Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Nikola Tesla Redux - Wireless Power Finally Arrives

via one of our top Canadian Blue Blaze irregulars...
TODAY
"We're going to transfer power without any kind of wires,"
says Dr Hall, now Chief Technology Officer at WiTricity, a startup developing wireless "resonance" technology.

"But, we're not actually putting electricity in the air. What we're doing is putting a magnetic field in the air." ...

In the house of the future, wire-free energy transfer could be as easy as wireless internet.

If all goes to WiTricity's plans, smartphones will charge in your pocket as you wander around, televisions will flicker with no wires attached, and electric cars will refuel while sitting on the driveway. (more)


YESTERDAY
In 1891, Nikola Tesla gave a lecture for the members of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers in New York City, where he made a striking demonstration. In each hand he held a gas discharge tube, an early version of the modern fluorescent bulb. The tubes were not connected to any wires, but nonetheless they glowed brightly during his demonstration. Tesla explained to the awestruck attendees that the electricity was being transmitted through the air by the pair of metal sheets which sandwiched the stage. He went on to speculate how one might increase the scale of this effect to transmit wireless power and information over a broad area, perhaps even the entire Earth. As was often the case, Tesla's audience was engrossed but bewildered. (more)


TOMORROW
No more replacing batteries in wireless bugging devices, voice recorders and spycams! 

Interesting side note... Leon Theremin invented a wireless bugging device that didn't need batteries back in the 1940's. (more)