Sony Develops Paper Powered Batteries

By siliconindia   |   Friday, 23 December 2011, 01:24 IST
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Bangalore: Sony demonstrated the new Bio- powered battery at the Eco-Products 2011 exhibition in Tokyo. The new eco friendly battery generates power from shredded paper.

The same technology used by ants and termites to digest the wood has been implemented to produce energy. Sony uses an enzyme to break down the cellulose present in the paper to glucose and further into electrons and hydrogen.  The electrons which travel through the outer circuit is responsible for the electricity production.

It is not first time that Sony is experimenting with the eco friendly batteries. In the year 2007 Sony had produced a sugar powered battery and again back in 2009, researchers from Uppsala University Sweden had come up with a battery made of salt and paper which can be a replacement for lithium batteries in the future.

The new battery is more advanced than the previous model as it can even work in the presence of impurities produced by decomposition of the paper.  This won’t be a great solution for our daily needs since the battery can’t produce a large amount of energy. But it will be sufficient to power low energy devices. In the exhibition, Sony propelled a small fan with the battery.

On a larger scale, advantage of bio batteries is they won’t produce any hazardous chemicals which cause serious threat to the ecosystem. Sony is working towards the commercialization of this technology in the near future, targeting on powering toys and low power products.