Static Electricity: Practical Uses in Daily Life

Replies

• 

  sauravgoswami

  well,tat can be done,but the cost can be very high
• 

  Kaustubh Katdare

  sauravgoswami

  well,tat can be done,but the cost can be very high

  What's the idea?
• 

  gohm

  I am guessing you are refering to creating a static electricity generator as trying to harness the ambient static electrical charge would result in a gathered charge too weak to do much of anything at to high a cost to be practical. Static electricity contains almost no amps, thus being very ineffiecent. Lightning, being a very high powered form of static electricity, is very random and would be tough to harness. A capacitor is basically a storage medium for a static charge. People have built generators using sulfur & amber in the 17th century. People currently have made clothing or suits that generate a static charge and store in a battery. There is even a cell phone charger that works on the static or piezoelectric effect. To mechanically create a static generator would be much more inefficient than current generation.
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  sauravgoswami

  well to make it use for low-voltage application is possible....but we have to find a consistent source to generate statis electricity...
• 

  neo1786

  Static electricity is very diff to store........a large capacitor wud be req to store any considerable amount of charge necess to supply current to anythng...........i guess using static electricity was rejected cuz it was diff to produce in large amounts................
• 

  ashuashi

  Good thought.... any body came across storing it.
  
  I find a lot of static charge being produced in my office. Any ways to utilize it... dont know... waht are your findings
• 

  aj_onduty

  Never thought about this. Seems to be interesting. I would love to see people storm their brains here.
• 

  d_vipul

  somebodu please reply to this thread.....................i also want to know about this.................where we can use it.....................
• 

  solie115

  It would seem that an important move in the dirrection of providing energy solutions is using less of it. I don't know just how much effort is aimed in that dirrection, the EI's may. A guy from oxford said that he had done some experimentation with a power cube containing solar cells and a halogen lamp. The object was to produce more energy than was being used. I don't know the results there. If a low energy or "free" source was the 'progenitor' ... ??
• 

  ISHAN TOPRE

  I have tried it many times and it is very simple too. Acually all of must have tried it. Whenever a battery discharges, try rubbing it with a cloth with high speed. You will find that it will be charged again.
  
  My idea is to build a reciprocating device which will rub a battery against a silk cloth. I have still not experimentally measured the amount of energy getting stored during such a process.
  
  Moreover, it would be an interesting exercise to see if we can rubbing both sides we can produce large static energy or is it that only rubbing single side is sufficient?
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Ishu,
  What kind of battery, rechargeable or the primary cell?
  As far as I know batteries that work on chemical energy - electrical energy conversion cannot be charged with static. Are you sure that you are not just removing some invisible non conducting film from the terminals? Device manufacturers do advice cleaning the surface with a lint free cloth.
• 

  narayana murthy

  as per my knowledge we can use this to attract substances by creating high amount of static electricity
• 

  ShrinkDWorld

  ishutopre

  I have tried it many times and it is very simple too. Acually all of must have tried it. Whenever a battery discharges, try rubbing it with a cloth with high speed. You will find that it will be charged again.
  
  My idea is to build a reciprocating device which will rub a battery against a silk cloth. I have still not experimentally measured the amount of energy getting stored during such a process.
  
  Moreover, it would be an interesting exercise to see if we can rubbing both sides we can produce large static energy or is it that only rubbing single side is sufficient?

  Nice.. Convectional DC generators are going to be outdated in future! 😁
• 

  Alienator

  well.... i guess static electricity can't be harnessed unless its dynamic...yet it can be stored
• 

  ISHAN TOPRE

  bioramani

  Ishu,
  What kind of battery, rechargeable or the primary cell?
  As far as I know batteries that work on chemical energy - electrical energy conversion cannot be charged with static. Are you sure that you are not just removing some invisible non conducting film from the terminals? Device manufacturers do advice cleaning the surface with a lint free cloth.

  Ramani Sir,
  I am talking of a primary cell. May be you will find it strange but I have tried rubbing simple Eveready battery on a cloth and they can be used for sometime. I think, we can charge them if we can induce static electricity, I have observed the fact with two different cells. The cell which I rubbed more worked more than the one which I rubbed less.
  
  I believe there is a mathematical relation in rubbing of electrical batteries and static charge induced. Forgive me but I do not agree with you that electrical batteries cannot be charged with static as I am seeing results with my eyes.
  
  An I am aware of the fact that manufacturers advice. And no, I am not removing any coating.
  
  Is there any other explanation for the phenomenon? May be I should devise a method to calculate the amount of power which the cell provides after rubbing. A simple electrical circuit would do. I will try exactly and tell you. 😀
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  In static electricity we are looking at charge separation. This is achieved usually by rubbing materials like hair, wool and such against rubber, plastics and such. One of the rubbed material gets a + charge while the other gets an exactly equal amount of - charge. A battery is a device that generates charges by chemical reaction. A battery is a low voltage device. Other than that whether there is nothing static about static electricity. In a capacitor electricity is stored as separated charges just like static charge. A capacitor can be 'charged' with static electricity.A primary cell can never be totally discharged. What happens is that the electrodes can get passivated (polarised) and stop delivering current. The high voltage static charge can depolarise the electrodes and allow a little more power to be drawn. This is what you have probably achieved.
• 

  ISHAN TOPRE

  Ramani Sir,
  
  If that is the thing, thanks for the knowledge. I have been doing the same thing. I never realized that I am merely boosting electrodes again. I always thought that I am charging battery again.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Ishu,
  However, there is some work being done to harness the huge power of static electricity in the atmosphere. All of which is wasted as lightning. Well not all is wasted. It has been estimated that the silent discharge of electricity in the clouds(When the lightning is a glow and not a streak) produces more nitrogen fertilizer(which comes down with rain) than all the fertilizer plants on earth put together!
  Here is an interesting motor that runs on static electricity.
  SODA BOTTLE ELECTROSTATIC MOTOR
  However, you can develop your concept further by charging super capacitors with static. That way static energy can be harnessed.
  #-Link-Snipped-#
  #-Link-Snipped-#
• 

  chauhanpratyush

  Issue

  Ramani Sir,
  I am talking of a primary cell. May be you will find it strange but I have tried rubbing simple Eveready battery on a cloth and they can be used for sometime. I think, we can charge them if we can induce static electricity, I have observed the fact with two different cells. The cell which I rubbed more worked more than the one which I rubbed less.
  
  I believe there is a mathematical relation in rubbing of electrical batteries and static charge induced. Forgive me but I do not agree with you that electrical batteries cannot be charged with static as I am seeing results with my eyes.
  
  An I am aware of the fact that manufacturers advice. And no, I am not removing any coating.
  
  Is there any other explanation for the phenomenon? May be I should devise a method to calculate the amount of power which the cell provides after rubbing. A simple electrical circuit would do. I will try exactly and tell you. 😀

  
  
  are u sure by rubbing battery to a cloth ur charging the electrodes and not charging the surface of the battery which is just a metal container????...
• 

  Nakash

  Hello all !
  
  ( This was the exact discussion thread i was looking for )
  
  

  The_Big_K

  Any ideas on how can we convert it into useful form of energy? ;-)

  sauravgoswami

  well,tat can be done,but the cost can be very high

  could you enlighten me Saurav sir on how it can be done , keeping the cost factor at bay for the time being .
  
  

  sauravgoswami

  well to make it use for low-voltage application is possible....but we have to find a consistent source to generate statis electricity...

  imagine we have a body that is continuously being charged with static electricity for , lets say a few hours .
  how do we
  1. store this electricity (for future use)
  2. use it straight away to run electrical devices or instruments .
  
  waiting eagerly for the reply !
  thank you in advance
• 

  grsalvi

  They had used in one of the aeroplane of USA.
  The red carpet on flooring would get charged due to walking of passengers and this charge was stored.(saw on discovery long back).
• 

  zaveri

  the van de-graff generator is an application.
• 

  kiransabarish

  I think the Capacitive touch screens that We use in mobile phones and various other touch screen devices also use this static electric charges.
• 

  Travis

  I'm getting tired of the electric companies, and I'm convinced this can be done with todays technology. I've been out of the electronic field for a long time, but I'm convinced that with the advent of nano tech a component and a device can be made to pull ambient earth atmospheric electricity to power homes. What is needed to be experimented is a micro or nano device that has a whole bunch of micro or nano antenna's the hight and width and type of material is what is not known. we feed those micro or nano antennna into a charge capturing device that can then transform the the power in to the desired voltage, here in america 120 AC. Here's a few links to get people thinking about it.
  
  #-Link-Snipped-#
  
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  I will continue to research as time permits, let me know what you thing about the possibilities, also I've been looking for some off the shelf anti-static electronic circuit components, does that exist?
• 

  Jeffrey Arulraj

  Travis

  I will continue to research as time permits, let me know what you thing about the possibilities, also I've been looking for some off the shelf anti-static electronic circuit components, does that exist?

  Anti Static circuits use seperate protective gears and that is what which makes them anti Static and other than that most of the existing and operable circuits and drives have a great draw back due to static electric potential
• 

  Scorpion007

  I think below link will explain why static energy cant used for power production and where it is used practically.
  
  #-Link-Snipped-#
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  sreeram v

  The_Big_K

  CEans,
  
  Static electricity is everywhere around us. Its there in your shirts, combs, hair, chair, table ...
  
  Any ideas on how can we convert it into useful form of energy? ;-)
  
  [PS: You see, finding interesting ideas is easy. You got to have your eyes and ears open.]

  i have an idea of developing static electricity for household electricity uses joing with help of wireless electricity transmmissions... but i need a guide to clarify my doughts
• 

  [Prototype]

  sreeram v

  i have an idea of developing static electricity for household electricity uses joing with help of wireless electricity transmmissions... but i need a guide to clarify my doughts

  That's a pretty deadly combination. Static electricity + wireless transmission. I would be surprised if you even get 0.00000000000000001 uA at the output.
  
  Static electricity, despite having a high voltage, is not capable of producing any significant amount of current.
• 

  Ilikerocks

  What if we strapped a low cost rechargeable battery onto cats. Let them collect static energy. Then save the charge into a bigger converter.
• 

  Jeffrey Arulraj

  Mate converter efficiency is lower as there are losses in every stage. I would not suggest using converters.
  
  Firstly don't you think that harvesting voltage into a battery is not possible due to the following reason
  

  • To charge a battery you will need to apply more voltage than its operating voltage to charge it

  That is If you want to charge a 3V rechargeable battery You must apply a minimum of 3.5V to charge it.
  
  Getting this much potential is not viable in a living organism
• 

  Real Aslam

  When you rub battery at high speed on cloth, it doesnt charge the battery because of static electricity but because the chemicals inside the battery get some movement.
• 

  zaveri

  what about van-de-graaf generators ?
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  VDG generators are efficient in maintaining very high voltages. However the current is very small. They have very poor efficiency in converting mechanical energy into electrical energy.
• 

  Ram eda

  Static charges repels the water away from it.If we were able to produce huge static power,we can use it to divert the floods.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Ram eda

  Static charges repels the water away from it.I

  That is the rub. One can produce huge static voltages but negligible power. All the experiments that one sees with water stream bending with a charged balloon or comb works only when the stream is thin and slow moving. Good to show opposite charges attract. It does not work with a full flowing tap.
  
• 

  Jayaram Reddy

  I think we can use a pulse transformer which can step up the flux [electro static charge]. But the sourcing current will be in nano amps.
• 

  Ricos

  Tesla has patents for a device to collect what he called cosmic energy, basically a capacitor, antenna and high frequency switching circuit. However infrastructure costs needed to generate large amounts of energy apparently out weigh the output. Either that or the energy companies don't want to be put out of business.
• 

  Ricos

  Kaustubh Katdare

  CEans,
  
  Static electricity is everywhere around us. Its there in your shirts, combs, hair, chair, table ...
  
  Any ideas on how can we convert it into useful form of energy? ;-)
  
  [PS: You see, finding interesting ideas is easy. You got to have your eyes and ears open.]

  Tesla has patents for a device to collect what he called cosmic energy, basically a capacitor, antenna and high frequency switching circuit. However infrastructure costs needed to generate large amounts of energy apparently out weigh the output. Either that or the energy companies don't want to be put out of business.
• 

  Ricos

  Tesla has patents for a device to collect what he called cosmic energy, basically a capacitor, antenna and high frequency switching circuit. However infrastructure costs needed to generate large amounts of energy apparently out weigh the output. Either that or the energy companies don't want to be put out of business.
• 

  highvoltpower

  Kaustubh Katdare

  CEans,
  
  Static electricity is everywhere around us. Its there in your shirts, combs, hair, chair, table ...
  
  Any ideas on how can we convert it into useful form of energy? ;-)
  
  [PS: You see, finding interesting ideas is easy. You got to have your eyes and ears open.]

  Electrical energy that has gathered in one place. Most of us know that static builds up when we rub things together, I guess static electricity can't be harnessed unless it’s dynamic.There are many other places where static electricity is incredibly useful from laser printers and photocopiers to pollution busting power plants, static can be really fantastic.
• 

  Fuzzy88

  My first thought initially is to think that energy can not be created or destroyed only transferred, so really its just a matter of a giant math problem. I would propose that we first figure a way to store the energy ( a capacitor), once we figure out a method to store such low energy charges we then can figure a way to convert that energy to a more useful state ( step-up or step-down transformer, from there we can figure a way to use that energy to power a motor of sorts. I have found that sometimes we have to start at the end of the maze to find our way to the start. we have all this technology which is great but we are so used to this technology that we sometimes forget to think and keep it simple.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Yes. There is no free lunch. However, there is a lot of biomechanical and other mechanical energies that get wasted as heat. It is not cheap to convert these into usable power.
  Georgia tech did some research on this:
  Static electricity generator harvests 1mW
• 

  Travis

  This may answer a few questions
  #-Link-Snipped-#
• 

  Travis

  Harvesting Lightning Energy
• 

  Travis

  Looks like someone is doing a little bit of the heavy lifting.
  Atmospheric Electricity Generation: Is this "true energy" the sleeping giant of renewables? — Land Art Generator
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Rather impractical. Hundreds of tethered balloons thousands of feet up in the atmosphere will be a nightmare for air traffic.
• 

  Travis

  A.V.Ramani

  Rather impractical. Hundreds of tethered balloons thousands of feet up in the atmosphere will be a nightmare for air traffic.

  Just need to figure out how to scale it down.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  The catch is that one has to go high enough to get enough static voltage difference.
• 

  Travis

  A.V.Ramani

  The catch is that one has to go high enough to get enough static voltage difference.

  I'm just wondering if this is an area, where micro or nano scale surface area technologies may be able to come in to play. Interesting how different types of materials when in proximity of each other create more or less electrical charges. Maybe possible to sap or gradually pull electricity from air maybe Electrical Windmills blades could be replaced with blades that have micro or nano wires sticking out from them so as the winds turns the wind turbine. it also induces or conducts electricity from the air that is passing over the blades? I think airplanes have leads sticking past the wings to release electrical charge?
  Static Discharger
• 

  Travis

  Triboelectric Effect
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  The Feynman Lectures on Physics Vol. II Ch. 9: Electricity in the Atmosphere
• 

  Arthur K

  Hi, everyone! I have a weird question:
  Can we use a capacitor as a grounding to get rid of static electricity? I saw an experiment where one man used capacitor to light up a LED, having charged it with static electricity.
  The matter is, I have no access to the actual "grounding" in my apartment but I need to get rid of the malicious static electricity before upgrading PC hardware.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Unless one of the electrodes of the capacitor is grounded it cannot be charged.
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Unless one of the electrodes of the capacitor is grounded it cannot be charged.
• 

  Arthur K

  A.V.Ramani

  Unless one of the electrodes of the capacitor is grounded it cannot be charged.

  So, is there any alternative way to "emulate" grounding if I have no access to the real grounding?
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  If the plumbing of the house is metallic, that should work as a ground.
• 

  Arthur K

  A.V.Ramani

  If the plumbing of the house is metallic, that should work as a ground.

  Unfortunately, it's all plastic(. Actually, I thought of a temporary static electricity collector that would keep accumulating static electricity from human body for some time then such device could be subsequently discharged to the real grounding. Could something like Leiden Jar do that?
• 

  Ramani Aswath

  Any metal pole just outside or a metal window sill might work.
• 

  Chris Stripling

  Mr. Ramani, a room humidifier would do more to reduce or eliminate static charges from building up in your ?apartment? than trying to ground everything. Humidity makes it much harder to strip electrons from surfaces in the first place. And humidifiers are cheap. An ounce of prevention...
  
  To the original thread, static charge could be stored in capacitors. The charge could be discharged though a resistor (a basic RC circuit), which slows the decay of the charge in the capacitor. Now you have something akin to DC, direct current. Its still not very usable, though. This RC circuit acts like a battery that dies quickly.
  Use three capacitors. Using a microprocessor to control the timing, charge each capacitor for two time periods then discharge it for one. You could make a pulsating 3 phase signal out of this. Three more capacitors out of phase 180 deg. to the first three would give you a reasonable 3 phase AC signal. This device is similar to a Variable Frequency Drive, VFD. The size of the RC circuits and static generators (van de Graff or Winhurst or?) would determine the output of such a device, but since that high voltage is now AC, that low amperage several people have already pointed to could be stepped up considerably through transformers. High tension power lines are very low amperage at very high voltage which minimizes the effect of transmission line resistance.
  One of the first comments was the cost. The engineering problem was/is the cost of the hardware. Modern power generation doesn't have the additional steps of capacitive storage and signal conversion that this static based system would have.
  Mr. Tesla, the inventor of poly-phase electricity, was indeed a very smart man.
• 

  STI Web

  Static electricity is used in pollution control by applying a static charge to dirt particles in the air and then collecting those charged particles on a plate or collector of the opposite electrical charge. Low Cost Vibration Monitoring Systems, Accelerometers, Proximity Probe & Vibration Transmitters | StiWeb.com and Low Cost Vibration Monitoring Systems, Accelerometers, Proximity Probe & Vibration Transmitters | StiWeb.com Such devices are often called electrostatic precipitators.
• 

  Corey Barton

  When i worked in a plastic bottle factory i found that the vats of preforms created an unmeasurable amount of static electricity. I found this out when one of our feed vats jammed and i was instructed to stick a broom stick "coated in rubber but not completely" into the vat and unjam the clog when i did i recieved a shock so great that it formed a lightning bolt pattern burn on my leg where it was contacting the hand rail. Would it be possible to convert that energy into useable power ? Possibly to charge the battery operated hand trucks used to move the pallets of preforms. Since the production of static electricity is constant would it be cost effective to create such a charging mechanism

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  Ramani Aswath

  Static voltages are high, not power. Not cost effective to harvest.