Electrical power, as South Africans know all too well, can be a finite resource.

While loadshedding could be a thing of the past, engineers at Ohio State University has developed a rather interesting way in generating wind power – from man-made trees.

The project is testing to see if high-tech objects can generate renewable power – and in this case, power would be generated by trees shaking in the wind.

The project, which has been published in the Journal of Sound and Vibration, has so far managed to demonstrate that man-made trees or similar structures outfitted with electromechanical elements can produce electrical currents. But this only happens if outside forces are exerted on it, like wind, foot traffic or any kind of motion. The same technology can also be applied to the sway of buildings.

“Buildings sway ever so slightly in the wind, bridges oscillate when we drive on them and car suspensions absorb bumps in the road. In fact, there’s a massive amount of kinetic energy associated with those motions that is otherwise lost. We want to recover and recycle some of that energy,” explained project leader Ryan Harne.

The technology that the university is working will take a number of years to produce electricity on a large scale, but for now just producing a charge is enough – and can be put to use.

Large buildings all have monitors and sensors inside to ensure structural integrity, and the team hopes that the building’s own motions can power those same sensors.

“The initial aim of the project is to turn those vibrations into electricity, so that structural monitoring systems could actually be powered by the same vibrations they are monitoring,” says Harne. “If sensors could capture vibrational energy, they could acquire and wirelessly transmit their data in a truly self-sufficient way.”

But for now, Harne and his team are sticking to man-made trees that produce about 0.8 volts when the conditions are right. There are a number of factors involved of course, but the team will forge ahead until this initiative can be implemented on a larger scale.

[Image – CC by 2.0/@Doug88888]