The Voltpot is for those who are not satisfied with the greenest thing on their coffee table being their organic java resting on top of it. The Voltpot is a product idea constructed on the promising technology of Microbial Fuel Cells (MFC’s).
As opposed to a chemical battery, a Microbial Fuel Cell uses themetabolic energy of microbes present inside soil samples and converts it directly to electrical energy to generate low intensity, but continuous output of energy. The basic construction revolves aroundmaking an anode and a cathode soil chamber, just like a conventionalbattery. The metabolic energy of the microbes is in the form of an ioncharge which is captured by the anode terminal and passed on to the“ion bridge” – sort of like a membrane. The ion bridge transfers thischarge to the cathode terminal from which point this charge is capturedin the form of electricity to be utilized by an external load or storedinside a capacitor. At the moment the output achievable is 1 watt percubic meter of soil. But under test conditions 10 times that amount ispossible using simple techniques such as nickel plating the terminals.
According to Voltpot designers, “Sustainability is more than skin deep, and the core architecture of products we design today has to be rethought with new technological paradigms in mind and new design paradigms to support and ultimately reinforce sustainability.“
Voltpot addresses sustainability as a hidden but strong asset of these products nonetheless. Using the MFC’s these products can deliver energy to fulfill various lifestyle activities, thus making it so pleasurable for the user to use that he/she will buy it solely because they desire the product and thus indirectly end up embracing a sustainable lifestyle. Sustainability has to be chic, it has to be cool, and most of all it has to make every other mainstream competitor appear as a poor compromise in contrast.
The liveeco team
