another ide kinetic energy

in England when electricity demand is low the electricity board uses electricity to pump water up from an enormous under ground reservoir to another above ground enormous reservoir and then when demand peaks lets it all down again to drive turbines to generate electricity to meet the demand. is this storage of clean kinetic energy?


could one not devise a system of gears that could lift a gigantic weight up into the air so that even small amounts of energy input could very slowly lift it up

people or persons could earn credits supply some of this energy, and this might solve the problem of money facing the world see " money as debt" thus we could have something that could be valued that did not belong to the banks

on a very small-scale something Similar was done in England during the war: a geared crank would lift a heavy weight up to the top of the house and it could then be released to drive a dynamo to supply electricity to the house. of course one had to do a lot of cranking to get it up high but it worked to supply electricity to the house while the weight was descending

my idea is that you could have many little cranks which anyone - even a one -armed cripple like me could turn to contribute, albeit very slowly to lifting the gigantic weight up really high- prisoners and criminals could be obliged to do their bit but without earning credits of course- you would earn so many credits for so many turns of the handle. I'm not an engineer but could not someone figure out such a mechanism?- . granted the world would look odd with thousands of weights hanging in the air. I accept it would take a lot of energy to build such mechanisms. but ordinary" honourable sweat" would become a valuable commodity once again. I imagine solar power or wind power could be used in addition to people power. and that way even a cripple like myself would not be a parasite on society and I would be healthier for the work- might even have to give up smoking

 

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obviously a stupid idea

 

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A good sign that it's always good to think things through thoroughly before presenting it in front of a bunch of people where one might look like an ass.

Baron Max

 

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Well, not exactly stupid, just very impractical.

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During the war, both the Brits and the Anericans used a bycycle-powered radio in several locations. It was just a small, low powered radio but it wore a guy out in about 30 minutes. Thankfully, that was enough to stay in contact most of the time.

 

I'm no scientist I'm just this bloke, I don't pretend to be clever about these things, it was only an idea. Obviously the haps in the electricity board, who had it and for whom it works fine didn't think it was impractical. I was just trying to think how one could aggregate lots of small efforts. one thing we do have in this world is man power and we do have a problem with money- see: " money as debt" and we do have a real problem with unemployment. if millions of people could generate even a small amount of electricity could that not be fed into a huge grid. i have no use of my legs but I do have a strong right arm; i just want to be useful for something and why should I give a toss about what strangers think of me?

 

Pump-Storage Hydroelectricity is used all over the world, its the cheapest way to store vast amount of electricity, I would not call it stupid or impractical just limited by geography.

 

To give you a better sense of why the idea is a bit impractical, consider the following.

It is rather well established that a human body can sustain a mechanical power output for a reasonably long period of time of only around 1/4 to 1/2 a horsepower. A horsepower is about 746 watts give or take a few tenths of a watt. So that is about 186 to 373 watts. Three to six 60 watt incandescent lightbulbs. Enough to light your house, if all you have on are the lights. No other appliances allowed. And someone has to be pedalling like Lance Armstrong all the time the lights are on.

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am i right in think that in that way electricity is stored as kinetic energy?


could it not just be bloody great weights lifted up high? albeit very slowly, for where water is in short supply or one could pump sea water up very high - there's masses of sea water- isn't there?

my idea is that a lot of little amounts of electricity could maybe fed in to a kind of grid to provide at least some of the lifting power- there is a lot of man power about and there is also a problem with money and unemployment, one has to look at it in a broad compass. i can only sit here but i could wind a big heavy wheel even from my chair in my flat and contribute something in that way and earn credits for so many turns of the wheel attached to a dynamo of some sort feeding out into a grid? silly maybe but not impossible, as a cripple I have learned that absolutely anything can be done an inch at a time, don't forget that there are hundreds of thousands of prisoners in the world- they could earn their keep

 

I have seen machines that work a very heavy flywheel to make it rotate really fast with minimal effort, that's the whole point of gearing is not? I can't pedal, neither of my legs work but my right arm is fine. any way I am only thinking of a lot of people doing a little the sort of energy equivalent of millions of people paying a pound adds up to millions of pounds or those crooks who steal millions by having a computer pay them the tiny decimals which you get in some bank accounts, surely all it takes is a little practical application and the determination to make it a reality nothing ever got done by people thinking of obstacles

 

you know back in the old days they did make criminals turn wheels and power pumps and pulleys. And there are ideas around today to make embedded linear generators in cloths that would be used to charge your cell phone and the like. How about a gym were instead of working out and producing only heat you could also produce electricity? But its never going to be a big source of energy because of how energy inefficient humans are, requiring energetically expensive to make food and maintenance, human generators are simply impractical for large scale use: it may be a good idea to get back some of the energy wasted in keeping humans alive with electric generator gyms, but its never going to be anywhere near energy positive ( or the amount of energy put into humans will always be greater than their bodies can give off).

 

I'm not exactly suggesting that human beings could power the entire planet, merely that the aggregate of relatively small amounts of energy combined with wind generators and solar panels maybe could be used to pump lots of water up really high for subsequent release. from an economics point of view I am hunting for something we could value and store that did not belong to all the banks watch "money as debt" and you will get an idea of what i mean

 

I think pump storage though is limited, we don't have enough places to make enough pump storage to all for 100% intermittent renewable, we are going to need things like sodium sulfur batteries, etc, we may always need some base level power plants as well, nuclear, maybe a coal plant running on biomass or a biomass gasifier plant.

 

point taken, thank you- in sum - non runner

 

Good Idea VHawk.

I may be simply rephrasing Electric Fetus, but I've long had the idea of using a windmill - long used as a mechanical device to pump water out of the ground - to fill a water tower arrangement, perhaps a pond or tank on the side of a hill, then using the flowing water to run a small generator. The wind is pretty cheap, the windmill requires some upkeep, but not as much as a nuclear or oil fired plant, and gravity is in no danger of running out. I would even arrange the discharge water - after turning the generator - to fall back into the well. The water is reusable and the problem of draining the aquifer is mitigated.

I also like EF's thought about hooking up the local gymnasium to generate electricity. At least all the narcissists would be doing something useful for a change.

Prisoners? Sounds too much like slave labor to me. However, it could be an option if they were bored sitting in their cells. Getting credit for it? Have to work out details.

How about putting some sort of generator in the output flow of an office or apartment building? Lots of water gets dumped as either 'gray' or 'refuse' water. But it could turn a generator.

On the down side, the Arab oil producers will not like it. Not a bit. Those governments or portions of governments who prefer keeping people dependent on said government will not like it, either. The Sierra Club and Greenpeace won't like it. (They don't like anything.) Al Gore won't like, he can't sell carbon credits.

I call that a win-win concept.

 

or you could drag a massive weight up hill on rails, could you not? as long as you got the gearing right the energy source would not matter that much would it?

our idea is a way of storing kinetic energy, mind you, it wouldn't last long and you'd have to start all over again but the principle must be good- well it seemed OK to me. Commonly a lawyer, not an engineerbut common sense tells me you want the output energy to last a long time, that was the flaw in my first idea- yours seems much better especially since there is almost unlimited sea water and anyway here in England it rains nearly all the time and we have too much water but we could use any energy to pump it up into towers and i have seen little pumps that use running water to pump water elsewhere, even higher, prisoners could damn well turn flywheels attached to generators and when they had done so many turns we could let them out, in England all they do is watch TV but hard labour might breach their human rights- so... X you are sentenced to produce 500 kilowatt hours of electricity-or pump 5000 gallons of water and some say jail is an easy option


the Olympic games- another waste of energy could be the Olympic generating electricity, the possibilities are endless

 

The principle you describe is the same as flywheels, although flywheels are actually practical.

 

if you don't want to do the work and are happy to stay in jail until youwork sentence is done- don't do the crime. our young people know that in jail all they do is watch TV and play computer games. I have seen a pedal operated machine( not a bicycle but a printing press, that can have a huge cast iron flywheel whizzing round, a suitably geared crank handle could do the same and I could earn credits by turning it as I watch television as long as you can store up the work I do, it wouldn't kill me it would do me good, I need the exercise, can't walk or run or dig, only one working arm left after my stroke, seems silly not to give something I can do to earn my keep so could prisoners, they would only be released when they had done their work so not slaves but earning their freedom

 

well that's good to know thanksm8 you've cheered me up

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Free for all

How about putting electric generating stationary bikes around parks and playgrounds, which are directly hooked onto a grid. You want exercize? simply place your credit card in the slot and peddle away, geting free aerobic exercize and getting a cut of the generated energy.

 

excellent idea, but no good to me,- no legs so I prefer a hand crank attached to a flywheel, I think there is a great deal to be said for your idea but at the centre for alternative technology in Wales they had a bike thing attached to a light bulb and no-one could light the light bulb, but they had no flywheel, once you get a really big flywheel up to a good speed- I'm only guessing, but it seems pretty powerful to me- someone should do some tests