> "Don't worry about getting zapped: Hall assures that the magnetic fields used to transfer energy are "perfectly safe" -- in fact, they are the same kind of fields used in Wi-Fi routers."
LOL. power transmitted by a Wifi router ~= mW. Power required for, even a low energy light bulb ~= 10W. The current draw in modern homes is so big that EM transmission, especially at sensitive wavelengths like microwaves, is highly likely to cook things (and people).
They may well have found a real way to make it work. But saying "it's the same as wifi" shouldn't convince anyone.
Also, static magnetic fields are conservative. You can't get energy out of them. The only way to get energy out of a magnetic field is by letting it change, which necessarily creates an electric field.
I sympathize with the need to find a way to explain how this could be safe, but they're stretching the truth. I hope it doesn't come back to bite them when somebody puts up a youtube video of cooking eggs on copper foil or something.
True, but its remarkable how constant the amount of electricity the 'typical' home draws, even as the things in it draw less. Things like the TV went from several hundred watts to only a couple of hundred, and then we added a home computer. I agree with the grandparent that you're not going to send a few kW of power into a house like this.
The other aspect that wireless power folks face is that any conductor now has a much more serious voltage potential on it. This can cause weird things to happen when dissimilar metals are suddenly energized. Electro transport can cause otherwise strong welds/connections to vanish.
LOL. power transmitted by a Wifi router ~= mW. Power required for, even a low energy light bulb ~= 10W. The current draw in modern homes is so big that EM transmission, especially at sensitive wavelengths like microwaves, is highly likely to cook things (and people).
They may well have found a real way to make it work. But saying "it's the same as wifi" shouldn't convince anyone.