Harnessing The Secret Power Of Humans

You all know the power of humans hasn’t been fully tapped.  What you probably don’t know though, is exactly how its being tapped by the engineers of today, and the part it could play in slowing, or even reversing, climate change by reducing our use of fossil fuels.

Tapping The Power Of Humans

We’ve all heard about the marvels to be found in the Toyota Prius.  One aspect that draws particular attention is the regenerative braking system.  Here, we have kinetic energy, in the form of motion, that generally goes to waste when the driver is braking.  With the Prius, part of the energy lost during braking gets captured and routed back to the battery for charging.

The ultimate result of all movement — human movement included, is kinetic energy.  Every time you take a step, swing your arms, or turn your head, you generate a small amount of kinetic energy.  That energy, although generated in small increments, when taken in aggregate, can eventually add up.  Watch makers have taken advantage of this phenomenon at the individual level for years with kinetic watches.  These watches utilize the kinetic energy of the wearer to generate and store power for the watch.

Now, engineers are taking advantage of this phenomenon on a larger scale.  Inventors have developed piezoelectric materials that can convert movement into electrical energy.  The electrical energy can then be harvested and stored in batteries for later use.  This technology has been applied in workout centers and dance clubs to collect the latent energy generated from human movement to reduce traditional power methods.  Perhaps this technology could be one day applied in subway stations and other places that have large amounts of human traffic, to one day generate much larger amounts of electricity.

Other, aspiring green entrepreneurs have taken the process one step further.  There are several workout gyms now that harvest a portion of the energy expended by their members to reduce their carbon footprint.  In most instances, even though users track the energy they produce during exercise, in the form of watts produced, all that energy  produced by treadmill goers, stationary cyclists, and rowers is simply lost.  Some sharp-witted gym owners have started collecting that energy and using it to further reduce energy consumption from traditional sources.

Right now, the application of energy harvesting to human motion is a niche market.  But, reversing climate change is a huge task.  The goal of reducing our energy consumption from fossil-based energy sources will require the use of a variety of technologies.  Considering the total number of people on the planet, its entirely possible that harvesting the energy expended through human motion could one day play a significant part in that process.

This post is part of the Blog Action Day 2009, a day for bloggers around the world to write on the topic of climate change.

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