Japan: Producing Electricity from Train Station Ticket Gates
by Michael Graham Richard, Gatineau, Canada on 08. 4.06
The East Japan Railway Company (JR-East) is doing research on how to make its train stations more eco-friendly. One of the technologies they are working on is a ticket gate that has piezo elements that would generate electricity as commuters walk through. "R claims that this sort of human-powered electricity generation system may provide a portion of the electricity consumed at train stations in the future. [...] When combined with high-efficiency storage systems, the ticket gate generators can serve as a clean source of supplementary power for the train stations. Busy train stations (and those with large numbers of passengers willing to bounce heavily through the gates) will be able to accumulate a relatively large amount of electricity." It can also be used as a way to know how many people went through the gates. "The system is being tested at the JR-East head office in Shibuya, where it is installed at the entrance to the reception area on the 4th floor. As visitors pass through the gate, a lamp lights up, signifying that electricity has been produced. Testing of the system will continue until August 11." ::Chunichi Shimbun, via ::Japan Railway passengers to generate electricity at train stations
Brilliant. Think of how many doors we push open or turnstiles we walk through... could this technology be attached to all of them?
Reminds me of something I'd once heard about Thomas Jefferson's place... some visitors were giving him a hard time because the front gate had been somewhat difficult to open and close behind them.
He thanked them for their good work and explained that they had just been pumping water for his household well.
Revolving doors. Brilliant. Maybe at a bank or a mall or hotel in busy cities. Keep the technology rollin.
This is genious@@@
"As visitors pass through the gate, a lamp lights up, signifying that electricity has been produced"
Doesn't this seem to be counter-productive?
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editor note: It's probably just for the pilot project and to better inform the public, and if the light is a small LED, it probably doesn't take much juice.
Almost a great idea. As visitors pass through the gate, a lamp lights up thus consuming all the electricity just generated by the person pressing the piezo elements. These elements do not generate very much power. Maybe a couple few milliwatts? Neat idea, but can't see the payback being useful.
Now, generators on turnstyles may produce more - but as noted by the TJ quote, they would be harder to turn which may annoy some weaker or hurried customers...
I'm skeptical. How many Joules (Watt*seconds) can you theoretically generate from a person walking through a ticket gate? Alternatively, how many Watts would this device generate with a constant stream of people going through it? How much does the energy capture device cost, and how about the storage system?
I have a hard time imagining that a device for capturing some small amount of mechanical energy from passersby, converting it to electricity, and storing it will be cheaper than putting just a few photovoltaic panels up on a roof somewhere.
(I know that Japan has a lot more rooftop photovoltaics than the US, but I don't think that they have so little room left on their roofs that it makes more sense to pursue human-generated power from a ticket gate, of all things)
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editor note: These are obviously good questions and I'd like to know the anwsers too (will look around), but we have to remember that in many Japanese cities, tens of millions of people use mass transit every day. It probably wouldn't be too hard to generate enough energy to help power part of the station and pay back for the piezo system fairly quickly.
Not to have blind faith in Japanese engineers, but I doubt that they'd be doing a pilot project if the math hadn't worked on paper.
I'll be more impressed when they take those turnstyles off the grid entirely.
When the turnstyles end up producing enough electricity to power themselves (card readers, electric locks, etc.), that will actually be useful. If they can't even self-power, the amount of electricity produced is probably dwarfed by the additional power required to manufacture the piezo-electronic plates in the first place.
Useful, if only coupled with room-temperature superconductor or a capacitor breakthrough.
I think it's cool. Even if it's not terribly useful and doesn't generate much electricity. Thousands of little experiments like this are going on in the world, and even if 999 contribute nothing in the long term, the combined learning and exploration is great.
As a frequenter of Japanese train stations, I find that I'm often passing through gates with my hands full and maybe a bag dangling in front of me. I think these panels will cause problems for lots of hurried customers.
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editor note: The picture above is of a generic ticket gate, it doesn't mean that the electricity-generating one will look anything like that. The piezo system that generates electricity is in the ground, it doesn't have anything to do with panels or barriers.
Great idea! I wonder how many other untapped sources we can think of?
Where is the voltmeter?
The amount of electricity produced will be small.
The benefit will be that you don't need to lay cables.
let's do the math, shall we?
have you ridden those gym bikes before with a display indicating the watts? if you set them to a slightly above average level it displays about 100watts when you start pedaling. So Let's say that's how much a person "jumping heavily" through the gate will produce. We should also take into account the lag time needed for the next person to enter so let's say every 3 seconds somebody will pass through, so we divide by 3 to get 33watts for each gate. Let's also say there are 10 gates so we have 33*10=330watts so what's the conclusion? it's pretty obvious, 330watts!!! that's like three light bulbs, so instead they could turn off three light bulbs during the operational hours and not bother with these gates, but again they're japanese so we shouldn't try to understand people who are about 20 years more advanced than the rest of us.
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editor note: I think they're planning to install such systems in really busy japanese stations where there might by (guessing) dozens and dozens of gates side by side with millions of people going through them every day morning and evening. Sure it wouldn't be worth squat with only a couple of gates and few people, but I trust the people who are spending money on this to have done the math on paper first.
This is cheeky, but will a heavier person produce more power when walking upon the plate? If so, we in the US have an untapped resource!
It can also be used as a way to know how many people went through the gates.
huh? isn't this part of what the turnstyles are originally used for?
the heavier people won't be able to walk fast enough because the heavier you are the harder it'll be to walk through it, so they'll end up producing the same amount of engery, but just slow down everybody else.
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editor note: Piezo elements are in the ground. They don't slow people down.
Perhaps the more critical commenters should bear in mind this is just an experiment. It may not be the answer to the world's energy crisis, but it does show some good thinking in the right direction.
oooops, cant imagine the amount of electricity that can be generated at any railway stations in India, especially in Bomabay. Been there once, oooops, was a complete chaos.
yeah..this technology can be fairly used in cities like mumbai in india...
hope it is productive,....
Wired also ran an article on this subject (http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,71582-0.html?tw=wn_index_25), and I thought they brought up some really good points at the end:
While this future is obviously far off, it holds consequences which I don't think many have thought about.
Wired also ran an article on this subject (http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,71582-0.html?tw=wn_index_25), and I thought they brought up some really good points at the end:
While this future is obviously far off, it holds consequences which I don't think many have thought about.
Wired also ran an article on this subject (http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,71582-0.html?tw=wn_index_25), and I thought they brought up some really good points at the end:
While this future is obviously far off, it holds consequences which I don't think many have thought about.
Above someone mentioned a breakthrough in capacitors.
The breakthrough is called ultra capacitors. It exists!
If you have a source of oscillating pressure or mechanical force then it is simply a matter of surface area. 1 cm cubed of Quartz or any of the man made piezoelectric materials can provide up to 100 MW per second.
(Assuming the cycle of the pressure oscillation/mechanical force is at a rate of 1 per second)
Using about 500 lbs per square foot of force. (41.6 PSI) A 4 inch cube is = to 1 watt.
11.6 Cubic feet gives us about 5 KW of power.
The average US house uses 1.2 KW per hour and peaks to 5 KW.
An approximate cost of the piezoelectric material to produce the electrical power is US $20 per cubic foot of Kynar at production costs. (Kynar being PVIDF a synthetic piezoelectric material) 11.6 times $20 = $232
*this does not include the cost of the wire or the capacitors nor does it have a storage system. The biggest issue is getting a regular mechanical force across the piezoelectric material. As far as the costs the life span would be from 50 -100 years. So for those who quibble about the math and think the Japanese are breathing in too many fumes. I would say they should keep doing what they are doing.
Kimberly Peacock - please shoot me an email - I have a piezo question and you seem to have a lot of knowledge in this area.
First I want to say that the editor is extremely courteous and level-headed. Second, I'm just curious, why not just use the piezoelectric elements in the floor? Seems like you'd get more bang for your buck if it were supporting the entire weight of people, or perhaps better yet, cars.
I read on wikipedia that cane sugar can also be used for the same purpose as piezelectric crystals.If we compare the cost of sugsrcane with any piezo-crystal,it will be too less making it far more economical.What do u people think?
I read on wikipedia that cane sugar can also be used for the same purpose as piezelectric crystals.If we compare the cost of sugsrcane with any piezo-crystal,it will be too less making it far more economical.What do u people think?
Great. Also, use the downward movements of elevators and escalators to generate electricity. That way, with an auto detect weight adjustment, higher output is generated for heavier loads going down!
Ten people walking by and pushing gates generate just enought energy for opening the gate automatically for eleventh person!! I am so happy I live in the age of innovations!
If the weight of a few footsteps can be harnessed to power an electronic gate at a train station, throw this bad boy under the train and see what it can do.
Instead of using lightweight, "bouncing" people, why not install the piezo pad in the lane of a busy highway where heavy cars and trucks will roll over it by the millions. Or place it under the rails of a subway train. Far more energy can be harvested in this manner.
In Japan, there have been recently added features to ticket gates that allow easy access to counting how many passengers will go through the gates.
At the time, it was much more difficult, because the gates were not all electronically connected to the system.
In Japan, there will be much more efficiency for using these systems under general entrances to busy train stations than most other locations.
Even when considering placement under a train, which (while circulating on a regular basis, and quite heavy) there are several of at one station, and generally just one main (usually several smaller) entrance/exit, in which a strip of the element could be placed to absorb the shock.
the u.s. Better hurry up and do this. This could make us so much more efficient= more wealthy
I found this site when doing research to find out how to create a human powered electric plant. I have a great idea to set up a building where people can ride bicycles, or lift weight, or jog whatever, to generate power that goes into a power grid. There are a lot of people who like to exercise, and there are a lot of people that are unemployed. If the right number of people and right type of equipment can be put together, you could generate power to sell to people or businesses. There are many empty warehouses in many low income cities that can be converted for this purpose. If the government can subsidize farmers, it would do well to monetize electricity produced by humans, as long as a viable amount of it is produced. This would be great to create a sustainable economy, save resources, even for electric power cars. Please give me more info on this. I read about a computer that can be powered for several hours by cranking a lever, and a gym that taps the mechanical energy of patrons. This is a major oversight in our thinking. Plants should be built that is powered by humans. Give me feedback.