Generation of electricity during wood drying. Free Technical Library News

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Electricity generation during wood drying

13.12.2022

By working with the fine details inside a tree, Swedish engineers have come up with an interesting new way to harvest electricity. This technology takes advantage of the natural processes that already occur when wood is dried, but overloads it to provide enough electricity for LEDs and other small devices.

The study, led by nanoengineers at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, focuses on the sequence of events that occur when wood becomes wet and then dries out. This is called transpiration and occurs in all plants as water passes through them and then escapes, actually producing a small amount of bioelectricity.

Previous attempts to capture and use this electricity have been made difficult by low power, but the authors believe they have solved this problem by redesigning the walls of wooden cells. With a new treatment using sodium hydroxide, the team was able to create highly porous versions with more surface area and greater water permeability of the cell walls.

This results in more surface charge and water movement through the material, which improves its ability to generate electricity. This could be further improved by fine-tuning the pH of the wood.

"We compared the cellular structure of ordinary wood with the material we have improved in terms of surface, porosity, surface charge and water transport," said Yuanyuan Li. "Our measurements showed that the power generation is 10 times higher than that of natural wood."

In its current form, engineered wood can deliver 1 volt and a power output of 1,35 microwatts per square centimeter. It can run at this level for two to three hours and endure ten water cycles before performance starts to drop. More work is needed for the technology to actually find practical applications, but the potential has inspired scientists.

"Now we can use small devices like an LED lamp or a calculator," Li says. For a normal household, we will need a lot more materials and water, so more research is needed.

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