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Urine Powered Battery Developed
Saeed al-Sahaf writes "Research investment into developing smaller and cheaper chips to process information in disposable health tests has been significant, but they were still reliant on an external power source. The researchers at Singapore's Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology think they have overcome this problem with their latest urine powered battery. From the article "The battery is composed of paper, soaked in copper chloride, sandwiched between layers of magnesium and copper. The whole thing, once laminated in plastic, is just a millimeter thick, and 6cm by 3cm in size." The breakthrough promises a cheap and disposable power source for home health tests."
Don't bother pissing in the radiator. Now you can piss in the GAS TANK!
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
Next up: Bullshit powered battery. John Dvorak would probably be able to fuel his entire home from the stuff he spews!
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
First
this will be great for those car trips where my laptop's battery dies and I have to wiz at the same time.
I'll be right back, I have to go fill up my laptop's battery....
Space for rent, inquire within
The whole thing, once laminated in plastic, is just a millimeter thick
So how does a reasonably sized chap introduce his electrolyte?
Why don't they just give us a hand crank? They're more than efficient to power or charge all sorts of small electronics. All we need is a universal plug interface, and we can all be our own emergency backups.
"Pee in this... and turn this."
While they're at it, why doesn't my car have an emergency gear/wheel/crank system that I can connect ot my battery on cold days when my Jolapy won't start?
Now I have a legitimate reason to piss all over the Compaq laptops at work.. No more awkward thinking up spur of the moment excuses
What's that smell?
Absolute power!
So, does that make urine an energy drink?
...piss ON!
I wonder if the power comes from the urine, or if urine is acting as an electrolyte that allows the energy stored in the "paper, soaked in copper chloride, sandwiched between layers of magnesium and copper" to be released.
Ceci n'est pas une sig
I saw that once in a bar near LA: there was a urinal with a 3x3 square hole and the top half of a small paddlewheel behind it. A small sign advised that it was an electronic pissing contest machine, and that men who could turn the paddlewheel the fastest would win a free supersize softdrink (to play again no doubt). A bulb on top of the urinal would go brighter and brighter as the paddlewheel would turn faster.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
The copy writing muse wispered to me.. These are going to be called "UP Batteries" Urine Powered...
- Henrik
- when the Shadows descend -
So, let me get this straight...
It's a battery.
Shipped dry.
Electrolyte added only when needed.
How is this new?
(It's not really urine powered anyway. Urine is just the electrolyte.)
I dub thee... Sir Phobos, Knight of Mars, Beater of Ass.
Calvin becomes new Enron CEO. News at 11...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Health tests my ass...more likely drug tests. Now it can wireless the data it senses to a handheld! They can have the cops waiting for you outside before you even know it...
A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both. Dwight D. Eisenhower
This battery is going to take the pressure off the industry. It doesn't take a whiz to see that they're looking out for number one. Trust me, these guys are going to make a big splash very soon!
A Pee-Powered Peltier Six Pack Cooler!
Ok, so the first two beers are warm. I could live with it.
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
The whole thing, once laminated in plastic, is just a millimeter thick, and 6cm by 3cm in size...0.2 millilitres of urine the battery will provide around 1.5 volts, with a maximum power output of 1.5 milli-Watts
.001 Amps = 1mA
So, let's get some facts...Jeeves says that normal humans feel the need to urinate when they hold 150 - 200mL of urine in their bladder. 200mL sounds decent for this math.
200mL / 0.2mL per battery = 1000 batteries that can be charged on a normal fill of urine.
1000 batteries * 1.5 mW per battery = 1.5 W
1000 batteries * 1.5 V per battery = 1500 V
1.5W / 1500V =
So, my own piss only has as much power as a spark of static electricity. Sorry folks, but it's going to take more than one run to the toilet to power your laptop.
If this thing could be made small enough, it could be put within the > bladder</a> (1.1 to 1.3 litres) to work as a permanent machine. It could talk using 802.11b and bluetooth, be its own 'hotspot' so that a human mesh can be made. You wouldnt need to carry a wallet at all. It could also check your health that way. I wonder if it can be used with a plug and an actuator to 'hold it' for you when you really have to go and have nowhere to go.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
The breakthrough promises a cheap and disposable power source for home health tests. ... that you pee on.
In Soviet Russia, battery piss on YOU!
Entire universities could be powered by frat boys as they piss on the lawn and walls after getting drunk.
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mobile search - try it on your phone
Comment removed based on user account deletion
1 battery outputs 1.5 mW / 1.5V = 1mA
theoretically you could get 1A at 1.5V by wiring them in parallel, OR 1mA at 1500V by wiring them serial, both outputting 1.5W of power.
until the next model; the one that incorporates crystalized urea. Then "just-add-water" will work. If they can do it this way, it will be much more acceptable, IMHO.
I'm afraid this post will get lost in all of the pee-pee jokes, but what the hell. I don't see what function urine serves in these batteries. I didn't think urine was all that energetic. The article says these things can output a maximum of 1.5 mW at 1.5 V, so why not just use a tiny alkaline battery? A very tiny battery could be produced for a few cents and they have shelf lives of several years. I just don't see why you need to involve urine at all (other than the fact that it gets your research in the news). What am I missing?
If you can read this sig, you're too close.
Just my bigger male bird dog alone should be able to light up my block at night, and he's very accurate.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
trust me, she _means_ to do that. I'd suggest a plastic bed cover and learning to like it.
works for me.
** "It's not my job to stand between the people talking to me, and the ones listening to me." -- Pego the Jerk
If you can rig up a system to spin the alternator (by re-mounting the alternator and using a jacked-up wheel with a belt for a flywheel), you can generate the ~14 volts needed to charge a 12V battery (charge voltage must be higher than discharge voltage - I won't explain that here, look it up), and with no fancy tools, you can recharge the battery enough for a start-up within a couple hours.
That's with NO special tools. If there was a crank system designed into the car, efficiency would increase so much (you also wouldn't have to remount the alternator) that you could get the car started with 10-15 minutes of cranking (and one hell of a tired arm).
The biggest problem with the ad-hoc system is that modern alternators require a starting voltage across their inner coil in order to BEGIN charging (again I won't explain here), and without a special system, you would be relying on residual battery voltage for the alternator start-up. If it was planned for, the crank would start by juicing the inner coil, then transition to spinning the alternator once the coil is charged and feeding back into the car's battery.
With all due respect, not knowing the solution does not mean there is no solution.
And to think I was worried before about having a uroscopy...
should we call it bladdery acid?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Now I almost *never* have to walk away from the computer!
It is just using the urine as an electrolyte
Hmmm, dunno about the chemistry on that one, but I do know a bit about urine. pH is around 5 but varies greatly. It contains:
Water (obviously)
urea (not an electrolyte - (NH2)2-C=O )
electrolytes including potassium, bicarbonate, chloride, ammonium, calcium, a bit of sodium (if your kidney is working right, otherwise a lot of sodium), and traces of everything else.
I wonder how the battery actually works. Any chemist figured this one out?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Great! Now I don't even have to get off the couch to change the batteries in my remote anymore. And as a side benefit, I don't have to *share* the remote anymore.