they could do if their intentions really were malevolent.
Re:Great... (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, that's OK. As long as there are less than 100 we're all safe.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Great... (Score:3, Informative)
The isotope you are looking for is Americium.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Informative)
In terms of increasing amounts of information (least to greatest):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hahn [wikipedia.org]l [dangerousl...tories.org] b .html [physics.ubc.ca]
http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/radscout.htm
http://laplace.physics.ubc.ca/Students/borthwic/r
Re:Great... (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, yeah. Except that as always, some countries would give a damn about regulations and these are the ones who will take advantage of the new technology and get ahead.
You think I'm kidding? Wait a few more years a
Re:Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Ummmm
Re:Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe not, but lets keep that Australian kid [slashdot.org] away from them, just to be safe.
Re:Great... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Great... (Score:4, Informative)
No. Excess energy would have to be expended in some form or another. Perhaps a small motor would be installed into the battery, and the power diverted there in case of a surplus.
If not, a laptop seems a poor use, but a tiny one might be great for cellphones.
Cellphones have always been the place that I have suggested the first batteries be made for. Besides lower power requirements, people have far more trouble keeping them sufficiently charged. But once that's tackled, there's no reason not to power laptops. Especially since many modern laptops (e.g. Macintoshes) rarely get turned off. (In the case of Macs, you just close the lid and the laptop goes to sleep. A pulsating LED on the front tells you it's state.)
Re:Great... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Great... (Score:3)
It's not. Ingested Tritium poses a health hazard, but it almost certainly NOT lethal. It would take constant exposure to high levels of Tritium to cause your risk of cancer to jump up significantly.
it is also very difficult to contain
Your logic is illogical. If tritium is lethal, it's also difficult to contain? Why? Tritium is very easy to contain. Millions of watches, keychains, and scopes are doing it as we speak. No neighborhoods destroyed that I'm aware of. (For that
Re:Great... (Score:3, Funny)
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It keeps glowing and glowing...
Re:Great...for iPods! (Score:4, Funny)
Until your mother launders it.
And you take a screwdriver to it.
And it flips you into orbit.
Politics and Energy (Score:5, Insightful)
Having said that, safe nuclear power, which is entirely feasible right now, is really our best option for dealing with energy shortages in the near future. The pebble bed nuclear reactor technology doesn't melt down, provides copious energy, and doesn't emit a gram of CO2. Plus, if I'm not mistaken, the disposal of the pebbles is less troublesome than the leftovers from the more traditional reactors.
A nuclear battery that could last 10 years would be way better, not only for the users of the batteries, but also for the environment. Think about how much energy you have to use to charge a laptop. All of that energy is primarily coming from fossil fuels. Then when you are done with the battery, you throw it in a dump (at least most people do), and the heavy metals that go into most of those batteries leak into the environment.
Of course, in order for any of this progress to happen, you're going to have to get people comfy with having a radioactive source a few inches away from their crotch. It might have all the shielding in the world, but it's still going to make a lot of people nervous.
Re:Politics and Energy (Score:5, Insightful)
Then don't call it a nuclear power source. When most people think nuclear, they are thinking nuclear fission, a la chernobyl and three mile island. Just call it a "betavoltaic power source". Tell people it's similar to solar cell technology, just skip the 'N' word. If they still ask where the power is from, tell them it comes from natural decay of hydrogen atoms, the same thing that makes the hands on their watch glow.
Besides, if I remember corrctly, beta particles can be stopped by a sheet of aluminum foil. When most people think of radiation shielding, they are thinking af gamma rays, which require much more effort to stop.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Great... (Score:5, Interesting)
Even air will absorb a significant amount of the tritium's radiation. If the tritium source is right next to you, almost no radiation will penetrate the outer layers of your skin. Even if you ingest tritium-heavy water (so that it can actually do damage), water cycles through your system pretty quickly. The only way you can really get tritium to do major damage without continually reexposing yourself or giving yourself a huge dose is to lock it up in a chemical for which doesn't get lost from the body very quickly and for which the hydrogens don't get interchanged with others often, and then ingest that.
To put it into perspective, ingesting all of the tritium from a gun sight (a common current use of tritium) would be equivalent to about two years of background radiation. In short, while tritium has its dangers, there are a lot of equally dangerous things out there - including what many conventional batteries are made out of.
Interestingly enough, as tritium decays, one product is helium-3 - the stuff that people keep saying we have to mine from the moon, despite its very low concentration there
Re:Great... (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmmm well it my A level physics is anything to go by (i did it in the last 20 years so probably not) beta radiation is high energy electrons, and 3mm of aluminium will stop them. They are bad for your health, but it takes time, usually.
Alpha particles are helium nuclei (2 protons, 2 neutrons), these are stopped by your sheet of paper. They don't penetrate skin...
then your gamma rays are not stopped by lead and are very bad.
Re:Great... (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, I used to worry about it just a little. Thanks to all the propaganda, there was always that nagging concern "What if I get cancer?" But now I'd be perfectly comfortable standing next to a nuclear power plant.
Why, you ask? Because I learned a lot more about radiation and eventually learned that it's not as dangerous as it's made out to be. You see, your body is fending off radiation from everything from bananas, to radon gas that you inhale, to Uranium scattered throughout your back yard, to cosmic rays that come screaming in from space with far more energy than anything naturally occuring here on earth.
Basically, it's a normal risk of living and we deal with it every day. Our bodies are quite well adapted to radiation. (In some cases, people exposed to higher levels of background radiation seem to live *longer*!) Most of the "instant death" or "cancer within months" scenarios involve being swamped with unnaturally high levels of radioactivity. Particularly rays higher in penetration power such as Gamma and X-Rays.
Trust me, a battery that uses Alpha or Beta rays is really nothing to worry about. The radiation can't even penetrate your skin!
Re:Great... (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, once somebody tosses one into an incinerator then the tritium will be directly released into the environment as radioactive H20, which is highly dangerous and doesn't need to penetrate your skin. Any nuclear battery with enough power to power a laptop (~20W) will contain a significant amount of total radioactivity, which would be a major concern if the battery were inc
Re:Great... (Score:3, Interesting)
Boosting a gun-type device with tritium is a pretty mighty task. Where would you put it? Into the pit? Won't do much good there. You'd have to inject it there very quickly before the assembly, or it'd soak into the metal and you'd get hydrogen embrittlement issues.
Tritium is useful for the implosion devices, and even there you can do without; and making enough tritium is easier than making enough plutonium.
Re:Great... (Score:3, Interesting)
Find a large enough market for strontium-90, iodine-131,133, caesium-134,137, tellurium-132, strontium-90, etc, and then we'll be in business
Re:Great... (Score:3, Informative)
If it's more efficient than using fission to boil water to spin turbines that generate electricity, then it would be a great idea.
But after looking around the web, I don't think it is.
Careful... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Careful... (Score:5, Informative)
The primary safety hazard is actually the inhalation of an Alpha Emitter. Once inside the soft tissues of the lungs, the emitter increases the risk of broken DNA strands, thus leading to cancer. Note that this is a worst case scenario. Most Alpha Emitters are far too heavy to float in the air, and far too strong to be easily pulverized into pieces small enough to float.
Note that evidence suggests that the other concern, indigestion, is a non-issue. In all documented cases where Plutonium (a common alpha emitter) was accidently ingested, it was found to pass through the digestive tract without issue. Radiation was not an issue due to the general thickness of the digestive system.
Compare this to the safety hazards of Alkaline and other battery technologies. These technologies can easily poison water wells, are quite dangerous if ingested, have the potential to explode, and can cause serious burns when in contact with the skin.
next time (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:next time (Score:5, Funny)
Re:next time (Score:3, Interesting)
The "interesting" part being that the battery, which is typically the component most worried about, will become something you'll never have to think about.
=Smidge=
Non-lethal exposure (Score:5, Interesting)
of toxic exposure through its mere presense, please read this Wikipedia article about Tritium [wikipedia.org], which explains
that " The low-energy beta radiation from tritium cannot penetrate human skin, so tritium is only dangerous if inhaled or ingested."
So it might make a good candidate for a household battery.
Re:Non-lethal exposure (Score:2)
Still, I'm not sure that I'd like to have one of these in my laptop, unless it was as a form of permanent contraception.
Not a new idea... but a great breakthrough (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Non-lethal exposure (Score:3, Informative)
Juggle some tritium in your hands and nothing will happen to you - sleep with it and nothing will happen. Eat it or let it into your blood stream and then you are in trouble... But then again let regular battary acid into your blood strream (or ingest it) and you are in trouble there too.
Nuclear Battery+Laptop = Sterile Work Environment! (Score:3, Funny)
Oh Noes--The "N" Word! (Score:5, Informative)
How does tritium affect people's health?
As with all ionizing radiation, exposure to tritium increases the risk of developing cancer. However, tritium is one of the least dangerous radionuclides because it emits very weak radiation and leaves the body relatively quickly. Since tritium is almost always found as water, it goes directly into soft tissues and organs. The associated dose to these tissues are generally uniform and dependent on the tissues' water content.
How does tritium change in the environment?
Tritium readily forms water when exposed to oxygen. As it undergoes radioactive decay, tritium emits a very weak beta particle and transforms to stable, nonradioactive helium. Tritium has a half-life of 12.3 years.
How do people come in contact with tritium?
People are exposed to small amounts of tritium every day, since it is widely dispersed in the environment and in the food chain. People who live near or work in federal weapons facilities or nuclear fuel cycle facilities may have increased exposure. People working in research laboratories may also come in contact with tritium.
How does tritium get into the body?
Tritium primarily enters the body when people swallow tritiated water. People may also inhale tritium as a gas in the air, and absorb it through their skin.
What does tritium do once it gets into the body?
Tritium is almost always found as water, or "tritiated" water. Once tritium enters the body, it disperses quickly and is uniformly distributed throughout the body. Tritium is excreted through the urine within a month or so after ingestion. Organically bound tritium (tritium that is incorporated in organic compounds) can remain in the body for a longer period.
Re:Oh Noes--The "N" Word! (Score:4, Insightful)
Kindly point out where I say "tritium is perfectly OK." You'll find that I haven't. Kindly explain why you are putting words in my mouth, and further explain why you think I'd be so blindingly stupid as to suggest that any radioisotope is "perfectly OK".
What the heck happens to the crap when the "battery runs out"? What happens to the stupid "ever on night lights" when the light is low enough that you can't see it anymore? That's right, it end up being thrown out. Then it migrates and eventually will end up in oganic compounts (it IS hydrogen after all) and well, might end up killing hell of a lot of people.
Take your pick: a landfill full of mostly-decayed tritium batteries, or a landfill full of lithium-ion, nickel-hydride, nickel-cadmium, and alkaline batteries. Which is going to pose the greater environmental health hazard--the radioisotope with a half-life of 12 years, or the battery acids and durable heavy metals?
I'm not suggesting that we should all pony up to the bar for a round of trititinis. I am saying that tritium batteries, at least at first glance, would appear to be much less hazardous to our health and environment than the batteries we use today. A constructive argument in this situation would be to debunk the notion that tritium batteries are safer than the batteries we use today.
And please don't give me crap about how quickly tritiated water leaves your body (one lifetime in human body is about 14 days since you pee it out! - I say one lifetime, not bullshit like "it all leaves your body within a month").
Well shit, Sparky, you'd better get right on the horn and set the EPA straight. Those knuckle-draggers clearly don't have the first clue what this "tritium" stuff is. I eagerly await links to scientific abstracts that support this assertion of yours.
Current modding when it comes to Nuclear on shashdot seems "Nuclear good" without any context. It is like blind leading the blind.
Again, show me where I say "nuclear good". All I did was directly link to and quote from the EPA's information. I'm not so much of a dullard as to think that tritium is harmless. That said, I'm quite willing to entertain the notion that a tritium cell could be significantly safer than what we use today.
betavoltaics? (Score:5, Funny)
Will it sell? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Will it sell? (Score:4, Insightful)
I dunno--the promise of never having to plug your computer/cell phone in to anything may sway a significant portion of the population.
Seriously. 100% self-contained, self-sustaining portable systems. Elimination of the single most annoying part of modern gadgetry--the external power source.
Many uses? (Score:2)
Yeah. Just don't try to take it on a plane.
Nooooooo!!! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Nooooooo!!! (Score:2)
-Jesse
Re:Nooooooo!!! (Score:3, Funny)
I was with you up to the equating of nucular with nuclear. Regardless of your feelings about Bush, pro or con, you have to admit he's managed to sway a lot of people by his [irony acknowledged] scientific choice of words. So since, as you seem to implicitly suggest, we seem a nation more susceptible to words than truths, maybe this is just the shift that's needed to get it over
AKA (Score:3, Informative)
The p-n junction is sometimes called by its more technical name: the "diode".
Re:AKA (Score:5, Informative)
You don't call two p-n junctions in the transistor a diode. You don't call the p-n junction in the solar cell a diode...
The term "diode" can also be applied to a vacuum diode, Schotky diode, etc. neither of which is composed of a p-n junction.
Re:AKA (Score:5, Informative)
Tough call... (Score:2, Funny)
I can imagine lots of applications for this new battery including my own laptop
That a calculated risk: will you end up sterile and impotent or the proud wielder of a 14 inch hammer...
Nucular (Score:2, Funny)
laptop use? doubt it. (Score:3, Informative)
this reminds me of an essay I read by a second year physics student that nanotechnology would allow us to run 10GHz computers for 10 years off a watch battery. it's BS but you don't need to look at the technology to see that, it's just basic thermodynamics:
law 1. you can't win
law 2. you can't break even.
law 3. you can't get out of the game.
Re:laptop use? doubt it. (Score:5, Interesting)
Consider the following:
You could engineer your batteries to produce significantly more power than the system needs. As the isotope decays, you approach the system's minimum power needs. System alerts you six months before it needs a new battery.
You could design a hybrid battery--part traditional power storage, part nuclear generation. As the traditional battery is drained, the nuclear battery charges it; best of all, when you're not using the laptop, it charges by default. You wouldn't need a nuclear battery big enough to run the whole laptop--just big enough to stretch that five hour standard battery to a ten-hour battery, with the added bonus of automatic, cordless recharging when the system isn't in use...
Re:laptop use? doubt it. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:laptop use? doubt it. (Score:3, Informative)
You seem to have a good point, but by not providing an estimate of energy output it's hard for people to tell.
One mole of tritium atoms (3 grams and 11.2 liters at STP: it's diatomic) will, over it's half life of 12.3 years, generate 6.02e23 * (6500 eV) / 2 = 1.96e27 eV.
Converting to ergs by dividing by 6.2e11 results in 3.16e15 ergs.
Converting to
Imagine the marketing meeting.. (Score:4, Funny)
Laptops (Score:2)
As if the existing laptops are not bad enough for putting on your lap! After Chernobyl there was a joke in Russia - "if you want to become a father, encase your ____ in lead".
Future slashdot headline (Score:4, Funny)
Apple: iPod Dangerous When Wet
Posted by CowboyNeal on Friday May 13, @05:43AM
from the potential-hazards dept.
somefutureslashdotter writes "What do you do when your mom washes your iPod? Fix it, of course. A teenager in Australia found out the hard way that messing with the insides of his iPod is dangerous and needed to be pieced together from basic components after it exploded, leveling several city blocks."
not much detail (Score:3, Informative)
How do you turn it off? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How do you turn it off? (Score:3, Interesting)
First off, its beta decay (a neutron in the nucleus in turn into a proton and ejects an electron), not fission. And you're correct, there no turning it off.
Yes.
You can just burn off extra power in a resistor (generating heat). Or you
Nuclear! (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds promising, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Practicality and Sterility (Score:5, Informative)
Disclaimer: I am a nuclear engineering graduate student.
This seems like a rather nifty extention of the technology. However, note that the fuel source, tritium, is rather hard and expensive to come by. (The total world supply of the stuff is < 40 kg.) So I see this as a great boon for, say, space probes or other fancy applications where getting your hands on some tritium gas aren't the biggest of concerns on the budget. It'd be interesting to see how they compare to other nuclear batteries that rely on heat from alpha-decay of heavy isotopes like plutonium to generate electrical currents.
As far as all the jokes about a nuclear laptop battery using this technology causing sterility, note that tritium decays via beta emission (i.e. an electron), with a range in solid materials of a few mm, so those energetic electrons will stay in the battery. Your primary concern would be if you somehow cracked the thing open and inhaled the tritium gas -- then those few mm of exposure in your lungs etc. aren't the best things to have around energetic particles. (And, as far as having to ingest nuclear sources, tritium is probably one of the better ones, since not only does it have a relatively short half-life of ~12 years, but it gets flushed out of the body rather rapidly as it diffuses into the bloodstream/water in tissues, leading to a much shorter effective biological half-life of 11 days.)
tritium on my lap (Score:3, Interesting)
Indeed, I believe there was a superfund site due to 3H contamination from watch manufacturing.
Recycling costs? (Score:3, Insightful)
Company I'm working at right now just gave away a bunch of old Thinkpads. Reason being - it's cheaper to give them away than send the batteries off for a proper recycling.
So I wonder what the cost would be to recycle a spent tritium battery?
Obligatory Safety Warning (Score:3, Funny)
With apologies to thunderpower-batteries.com [66.102.9.104]
This is photovoltaics, revisited (Score:5, Informative)
There is another way to make a "nuclear battery", which was discussed in the september 2004 issue of IEEE's Spectrum magazine [ieee.org] (could not get a link...): by ionizing a bit of matter, it gets attracted to other matter (think static electricity). So you ionize a flat, piezoelectric part that's attached at one end over an unmovable base plate. The attraction makes the loose end of the part strain down to the base, and the piezoelectric nature of the part makes it generate electricity on the way.
Tritium is too expensive for this (Score:5, Informative)
There's a modest demand for tritium. It's needed to recharge H-bombs. Fusion researchers need sizable quantities of it. It's used for night lights in exit signs, watches, and gunsights. Tritium has a half life of about 12 years, so you lose 5.5% every year as it decays to helium-3. So a new product that requires tritium faces a major supply problem.
The hazards of tritium exposure aren't high, but some precautions are required. Cleanup procedures for a broken tritium exit sign are as follows:
When an Exit Sign Containing Tritium (3H) Is Damaged (broken with the release of 3H): [hps.org]
The protective clothing required for cleanup usually consists of gloves and booties. The broken sign should be placed in an air-tight container by a health physics consultant. If silica gel is available it should be placed in the container with the broken sign. The silica gel will collect tritiated water. At a minimum, the broken sign and any miscellaneous pieces should be double bagged and sealed in plastic. Disposal of the broken sign should be arranged through the manufacturer or a health physics consultant.
And people screw up, even with ordinary exit signs. Here's a Nuclear Regulatory Commission report from 2004:
USAF personnel in the Johnston Atoll in the Pacific were attempting to remove the "batteries" from an exit sign they believed to be battery powered. During the attempt to open the case, they destroyed the sign only to discover that it was a tritium sign. All tritium modules were broken.
Five personnel were in the room at the time and all were potentially exposed to the tritium. The Radiation Safety Officer (RSO) isolated the room and the personnel clothing, etc. Pre-cleanup surveys indicated greater than 6 times the normal background survey readings in the room. The RSO double-bagged the sign and tritium module debris. The room and work areas were decontaminated. Post-cleanup surveys indicated normal background readings. Personnel uptake and dose evaluations are currently being assessed.
So, like the nuclear batteries of the 1960s, this will be a specialized technology of very limited application.
Re:Tritium is too expensive for this (Score:3, Informative)
Not quite. The TVA's Watts Bar reactor has a few rods being irradiated, and DOE hopes to get some tritium out by 2007. The facility to extract tritium from the rods, at Savannah River, isn't finished yet.
waste? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:waste? (Score:3, Informative)
These are *very* interesting (Score:4, Interesting)
At first I figured the output, while long lasting, would just be too low to be useful. I went to beta-batt's website, got the numbers and did the math. These batteries are surprisingly good.
The first-gen tritium ones (and tritium ones is probably all we'll ever see in commercial applications) put out 400 microwatts per cubic centimeter of nuclear battery volume, half-lifing at 12 years of course.
Based on various data I pulled from Energizer's website and Betabatt's website, it comes out like this:
A regular AA-sized NiMH rechargeable battery (2,500mAh @ 1.2V) can be recharged by a nuke battery of identical volume (picture a companion Nuclear-AA battery next to it) from empty to full in roughly one month. Or five AA-sized nuked batteries could recharge a normal NiMH AA in a little under a week. In either case, that's for years (obviously, the charging rate gets slower as the years go on).
Even in that form, it's quite useful. Assuming linear scalability in both regular and nuke batteries, that means if you have a device which can last up to two months on a rechargeable battery of some size, you can stick a nuke-charged of equivalent volume to your battery next to it, and between the two of them your device will stay continuously powered for at least 12.3 years.
Imagine when the next generations come out and get more efficient. I can't wait. For useful largish devices you'll always need a chemical battery for bursty amperage, but have a nuke-batt as a recharger is so handy.
Re:Laptop?!? (Score:2)
Re:Laptop?!? (Score:2, Informative)
defibrillators are usually *not* implanted, so it's worth specifying.
Re:Laptop?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Is the lead suit included? (Score:4, Interesting)
Tritium does not emit in the gamma range. It emits beta particles (electrons), and neutrinos. Both are harmless to humans, since the electrons are caught to produce current, and neutrinos can go through the entire planet without colliding with a particle.
It's particle physics, but it's not out of the public's understanding. Especially not the
Re:Is the lead suit included? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sterility, here I come! (Score:5, Insightful)
A) Have a freshly-maimed lap full of delicious, toxic, viscous, burning battery acid; or
B) Inhale the rough equivalent of breathing a couple months' worth of naturally-occuring tritium [epa.gov]?
Take your time. This one's a toughie.
Re:Pricy Battery (Score:4, Informative)
This blogger [blogspot.com] comes to the conclusion that it is at least a thousand times more expensive than gold.
And here's [laka.org] a solid figure: the Canadian Ontario Hydro company asks about 28 million dollars (Canadian) a kilogram. Hang on, I'll get my wallet.
Paranoia will destroy ya (Score:3, Insightful)
I see little evidence that "entrenched interests" have been able to stop progress. I work in an industry where technical advancement is continuous. Never once have I heard someone suggest we try to prevent the introduction of some else's advancement. People know that, practically speaking, it's impossible. The only
Re:big corporations (Score:3, Insightful)
Um... how many other not true things are relevant? Like, the whole flat-earth-help-up-by-turtles thing, maybe? I mean, it's not true, but I guess it is relevant.
the problem is these will never go into production as companies would stop making money from selling electricity
First, the companies that make laptop batteries are, generally speaking, not the ones that sell you electrons at 220/120VAC in the line to your house. Likewise, the sale of the electr