OneAndOneIs2

The BBC has a story about the latest in a long line of ways to transmit power wirelessly.

As I said in my last rant on the subject of going green, you'll accomplish far more by finding better and more efficient ways to accomplish a given task than you will by just trying to stop people performing that task at all. Cutting down on the number of batteries we use would be a good example: They have all kinds of exotic and expensive things like lithium in them, and heavy stuff like lead as well: making and transporting batteries to where we need them, and disposing of them when they're done with, wastes a lot of resources.

But they demonstrated this technology powering a cell phone. Maybe it's just me, but surely the point of a cell phone is that you can use it when you're out of the house..?

So that makes me think: Just what gadgets would really benefit from wireless power? Something that's battery-powered but always used at home...

Remote controls for TVs, DVD players, etc - that's the first, most obvious one. I know I'd happily buy an RC that never ran out of power.

Lights would be good, too. Attics, basements, cupboards under stairs... it'd be good if you could power lights anywhere in the house without running cables.

Power tools, maybe? Battery-powered screwdrivers, drills, etc, are heavy and have short lives between charges. And they spend most of their lives at home.

Chargers for battery-powered devices would be good too - laptops could be a lot more portable if they could get power wirelessly to charge the battery.

And then you start thinking, Forget batteries, if this can transmit enough energy to power devices normally run off the mains, things like food processors would be great if they had no cables: They could be completely sealed so you could dishwasher them! It'd be easy to have wall-mounted TVs without trailing cables. Electric lawnmowers for the garden would be so much better if they were cordless.

All sounds ideal, really.. you could do a lot with wireless power.

The catch is, of course, that as far as I can see, there's nothing to stop your next-door neighbour ALSO doing a lot with your wireless power. Magnetic fields won't stop for walls, and you can't encrypt energy like you can a WiFi signal.

Maybe sticking to battery-level power would be best after all...