Emergency Power Generation

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I am only a cat veterinarian but I thought up a potentially feasible power generator. Use a fresnel lens or parabolic reflector to focus heat on the junction of two dissimilar metals, creating electricity via the Seebeck effect. There is a power company in the Mojave, it turns out, that does this with parabolics and provides power to 260,000 homes. Can a smarter person than me rig this up and test??

-- Gayle Robison (dr.meow@usa.net), December 01, 1998

Answers

Sounds fascinating! Where is the power co in the Mojave that does this???

-- Seeker (seeker_six@yahoo.com), December 06, 1998.

Gayle, brilliant idea, great use of the ol' grey matter--but sorry I don't have a clue. I'd be real interested in the efficiency compared to solar panels. I have a friend who is a genius on energy stuff so I'll talk to him and if I get anything of value I'll let you know. Good luck!

rishi

-- rishi (vedaguy@mediaone.net), May 11, 1999.


Anything new on this? It seems to me that this technology was used before...on the Apollo crafts I believe. The cold of space against the internal heat of the space capsule created a slight current which I believe was enough for them to do electrolosis of water to create O2. I recall this from grade school, which was a very long time ago.

-- Jed Clampet (karenp@globalserve.net), August 25, 1999.

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