h a l f b a k e r yWarm and Fussy
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I used to work in a museum and it struck me you could make electricity in a two or more storey building by giving the visitors a guide book. First, make the last exhibit on an upper floor. The visitor would carry it around and eventually get to the last exhibit, hand the book back and it would go down
a conveyor belt connected to a generator. The visitor would be happy to be able to read an informative guide book, the museum could cut their electricity bill.
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Stick the visitors on a treadmill. As they pace, all the museum exhibits are paraded slowly past them on a belt connected to the treadwheel by cogs. Another cog can be connected to a generator for lighting etc. |
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//What? Don't get it.//
The energy is generated by the book losing its potential energy as it sinks from the top floor of the building back to the ground floor. |
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Because of the small amounts of energy generated, this might be better suited to an art gallery where the book, the machine and whetever it powers could all be part of the same exhibit. |
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"To listen to background information about this piece, please crank this lever three times." |
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I'd like to make electricity from visitors to my house. But I'm mean. |
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Seriously, say the book weighs 100 g (4 oz). It is carried up 10 m (33 ft). That gives you 10 joules of energy. One book per second would give you 10 watt of power. The Science Museum in London gets 1,600,000 visitors per year and is open 56 hours a week, making 0.16 visitors per second. Which equals 1.6 watts total power output, assuming a perfectly efficient generator. Not even enough for a single light bulb. |
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Why would you not capture energy from the visitors in the same way? They are heavier and therefore contain more potential energy. |
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What about elevators? Aren't they used to generate electricity when people want to go downstairs? |
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You forget there is no efficient way to get the energy from a falling object. The Earth eats it up man. |
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Falling objects just don't generate power. There has to be a medium in which they pass, which is redirected to make electricity. |
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Why not just put all the bathrooms on the top floor of all buildings. The fluid from the flush could be directed to also run turbines. |
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Damned inconvenient, though... |
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hmm, yeah using the vistors would be more fun...maybe a trap-door leading to the conveyor belt to make it more interesting. Principally I'm just trying to correct the inbalance of museums, the visitors get something of interest and the people working there have to say "please take your hand off that 50 million pound painting, please" on a too regular basis, I speak from bitter experience... |
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