Harnessing the Power of Sitting Down at a Desk. Seriously.

July 2nd, 2012 by Joshua S Hill



“Human nature is above all things lazy,” said Harriet Beecher Stowes, and that was the catalyst behind Swedish design student Eddi Törnberg’s “Unplugged” desk.

I sit at a desk all day, every day, writing. Needless to say, it would be nice to switch up what that means, and Törnberg’s design is all about switching up. Instead of trying to revolutionise the way humanity works — which, we have to acknowledge, is very sedentary — Törnberg has designed a desk that fits in with our current way of life, and still produces energy from that existence.

The “Unplugged” desk generates energy using three different techniques:

So-called piezo-elements are woven into the carpet, which means that whoever walks on the carpet [exposes] the crystal in the elements to mechanical stress and the elements then emit energy. The flower is a plant-microbial fuel cell, which means that the natural sugars and enzymes help to extract energy through photosynthesis. The seat of the chair is based on the Seebeck effect, which means that the metal on the upper surface becomes warm, in this case from the body heat, while the underside is kept cold by metal fins. The difference between these temperatures emits energy.

Source: Eddi Tornberg (.se)









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