Comments on: New tech for e-book gizmos? ‘All the battery juice you need directly from the air’ http://www.teleread.org/blog/2007/03/31/new-tech-for-e-book-gizmos-all-the-battery-juice-you-need-directly-from-the-air/ News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:27:51 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Rob Preece http://www.teleread.org/blog/2007/03/31/new-tech-for-e-book-gizmos-all-the-battery-juice-you-need-directly-from-the-air/#comment-291982 Rob Preece Sat, 31 Mar 2007 23:35:37 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/blog/?p=6359#comment-291982 Yes! Solar cells make so much sense. Perhaps we could build the substrata from solar cells and have the entire machine double as a solar power collector. Now, if we could just find a cost-effective way to let those of us with solar cells to trickle unused power back into the grid, we could begin to make some real contributions. Rob Preece Publisher, www.BooksForABuck.com Yes! Solar cells make so much sense. Perhaps we could build the substrata from solar cells and have the entire machine double as a solar power collector.

Now, if we could just find a cost-effective way to let those of us with solar cells to trickle unused power back into the grid, we could begin to make some real contributions.

Rob Preece
Publisher, http://www.BooksForABuck.com

]]> By: Marcus Sundman http://www.teleread.org/blog/2007/03/31/new-tech-for-e-book-gizmos-all-the-battery-juice-you-need-directly-from-the-air/#comment-291854 Marcus Sundman Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:42:38 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/blog/?p=6359#comment-291854 Transmitting power omnidirectionally over the air is highly inefficient. Furthermore, several studies have indicated that even though the heat that radiation of some wavelengths (e.g. microwaves) transfer to human cells don't do the cells any damage (which is the way almost all related safety standards measure damage) there seems to be something else causing damage to the cells. Maybe some resonating causes disruption to some process inside the cell, I don't know. Transferring power by induction works very well with my electric toothbrush, across a distance of a few mm, but I wouldn't trust it to be safe to have a powercast transmitter at my desk. Also, the "Powercast Safety Whitepaper" is a joke. For ebook devices based on E Ink I would rather go with solar cells. You need to flood the device with light to be able to read the screen anyway. For devices with illuminated displays I'd rather use batteries (maybe one of those nanotube-capacitor thingies that you can charge in no time flat). Transmitting power omnidirectionally over the air is highly inefficient. Furthermore, several studies have indicated that even though the heat that radiation of some wavelengths (e.g. microwaves) transfer to human cells don’t do the cells any damage (which is the way almost all related safety standards measure damage) there seems to be something else causing damage to the cells. Maybe some resonating causes disruption to some process inside the cell, I don’t know.

Transferring power by induction works very well with my electric toothbrush, across a distance of a few mm, but I wouldn’t trust it to be safe to have a powercast transmitter at my desk. Also, the “Powercast Safety Whitepaper” is a joke.

For ebook devices based on E Ink I would rather go with solar cells. You need to flood the device with light to be able to read the screen anyway. For devices with illuminated displays I’d rather use batteries (maybe one of those nanotube-capacitor thingies that you can charge in no time flat).

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