The New “Power Plants”: Trees Make Electricity?

MagCap Engineering is pretty sure they’ve come up on the next renewable energy revolution...

MagCap is applying for a patent while MIT tests the phenomenon in the blistering Cambridge cold.

Will it really be a revolution if one company holds the patent and charges exorbinate licensing fees. Especially when this could otherwise be cheaply employed as a small energy source in third world countries?

Congratulations - they've invented the potato battery!

Seriously, folks, these guys are to "green" energy what the perpetual motion people are to inventing.

This is a chemical battery (aluminum nail in tree, copper conductor in the ground) that works the same way that old potato battery worked - the aluminum nail slowly corrodes and releases aluminum ions, which provide the (weak) current detected. Given the massive amount of electricity required to turn bauxite into aluminum, this isn't a very efficient battery - and you'd get a better current just dipping the aluminum nail and the copper wire into a bucket of salt water (the reaction is more efficient).

On top of everything else, the released aluminum ions are toxic to trees - if you managed to rig this in a way that increases the efficiency of the aluminum corrosion, you'd kill the tree.

Not very TreeHuggerish, if you ask me. Hug that tree before it dies...

The same or similar story was posted on Slashdot a few months back. Like Brian said it's junk and is basically the potatoe/lemon battery experiment performed in grade school.

Actually interesting related info about Nathan Stubblefield, he did something like this about a century ago as well as earth batteries -alternate metallic plates buried in the dirt produced current -faint mind you; as well as a varieted list of earth powered devices.

I liked the post a lot better when I misread it and thought it was "Madcap Engineering"...

Any good information on earth
power systems??Perhaps someone here that knows something about human electrical and magnetic system?? thanks for sharing info. milan

the diff between a potato battery and this is that the tree remains alive.

im not saying that this is the end of oil reign but more like another foot in the door.

Froggy -

Actually, the aluminum ions will eventually kill the tree if you want to get any decent current out of this battery. Live tree + lots of aluminum ions = dead tree.

There's nothing magic about the tree (or the potato) - the magic is the aluminum nail. You use a LOT of electricity to change bauxite (the principle form naturally occurring aluminum ore consisting mainly of aluminum hydroxide) into aluminum metal (up to 40% of the cost of aluminum is due to the electrical costs of the Hall-Heroult process of turning alumina (which is made by caustic wet chemical leaching from bauxite via the Bayer process) into aluminum metal).

Now, pounding the nail into the tree and the copper wire into the ground causes the nail to corrode (turning back into an aluminum oxide), giving off aluminum ions which convey a charge through the wire into the ground. The nail slowly turns into oxide, the tree dies and the process stops. You are left with a dead tree, a "rusted" nail and a truly tiny percentage of the electricity it took to create the aluminum metal from ore in the first place.

This is NOT any kind of foot in the door - it's hucksterism. It's embarrassing that any part of MIT got involved in this. Wind farms, solar arrays, biodiesel, cellulosic ethanol - those are feet in the door. Tree power (except for coppiced willow biomass power) is just a way to fleece money from the rubes.

I didn't read anything in the article about an aluminum nail. They just said "pounding a nail into a tree..."

It could be a chemical battery, and perhaps it is an aluminum nail, but lets not rain on their parade too quickly.

Unless of course you have investigated the phenomenom and are certain of your facts.

Beware of corporate spies...

PS -

If you read MagCap's actual press release, you will see on page 4 a description of the "invention".

"Simply drive an aluminum roofing nail through the bark and into the wood of a tree – any tree – approximately one half inch; drive a copper water pipe six or seven inches into the ground, then get a standard off-the-shelf digital volt meter and attach one probe to the pipe, the other to the nail and you’ll get a reading of anywhere from 0.8 to 1.2 volts of DC power.”

This was "dirty" power, so they rigged up a series of three capacitors in order to smooth out the current draw. With this arrangement, they got out approximately 2 volts of current.

Interesting number, "2 volts". The electric potential of reducing copper (the pipe) is +.34 volts, while the electric potential of oxidizing aluminum is -1.66 volts. Do a little math on the differential: (.34v) - (-1.66v) = 2 volts. Fancy that!

Believe me, if "tapping" the electrical potential of non-animal life forms (that's how MagCap puts it) was as simple as driving a nail into a tree and tying it off to a copper tube, we'd have been powering Atlanta that way for the past 100 years. Read the press release yourself - it's full of crackpottery.

Even if you drank the kool-aid and believed you were actually drawing down electrical energy from the plant, rather than from the nail, wouldn't this be harmful to the plant? Presumably, that electrical current would be there for a purpose (as are the human body's various weak electrical currents, which are used to do non-trivial things like keeping our hearts beating). Also, some process would have to be in place to generate that electricity - presumably some sort of solar power conversion. Considering that most of that solar energy is going into keeping the plant alive and growing via photosynthesis, it stretches the imagination that it would have a whole bunch of "leftover" energy that it would turn into electricity just so we could harvest it. What evolutionary pressure was working on trees to push them into being stationary electrical generators?

There really is nothing to see here, folks.

Not that I'm saying that this is something big and nothing more than a battery, but the person "doing the math" was applying it to the wrong voltage figure. The 2 V. is the output of the switching circuit. The voltage being "produced" by the trees was reported to be 0.8 to 1.2 V. . Does it really matter? I don't know.

Poor trees. What happens if they drive a nail into their heads?

Electricity from trees!!

When I was a kid I ran a wire from a tree to my house and got electricity. I intended to use it for an antenna which worked very well but it also gave me a very weak shock. I could go out at night, hook up a flashlight bulb to the wire and ground the bulb with a wire in the ground and it would glow dim.
Donald

>Congratulations - they've invented the potato battery!

That's pretty much exactly what I thought. when the don't mention the wattage you know it's small.

Hi,

I'm a retired electrical engineer and enjoyed your article on getting electricity from trees. I've often thought that there's a potential (??) for making use of the difference in potential between the earth and the atmosphere. A tree, especially a tall one with much foliage, might possibly be a conductor of electricity from this phenomenom although I figured you'd have go a bit higher to get useable current. However we do it, we could pass the current through water and thus generate useable hydrogen via electrolysis. With a cheap and ready supply of hydrogen we'd be on our way to freedom from petroleum for energy.....Otis L. Osborn

I tried this and was unsuccessful! I tried lighting up an LED light that runs off of a 1.2 volt battery. I nailed in an aluminum nail and attached it to a copper wire to the positive terminal and attached a copper wire with a copper tube into the ground...I got nothing; any suggestions?

Well spoke,now for the serious question, power lines above 35 ft trees.What is needed to draw from the alternating magnetic field ? What would happen ,in various power/distance/? conditions? My iron wood trees are an adjustably close, to distribution lines.17kv and house service lines within the trees.Sounds incrediby dangerous to me,that said,what would happen if power neutral was introduced to a system tapping ,some way,the fore mentioned mag field,would some person care to point the way to model such a situation?

What if there is a thunder storm. I know there is a very slim chance of the lthunder bolt to hit the nail or anything but stuff like that have happenend What if the thunder bolt hits the tree or the nail. Will it completely fry the whol system or tree?

Actually, the aluminum ions will eventually kill the tree if you want to get any decent current out of this battery. Live tree + lots of aluminum ions = dead tree.

I will you never do that that it dangerous VERY dangerous...

so true with the potato idea, but also how did u guys figure out that tree's give out electrical vibes?

That’s great idea producing electricity from tree, could any one give me the simple workout to produce electricity from any natural source. Because iam interested to save this world, in future the source of power energy is very little, so that natural source is important, let me any one to complete my research.
Thanks for your kind co-operation.
Regards
Rathish Viswanathan.

Is it possible to genetically engineer a tree so that could produce electricty?
Surely this could be the next way of generating electricty.

I agree with froggy on this one about all they have created is an oversized potatoe battery.

this is possible so then why dont they do, this is a renewable souce so this is the best way.

the is a possible way, so why dont they do it

How do people go and post a comment and not read the wealth of comments before theirs?

One might notice that, GEE, you're just getting the energy back out that you spent converting Alumina (Aluminum oxide) into Aluminum.

They take Bauxite, reduce it to Aluminum oxide, and then make aluminum from that, its not like they just FIND aluminum nails in the ground. (Well they do, but its hardly a reliable energy source)

Man, the education system in this world could use some work.

I was at an ocean's health symposium a while back, and there were a couple of snake-oil salesmen outside claiming to be producing power via the use of superconductors and a laser.

According to them "All you have to add is liquid nitrogen, which is very cheap"

People were eating it up, until I jumped in and started calling them on their BS.

this is great... now they have another good source of energy...

but the question that remains hanging is...

"will it affect the growth of trees and eventually conclude to global warming?"

It is possible to generate power from the trees using the wind, and I don’t mean putting a wind mill on the top of it.
Sorry that I can’t tell you more, But when you finally see it work you are going to crap!!!
It can be put together for almost nothing, A couple of trees; bit of hard where; a few car parts, and a few hours of your time, And you can have a super high output generating source giving a endless supply of AC power.
It will generate lots of power from a small bit of wind.
This should not damage the trees in any way..
The power company’s may hate me but so what!!!

I think it is pretty cool that we as a people can make electricity. The government is trying to stop this but they can't.

ha ha

i guess you could tie the branches that flap in the breeze and convert that wasted energy into another form of energy, which can then be stored?

A coulpe of weeks ago, it occurred to me that tree trumks might act something like dry cells. I had some 8 inch aluminum spikes, left over from a a rain gutter replacement job. so I drove one into a tree about four feet above the ground; drove another into the ground about a foot away from the trunk. When I checked with my Radio Shack multimeter I read a little over .5 volts. I thought I had invented sliced bread!!!!!!! Further testimg with more nails showed an increae in voltage , the further I went down the tree in large steps; suggesting that the real source of power was just below ground level. I have a suspicion that this is not a potato battery but that something else is involved waiting to be discovered and developed.

In respons to jhon Roche.

the increse is most likley due to the increase in the amount of water as you get closer to the root/ or rott ball of the tree.

Just a Thought

Just before reading this article, I had the notion that perhaps the electron transport chain of photosynthesis is less that perfect~ which I found it to be~ and perhaps excess energy could be drawn from a plant. A quick search brought me here.

The way to do it would Not be to simply drive a nail into the trunk! Such would just be a chemical battery if the nail was aluminum, and would have nothing to do with the tree (which has been pointed out in comments here).

Hi folks,
This doesn't really sound like anything new, let alone revolutionary. It is well documented that you can extract electricity from vegetive matter, such as potato, lemon,or oranges,vinegar, etc.. But wait!!..,
Did you know that you can produce high voltage electricity just by running water!!
You can actually create more energy when you water the trees that you are trying to harvest energy from!!!
Quote;"The battery he creates has a huge potential difference - 10 to 20 kV!" (1 kilovolt = 1,000 volts)
Well,I'm not a physicist or an electrician, but I don't see why you couldn't set up a series of these simple devices and harvest the pulses of electricity produced. I also speculate that something like this could augment a hydro-electric dam, and create electricity in ways that are currently untapped. (all rights reserved on those idea by the way.) ;)
If you don't believe me, have a look at these demonstration videos. Go to youtube and search for the title there;
'Walter Lewin Makes a Battery out of Cans and Water'
And if your stil interested in the 'Potato Battery' concept theres a demo or two of that as well.
Peace Folks,
'Chemical' Mike

Hi People,
I stumbled on this web site as I was browsing for some information on alternative energy sources.

They mentioned clearly that they have A NAIL in the tree and to complete the circuit they GROUNDED it. This is NOT A POTATO or a lemon experiment where we stick a cathode and anode and observe the flow of electrons between them. Potato and lemon have weak acids and therefore, conduction takes place. In this case, you're using only a NAIL. Just one! So relax, the tree won't die.

so cheers :)

Hi everyone,
As an electronics technician, I've experimented with this phenomenon in the past. First of all, it works just as well on a dead tree, as a live one. That is to say, putting a nail in a tree, and one nearby in the ground, and measuring the voltage across the two nails. You always get a reading of about .5 to 1 volt, DC. The current output is only about 45 microamps, so it is almost worthless. It will never drive an LED light which takes about 10,000 microamps. Also, it works the same on a stump of a tree, so it has nothing to do with photosynthesis. Also, you don't even need a tree. if you place 2 nails in the ground 3 feet apart, you end up with the same effect, and the same voltage range. It's definitely something along the potato battery line of reasoning, and I don't believe for a minute, that MIT is wasting any time on it.