Freevolt generates power from thin air

[GamersCouch]

Engadget Article 

 

According to Drayson Technologies, "Freevolt is the first commercially available technology that powers devices using ambient RF energy, no dedicated transmitter required."

 

This can power smoke alarms, watches,  and other small devices indefinitely through the use of RF energy! 

 

 

[vanished]

Engadget Article 

 

According to Drayson Technologies, "Freevolt is the first commercially available technology that powers devices using ambient RF energy, no dedicated transmitter required."

 

This can power smoke alarms, watches,  and other small devices indefinitely through the use of RF energy! 

That sounds like a bad idea - if I read that right, it's basically sucking the power out of wireless signals like radio, wifi, etc. to run itself, thus making them all weaker

[iamdarkyoshi]

The power harvested is almost useless.

[Electronics Wizardy]

That sounds like a bad idea - if I read that right, it's basically sucking the power out of wireless signals like radio, wifi, etc. to run itself, thus making them all weaker

It wouldn't suck up rf energy from other devices as you can't make the waves move toward your device. It would do less to your reception than having a metal box in the room.

[vanished]

It wouldn't suck up rf energy from other devices as you can't make the waves move toward your device. It would do less to your reception than having a metal box in the room.

It would weaken any signals passing through it though, right?  That's what I mean

[GamersCouch]

That sounds like a bad idea - if I read that right, it's basically sucking the power out of wireless signals like radio, wifi, etc. to run itself, thus making them all weaker

But imagine them making a power supply that emits bands that aren't used, say .5-1.9Ghz and 3.0-4.5 Ghz... and everything else would be powered  wireless. The implications would be vast! 

[Deletive]

But imagine them making a power supply that emits bands that aren't used, say .5-1.9Ghz and 3.0-4.5 Ghz... and everything else would be powered  wireless. The implications would be vast! 

You could crank it up to some unknown frequency because there isn't a need for latency but at that point you still need to transmitter so it's pretty useless. 

[iamdarkyoshi]

But imagine them making a power supply that emits bands that aren't used, say .5-1.9Ghz and 3.0-4.5 Ghz... and everything else would be powered  wireless. The implications would be vast! 

you might even be able to power a digital watch!

[GamersCouch]

The power harvested is almost useless.

This guy is hilarious. that said, this is the kind of implications that can be done with 5 years of research since that video was made...

 

"Freevolt may well be the most efficient system of its kind, but it's still only viable for devices that require very little power. In a location where lots of RF signals are flying around, like in an office, a standard Freevolt unit can produce around 100 microwatts of power. That's nowhere near enough to say, run your smartphone, but Drayson has some specific use cases in mind. The company thinks Freevolt can be the backbone of the connected home, and in a broader sense, the internet of things. Sensor-based devices, such as a smart smoke alarm, can be powered by Freevolt indefinitely. Beacons that provide indoor mapping and targeted advertising are also perfect candidates."

[Electronics Wizardy]

Engadget Article 

 

According to Drayson Technologies, "Freevolt is the first commercially available technology that powers devices using ambient RF energy, no dedicated transmitter required."

 

This can power smoke alarms, watches,  and other small devices indefinitely through the use of RF energy! 

This isn't gonna work well. The amount of power that can be made with out a huge antenna is in the less than 10 micro watts range and almost useless range. 

 

Letts assume that all the power you can get is from a wifi hotstop(there is also lots of other emmiters but this is a easy ballpark calculation). The max power they can output in the US is 1 watt. If your device is 2 meters away that means a surface area of about 50 square meters. Assuming the antenna can get energy from a .1 x .1 meter area you would get a max of 200 micro watts. Thats assuming a perfect enery capture device. This won't be and at 50% efficiency(im being very nice) were thinking of 100 microwatts. 

 

Soo. about 100 microwatts max with a good solution... not bad but what can you do with 100 micro watts.\

 

A smoke alarm battery lasts about a year on a 9v battery. Lets assume the battery holds 3 watt hours and uses 60% of the charge. That means it uses about 0.00022 watts or 200 micro watts. Thats close to the power form the perfect rf energy capture device, but remember that there will be big losses with the boost converter to increase the votage.

 

A low power micro controller in idle mode can get to around 200 micro watts(a 8bit computer with the coure running at 1mhz and most parts turned off.

 

Well Its has to be perfect and even then there just isn't enough energy to make this a reasonble solution to power problems. Solar panes makes lots power power compared to trying to capture rf energy. 

[Stefan1024]

Nearly all NFC and RFID devices uses this trick to generate it's own power supply. You can only harvest around 0.1 to 1 mW, but this is still enough for some applications like sensors.

 

And don't worry about your signal gets weak. The field captured is (more or less) only as big as the antenna. A metal plate of the same size has the same effect on you signal. And there is metall all around you nevertheless the WiFi still works.

 

But seriousely, you loose >50dB at any reasonable distance, what is a factor of 100 000.

[Lethal Seraph]

Right now it may not do much, but with this breakthrough we can expect an explosion of possible tech that we can create. 

[Electronics Wizardy]

It would weaken any signals passing through it though, right?  That's what I mean

Yea a metal plate would also do that. 

[Electronics Wizardy]

It would weaken any signals passing through it though, right?  That's what I mean

Yea it would. But any electronic device(that meets fcc standards) does as well as there all have to have shielding that keeps most rf from going through it.

[GamersCouch]

You could crank it up to some unknown frequency because there isn't a need for latency but at that point you still need to transmitter so it's pretty useless. 

Not so... I would rather have my smoke alarm constantly fed power instead of having the batteries run out when I need them... and those are the things that can run indefinitely by scavenging RF signals.

[Bittenfleax]

-snip-

You watch him as well?!!!  :lol:

 

Nice

[Prysin]

But imagine them making a power supply that emits bands that aren't used, say .5-1.9Ghz and 3.0-4.5 Ghz... and everything else would be powered  wireless. The implications would be vast! 

this was tested with some laptop some years ago.... this exact method...

lets just say, a low end laptop took like 7+ hours to charge to max and would lose power if it was being used while "charging"... the range was abyssmal and some users complained about "that whiny noise your old CRT tv made"

[You_are_a_cunt]

I smell BS

[Tedster]

Damn! Where I live we only have thick air!

 

I understand what it does. Maybe we could have freevolt fairy lights or something in the not so distant future or something - if they wouldn't require too much power.

[Prysin]

I smell BS

the system works... its basically "long range induction".

it works on the same principle as "wireless charging" does for phones, just on a longer range and WAY worse efficiency...

 

if you think the energy efficiency between a 970 and a 390 is bad... wait till you compare the efficiency of this with that of a wireless phone charger.....

[You_are_a_cunt]

the system works... its basically "long range induction".

it works on the same principle as "wireless charging" does for phones, just on a longer range and WAY worse efficiency...

 

if you think the energy efficiency between a 970 and a 390 is bad... wait till you compare the efficiency of this with that of a wireless phone charger.....

 

I know the physics that allow it to work. I'm calling BS on it actually working to the point where it's a viable solution

[Stefan1024]

the system works... its basically "long range induction".

it works on the same principle as "wireless charging" does for phones, just on a longer range and WAY worse efficiency...

It uses electromagetic (far feeld) coupling instead of magnetic (near feeld) coupling like wireless charging does.

[Stefan1024]

I know the physics that allow it to work. I'm calling BS on it actually working to the point where it's a viable solution

The funny thing is, that even if it works, a solar cell the same size can harvest much more energy, even in low light situations.

[BuckGup]

If we can power low powered devices with random RF energy in the air what is that doing to our bodies?

[bcredeur97]

wasn't there someone implementing this into a phone case a while back? What happened to that project? Was it a failure because its so little power that it is basically useless?