New multiferroic alloy turns waste heat into green electricity for free

I don't want to play grumpy old guy, but I'm getting a bit tired of breathless articles that omit key facts.<p>What's the efficiency? It's such an obvious question I can't imagine writing an article without that data. How about current costs of other green power? Difficultly of the subject area? Others who have tried?<p>I love these new tech stories, but one or two paragraphs of context can go a long way for the reader. We're left having the same old discussion: one person says "awesome!" and then another points out one of these obvious (and common) holes. It's the same discussion, over and over again.<p>It's not just the energy stories. I've seen dozens of startup stories that are long on hype and emotion and really short on explaining the market and how the company is executing -- the key things that any other startup person would want to know. Heck, I know everybody's excited about it, what I want is somebody giving me a bit of perspective.<p>Same goes for "new cancer treatment found!" articles, which are also long on emotion and short on context. I know emotion gets clicks, just wish we could do better here.

In materials science labs around the world, researchers are performing 'miracles'.<p>Aerogels could eliminate most of the waste heat from buildings. Piezoelectric nanogenerators could power mobile electronic devices. Graphene transistors could attain speeds of 1THz. And multiferroics like the beastly Ni45Co5Mn40Sn10 mentioned above could replace bulky laptop batteries.<p>But what is achieved with multi-million dollar government sponsored research grants in controlled labs is difficult to transfer to ones doorstep.<p>One barrier is economic: an aerogel house would cost $50M! A pricetag that may be acceptable to the Department of Defense, but won't do Peoria Joe much good.

The whole article acts like we have never discovered thermocouples: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermocouple" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermocouple</a><p>I mean the voyager spacecraft are powered by them: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_gen...</a><p>Along with many gas appliances with pilot lights.

Basically the same as a seebeck generator; but it can be used in places where current seebeck generators would not do well.<p>I wish they would phrase these things as "turns heat differences into electricity;" because every time they say "waste heat," people get excited about harvesting heat from their CPU and having their computer power itself.

If I remember correctly, there was recent talk about the magnetic component of light being much strong than thought. Well, why not focus light on this material and let the <i>heat</i> make a stronger magnetic field and use it as a solar panel?

I'm guessing its applications would be more in the line of powering remote devices then anything more substantial. I could see the point of replacing a photovoltaic panel with a hunk of metal in a seismic sensor or something like that.

One application of the alloy is automotive, but there is other work being done in this space:<p><a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2687439" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2687439</a>

I don't get it. So you can use heat to make a magnet. We already have permanent magnets. Magnetism, in and of itself, doesn't create energy. You'd have to either pulse the magnet, or move a coil past the magnet. The former seems impossible since you'd have to cycle its temperature, and the latter just gives you an alternator, which we already have.<p>If I'm missing something, I'd like to know. It just looks like, "hey, magnetism!" and some hand-waving.

This looks like it has the possibility to dramatically increase the efficiency of motors and engines.<p>Also, if they could capture the heat coming out of a nuclear reactor, they could both avoid meltdowns and not require proximity to a large body of water.<p>Edit: Disregard this. I don't know thermodynamics as well as I thought I did.

Epic thermodynamics fail:<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_efficiency#Efficiency" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnot_efficiency#Efficiency</a>