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IPFS News Link • Energy

As it turns out, salt water + graphene = electricity

• http://www.dvice.com, Travis Andrews
 Frankly, it’s almost like the stuff is fictional. Luckily for the human race, it isn’t, and we’ve just discovered something pretty cool: flowing salt water over it generates electricity. That’s right. The Harry Potter-esque substance can create electricity out of thin air. In fairness, we’ve been using hydroelectricity basically since we knew electricity was a thing. But things like water mills only work when you’ve got an awful lot of water flowing through them, and flowing too much isn’t green since it can screw up the ecosystem of rivers and streams.

Unsurprisingly, researchers have been trying to find a new way to harness hydroelectricity for years. The reigning idea was to push ionic fluids through a pressure gradient. Problem is, pressure gradients aren’t exactly easy to come by, so the process was impractical for creating large amounts of electricity. But, as it turns out, if you drag salt water over graphene, then you get electricity in return. Without the use of a pressure gradient.

When the water is pulled over graphene, its charge becomes unbalanced. The graphene’s electrons are desorbed on one end and reabsorbed on the other end, meaning the graphene generates electricity across itself as the water slides down.


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