14 DAY TRIAL // Imagine being able to fire up your favorite power-starved gadget without having to crawl out of bed to find your charger. Thanks to researchers in Japan, this utopian scenario might one day become reality.
Thus, just yesterday, scientists with Japanese company Mitsubishi Heavy Industries announced to the world that, in a series of experiments, they managed to wirelessly transmit energy over a considerable distance.
The achievement is one for the books
The scientists behind this research project say that, during their latest series of experiments, they used microwaves to send 10 kilowatts of power to a target located at a distance of 500 meters (1,640 feet) from the energy source.
That's right, these brainiacs claim to have transmitted enough energy to power a decent collection of kitchen appliances through the air. Pretty impressive, right?
Even cooler, the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries researchers say that, having covered the target distance, the 10 killowatts worth of energy that they toyed with successfully lit a few LED lights purposely included in the experiments.
“The reception of power was confirmed at a receiver unit located at a distance of 500 meters away by the illumination of LED lights, using part of power transmitted,” the company writes in a statement.
On the day that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries went public with this breakthrough, one other team of scientists, this time with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, told the world that they too had succeeded in wirelessly transmitting energy.
More precisely, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency researchers announced having wirelessly transmitted 1.8 kilowatts of power over a distance of 55 meters (170 feet), Science Alert informs.
Transforming the energy industry
It would be great if we could just get rid of power cables once and for all and use wireless technology to keep our gadgets and gizmos up and running. Still, it's not our comfort that that the scientists behind these experiments are interested in.
Instead, the idea is to use wireless power transmission technology to transform the energy industry. Thus, this technology has the potential to make it possible for us to harvest solar energy in space with the help of satellites and then simply beam it to Earth.
As explained by the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, the end goal is to rid the world of its dependence of fossil fuels and, in doing so, help put a leash on man-made climate change and global warming.