Tapping Trees for Electricity?

dr_agonfly writes "Despite many skeptics, a Massachusetts company is getting investor interest in developing a process to tap electric power from trees. MagCap is looking to boost the current power from just under 2 volts to a more useful 12 volts with investor funding." From the article: "Jim Manwell, director of the University of Massachusetts Amherst's Renewable Energy Resource Laboratory, questioned the potential of MagCap's plans. 'I'm wildly skeptical,' he said. 'I would need to see proof before I believed it. It strikes me as pretty questionable for a number of reasons.'"

2 - 12 Volts?

[Anonymous Crowhead]

How many amps? Enough to be worth it?

Confusing terms

[Arctic Fox]

"the current power from just under 2 volts to a more useful 12 volts"

How about something more useful? Like wattage?

Don't invest, this is bollocks.

[JackDW]

MagCap is looking to boost the current power from just under 2 volts to a more useful 12 volts
Neither current nor power is measured in volts. If they can't get that right...

Re:Long way to go yet...

[Mr.Zuka]

Call me a skeptic but they are claiming that right now they are only able to produce under 2 volts. How much under 2 volts?

Long ways to go

[gasmonso]

With such a poor output, you would need an entire forest to power a TV set. While I find the article somewhat interesting, it lacks detail of any sort. It really just seems like the potato clock I saw on Mr Wizard as a kid.

http://religiousfreaks.com/ [religiousfreaks.com]

Re:Clueless Dweeb, he created a classic battery...

[Marxist Hacker 42]

One big difference is that the lemon is dead and slowly rotting, needing replacement. The tree is living, thus the only thing that needs replacing (assuming that the drainage doesn't destroy the tree) is the anode and the cathode. But we use electricity to make aluminimum don't we? I'll bet this comes out to be energy negative in the long run.

The lemon battery experiment

[retro128]

It doesn't sound too different from the old lemon battery experiment [ca.gov]. Sure, he might be able to generate voltage, but the question is...Where are the AMPS? If he has 12V at .005 milliamps, this tree electricity won't be useful to anyone. I hope not too many investors are buying this guy's line...

Re:Long way to go yet...

[Rorschach1]

The fact that they're equating voltage with power should be a big clue that something's not right. It's like that comment in the Matrix about a human being generating as much power as a 100-volt battery. Without knowing current, it really tells you nothing. I can produce thousands of volts from a 3-volt battery with a fairly simple circuit. Will that create more power? Not at all - it's less, because of the losses in the circuit.

Nothing to see here...

Re:Let's just get them out of the way...

[pomo monster]

Look, I'm no troll--check my posting history--but your comments, TripMaster Monkey, are just inane. This one isn't funny and it serves no purpose. Please stop.

You can't connect the trees in series

[Anonymous Coward]

Each tree would have to be in its own pot, otherwise, the battery cells (trees) would short themselves out. Anyway, the energy you get comes from the aluminum going into solution. To make the aluminum you use electricity. You would get less energy back from the trees. Not exactly perpetual motion.

This reminds me a bit of cold fusion. There's something happening but maybe not what the inventors think.

Re:Clueless Dweeb, he created a classic battery...

[Marxist Hacker 42]

How do you suppose the nails are created? They don't grow on trees. The production of the raw metal uses electro-chemical energy. It is precisely this energy he found.

That may be correct- I've seen at least one other potential explaination. But you're completely correct in that the process is energy negative when you figure in the cost of making the nail (and likely also the copper).

Re:Let's just get them out of the way...

[heauxmeaux]

You know what TripMasterMonkey?
Anonymously posting in praise of your own comments is just lame. Get a grip on your ego you friggin goof.

Re:The guy made an electrochemical cell ("battery"

[slashname3]

You will get more energy out of burning the tree than you will using this old potato clock idea. This article at best is a troll. Nothing more.

Re:This is how it works

[goldspider]

I knew it was snake oil without wasting time on TFA, and here's how I knew:

"MagCap is looking to boost the current power from just under 2 volts to a more useful 12 volts with investor funding."

Apparently any technological breakthrough, no matter how fantastic, unfeasable, or absurd, can be achieved with enough funding.

Dollars to donuts these asshats are just trying to fleece some hippies with more money than brains.

Re:The guy made an electrochemical cell ("battery"

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't wire trees in series. They are grounded.

Re:Long way to go yet...

[shawb]

Oh, the energy comes from somewhere indeed. There is an aluminum spike and a copper spike inserted into a tree. A tree has water with several dissolved compounds (including acids and salts) flowing through it. The tree's sap acts as an electrolyte, while the spikes are the anode and cathode in a simple aluminum/copper battery, similar to this gradeschool science experiemnt [exploratorium.edu]. The spikes will be consumed in the reaction, thus the tree is not generating any power at all. The fluctiations in voltage would be related to a changing internal resistance within the tree. Considering the amount of energy it takes to make aluminum, this fits under the "nothing to see here" category.

Re:Long way to go yet...

[shawb]

Oh yeah, and considering the electric potential of reducing copper is .34v, while the electric potential of oxidizing aluminum is -1.66v this working out to .34 - (-1.66) = 2volts, it seems kinda suspicious that the tree "generates" up to two volts of electricity.

Re:Let's just get them out of the way...

[sckeener]

Ironically, the "Let's get the cliches out of the way" post has become a cliche.

And in time, so will pointing it out.

Dang it! It is like Pi. It will never end. For the love of god, let it end. Think of the children!

Even longer to go

[LordEd]

The article says there is voltage, but nothing on current. How much current is drawn across 2V? Power = current * voltage. You could have 1000 V, but if the current is about a nano-amp, you won't have enough to run a radio.

Re:Let's just get them out of the way...

[Zordak]

Think of the children!

I'd like to point out -- that's a cliche.

Heh. And I ain't even a physicist

[freeweed]

It's funny to see 300 people point out that this guy has re-invented the potato/lemon battery, and at the tail end of the story someone tries defending the process, by quoting the FAQ:

Q: Is the voltage potential between an electrode inserted in the tree and one grounded both having different electro-potential characteristics due to electro-chemical reactions e.g. Galvanic batteries?

A: In a Galvanic reaction there is metal to metal contact. Henceforth the word "galvanized". Validation and voltage measurement does not involve metal to metal contact.

See, um, I'm no physicist, but I do know that in a galvanic cell, the metals most definitely do NOT touch each other. There is no metal-to-metal contact. None. The metal electrodes only interact through an electrolytic medium which carries ions between the two of them.

Just for fun, let's look at the rest of this answer:

In addition, a chemical reaction requires a very elevated or very low PH level in order to create this alkaline or acidic condition.

No, chemical reactions can take place at literally any pH. Try again.

A chemical reaction requires hours if not days to manifest.

Try telling that to someone who works with high explosives. Or, if you don't believe me, go to your kitchen and add some vinegar to some baking soda. It won't take hours to react, but see for yourself if you're unsure.

Anyway, the fact that the size of the trees has no effect on the amount of power .. well, all I see is talk about voltage, but we'll leave the advanced (ie: grade 11) physics out of this for now. We can safely stick to elementary school science for this. Go make a potato battery using the smallest potato you can find, and copper and aluminum electrodes. Now go make one using the biggest potato you can find. Notice that the voltage you can get from that is exactly the same!

Dude, you've been hoodwinked. The FAQ is entirely, completely, 100% wrong on the most basic fact of how batteries, and for that matter, chemisty works.

Mods, you've been had as well.