You’ve probably noticed that burning stuff makes both heat and light. You can get more or less of each, depending on how you set things up, but the truth is we usually don’t want either. We want electricity.
We’ve gone whole hog on turning heat into electricity. Most of the electricity in the world is made by burning something to heat up water. When a water molecule heats up, it changes from liquid to vapor that is 1600× bigger by volume (that’s why popcorn pops). This massive expansion moves a steam turbine producing mechanical energy, that’s connected to a generator that spits out electrons. Whether you start with wood, coal, oil, gas or uranium, that’s where your electricity comes from.
In the last couple decades, we’ve also gotten pretty good at turning light directly into electrons with solar panels. The sun is super reliable, but the ass end of Earth gets in our way at dusk every day. What if we could make make our own sunshine?
The ingenious Lightcell burns fuel, like hydrogen, but is optimized to make more light and less heat. Many times brighter than the sun, it can convert a lot more of the chemical energy from fuel into electricity.
Swapping a Tesla battery out for a Lightcell would weigh 1000 pounds less and give it a 2,500 mile range. You could “recharge” in minutes at the gas pump! That might not be your ideal electric dream but the implications for drones and planes are extraordinary. There are lots of cases where liquid fuels are necessary or ideal. Lighter, quieter, safer, more efficient and reliable than internal combustion engines, Lightcell could go anywhere a generator is used and make better use of the fuel.
Listen to my conversation with Lightcell’s founder, Danielle Fong on the Deep Future Podcast: