Can earth's (or a planet's) magnetic field be used to generate electricity ?

[Skybuck Flying]

Hello,

The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.

Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down in
the core) ?

How much electricity would it generate ?

(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)

Bye,
Skybuck.

[colin]

Post by Skybuck Flying
Hello,
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down in
the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)

You need to have a coil move through the earths magnetic field to get any
electricity,
then the power comes from the effort required to move the coil,
the earths field is changing very slowly however and this change would
produce some electricity albeit exeptionaly small amounts.

Colin =^.^=

[Skybuck Flying]

Yeah how about deploying many many many many of these (tiny) devices ?

How much "power" would that generate ? ;)

Bye,
Skybuck

Post by colin
You need to have a coil move through the earths magnetic field to get any
electricity,
then the power comes from the effort required to move the coil,
the earths field is changing very slowly however and this change would
produce some electricity albeit exeptionaly small amounts.
Colin =^.^=

[colin]

Post by Skybuck Flying
Yeah how about deploying many many many many of these (tiny) devices ?
How much "power" would that generate ? ;)

At a gues i would say a lot less than is needed to recover the energy used
to build them over their lifetime.
polymer solar cells are probably a better bet.

Post by Skybuck Flying

Post by colin
You need to have a coil move through the earths magnetic field to get any
electricity,
then the power comes from the effort required to move the coil,
the earths field is changing very slowly however and this change would
produce some electricity albeit exeptionaly small amounts.

Colin =^.^=

[Bill Sheppard]

Google 'Space tether experiment',

[Skybuck Flying]

Post by Bill Sheppard
Google 'Space tether experiment'

Hmmm if suddenly an astronaut is whipped in half we know what did it ;)

Bye,
Skybuck.

[martin griffith]

On Sat, 23 Dec 2006 21:50:15 +0100, in sci.electronics.design "Skybuck

Post by Skybuck Flying
Hello,
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down in
the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)
Bye,
Skybuck.

Grey Lensman by E E 'Doc' Smith (1951)
They used, AFAIR, planets, with the the sun as a heater (not 6.3V) as
the components of a triode as a weapon.
(Don't tell GWB for heavens sake)



martin

[Starlord]

The Earth's core is soild Nickel and it has montians and valleys of it's
own, there is no 2nd metal layer.
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltechs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.


The Lone Sidewalk Astronomer of Rosamond
Telescope Buyers FAQ
http://home.inreach.com/starlord
Sidewalk Astronomy
www.sidewalkastronomy.info
The Church of Eternity
http://home.inreach.com/starlord/church/Eternity.html

Post by Skybuck Flying
Hello,
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down
in the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)
Bye,
Skybuck.

[Double-A]

"The giant orb of iron and nickel that anchors Earth's center is
spinning faster than the planet's surface, according to a new study
that confirms scientists' expectations."


"Earth's core is made of a solid inner part and a fluid outer part, all
of it mostly iron.

The solid inner core has an uneven consistency, with some parts denser
than others, and this can either speed up or slow down shock waves from
earthquakes as they pass through.

So the researchers speculated that if the Earth's inner core is
rotating faster than the rest of the planet, then shock waves from
waveform doublets would enter and exit through different parts of the
core despite originating from roughly the same spot on the planet's
surface.

By analyzing the minute changes in travel times and wave shapes for
each doublet, the researchers concluded that the Earth's inner core is
rotating faster than its surface by about 0.3-0.5 degrees per year.

That may not seem like much, but it's very fast compared to the
movement of the Earth's crust, which generally slips around only a few
centimeters per year compared to the mantle below, said Xiaodong Song,
a geologist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an
author on the study."

http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/050825_earthcore.html


It makes sense that the inner core should be rotating faster, since the
tidal drag from the Sun an Moon would have the most leverage on the
outer part.

Double-A

[a***@netzero.com]

Post by Starlord
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltechs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.

It's spelled Toltecs.

[Starlord]

I had never noticed that before, I copyed it from another post, so it's
fixed.
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltecs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.


The Lone Sidewalk Astronomer of Rosamond
Telescope Buyers FAQ
http://home.inreach.com/starlord
Sidewalk Astronomy
www.sidewalkastronomy.info
The Church of Eternity
http://home.inreach.com/starlord/church/Eternity.html

Post by a***@netzero.com

Post by Starlord
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltechs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.

It's spelled Toltecs.

[Howard Eisenhauer]

Post by a***@netzero.com

Post by Starlord
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltechs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.

It's spelled Toltecs.

Unless you're talking about the poor bastards at the bottom of thier
society who had to resort to earning a living by fixing the mistakes
of the Tolengineers :)

H.

[Tom Kerr]

Post by Starlord
The Earth's core is soild Nickel and it has montians and valleys of it's
own, there is no 2nd metal layer.

You are joking of course. Nice one.

[Starlord]

I have seen the mapping that has been done of the earth's core via sound
waves and the maps have shown that the earth's core is anything but smooth,
that it has what could be called pecks and valleys, some of which are of
good sized. This research has been down over meny years, using not only
sound waves made by man but ones made by earth itself.
--
There are those who believe that life here, began out there, far across the
universe, with tribes of humans, who may have been the forefathers of the
Egyptians, or the Toltecs, or the Mayans. Some believe that they may yet be
brothers of man, who even now fight to survive, somewhere beyond the
heavens.


The Lone Sidewalk Astronomer of Rosamond
Telescope Buyers FAQ
http://home.inreach.com/starlord
Sidewalk Astronomy
www.sidewalkastronomy.info
The Church of Eternity
http://home.inreach.com/starlord/church/Eternity.html

Post by Tom Kerr

Post by Starlord
The Earth's core is soild Nickel and it has montians and valleys of it's
own, there is no 2nd metal layer.

You are joking of course. Nice one.

[Rich Grise]

Post by Skybuck Flying
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down
in the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)

It's been done in sci-fi decades ago. You run a couple of tethers with
corona generators on the end, and just pick up DC in your satellite. Of
course, since you're generating electricity, the energy comes from your
orbital momentum.

No problem! Just put a couple of megawatts of solar panel on the
station, and energize the wires, and you've got a motor!

Cheers!
Rich

[dalai lamah]

Post by Skybuck Flying
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down in
the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)

It has been done:

http://www-spof.gsfc.nasa.gov/Education/wtether.html

[Charles Jean]

On Sat, 23 Dec 2006 21:50:15 +0100, "Skybuck Flying"

Post by Skybuck Flying
Hello,
The inner core of the earth has two different moving layers of metals (?)
which generate a magnetic field.
Would it be possible to come up with some kind of device to use this
magnetic field to generate electricity (be it in space or be it deep down in
the core) ?
How much electricity would it generate ?
(I'll include one eletronics newsgroup since they might know some stuff
about eletricity as well)
Bye,
Skybuck.

___
NASA did this on one of the shuttle missions. Just let a long wire
out that swept the earth's magnetic field, and generated enough
induced current to melt and break the wire!
Gelogical evidence shows that the earth's magnetic field wanders all
over the place in terms of both pole position and strength. At times
the NS poles lie at the equator. N and S will eventually trade
places, and sometimes field strenth cycles through a 0 field strength
period! All on a geological time scale, of course. Nothin to worry
about for a while.......
___

Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabris, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam.--
I have a catapult. Give me all of your money, or I will fling an enormous rock at your head.