A nuke in my cell phone??? NO!!!

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

A recent OilPrice article discusses the "NDB battery".

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Nano-Diamond-Battery-That-Lasts-For-28000-Years.html

The article and the company's web site go to great lengths to avoid discussing the actual nature of this device. It is a tiny RTG:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator

Yep, that's right. The power comes from radioactive fission of Plutonium or Uranium atoms. I'm highly in favor of nuclear power, but not in my pocket. Fission emits neutrons and gamma rays, and the only way to stop them is enough mass. That would be about 4 inches of lead, in all directions. any electronics near the "battery" will be exposed to the gamma and neutron radiation, also.

Conclusion: this is unworkable for laptops, cell phones, and most other consumer electronics.

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

41 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

A recent OilPrice article discusses the "NDB battery".

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Nano-Diamond-Battery-That-Lasts-For-28000-Years.html

The article and the company's web site go to great lengths to avoid discussing the actual nature of this device. It is a tiny RTG:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator

Yep, that's right. The power comes from radioactive fission of Plutonium or Uranium atoms. I'm highly in favor of nuclear power, but not in my pocket. Fission emits neutrons and gamma rays, and the only way to stop them is enough mass. That would be about 4 inches of lead, in all directions. any electronics near the "battery" will be exposed to the gamma and neutron radiation, also.

Conclusion: this is unworkable for laptops, cell phones, and most other consumer electronics.

It’s not plutonium or uranium, it’s carbon 14.

https://newatlas.com/energy/nano-diamond-self-charging-batteries-ndb/

My understanding is you already have more carbon 14 in your body than what would be in a small battery/reactor (not sure how to classify this) of this type.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/archaeology/radiocarbon-dating-explained/

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

30 minutes ago, Strangelovesurfing said:

It’s not plutonium or uranium, it’s carbon 14.

https://newatlas.com/energy/nano-diamond-self-charging-batteries-ndb/

My understanding is you already have more carbon 14 in your body than what would be in a small battery/reactor (not sure how to classify this) of this type.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/archaeology/radiocarbon-dating-explained/

Interesting. I based my post on this paragraph in the paper linked from the article:

• Lock-in System: Using a nuclear power source for a battery system brings up the question of nuclear proliferation due to production of fissionable isotopes such as Pu- 238 and U-232. To tackle this issue, NDB uses an ion implantation mechanism called “lock-in system” which prevents usage other than power generation. This increases the usability, by meeting consumer safety requirements.

At this point and based on the discrepancy between the info you found and this quote, I will wait before buying a gold brick from these guys. They claim a thermoelectric efficiency of about 30% so a 1-Watt electric output requires a 3-Watt total heat output, and this is continuous, whether or not you are using the electricity. The neutron flux associated with a 3-watt thermal source will result in neutron activation of other atoms. I see no way to make this safe other than massive shielding, but I am going by guess, not by computations at this point.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

1 hour ago, Strangelovesurfing said:

It’s not plutonium or uranium, it’s carbon 14.

https://newatlas.com/energy/nano-diamond-self-charging-batteries-ndb/

My understanding is you already have more carbon 14 in your body than what would be in a small battery/reactor (not sure how to classify this) of this type.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/archaeology/radiocarbon-dating-explained/

OK, I am now ready to officially call bullshit on the C14 fantasy in the article you cited.

Body mass is 20% carbon  ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composition_of_the_human_body )
C14 is one part per trillion of carbon ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon-14 )
A 70 Kg body is 14 Kg carbon
12 g of carbon contains 6.02214076×10^^23 atoms.
1 g of carbon contains about 5×10^^22 atoms
1 Kg C contains 5×10^^19 atoms
14 Kg C contains 7×10^^20 atoms
1 trillion is 10^^12
The body contains about 7×10^^8 C14 atoms

C14 half-life is 5,730 ± 40 years.

This is 3600x24x365x 5730=180701280000 seconds, or 1.8×10^^11 seconds.

So on average, (7/1.8)x10^^(8-11) = 3.9x10^^-3 atoms/sec  decay.

Each decay provides .157 (Mev) of energy = 7x10^^-18 Wh or 2.5x10^^-14 Watt seconds

Thus, all of the C14 in a 70 Kg human will deliver 3.9x10^^-3 x 2.5x10^^-14 Watts of thermal power. This is about 10^^-16 Watts, or one ten-thousandths of one trillionth of a Watt thermal, 30% of which is converted to electricity in the NDB cell.

 

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

7 hours ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

They claim a thermoelectric efficiency of about 30% so a 1-Watt electric output requires a 3-Watt total heat output, and this is continuous, whether or not you are using the electricity.

This is the thing that puzzles me. Where do the electrons go if your not using it or the battery it charges gets full?

Edited September 7, 2020 by Strangelovesurfing

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

6 hours ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

OK, I am now ready to officially call bullshit on the C14 fantasy in the article you cited.

Body mass is 20% carbon  ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composition_of_the_human_body )
C14 is one part per trillion of carbon ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon-14 )
A 70 Kg body is 14 Kg carbon
12 g of carbon contains 6.02214076×10^^23 atoms.
1 g of carbon contains about 5×10^^22 atoms
1 Kg C contains 5×10^^19 atoms
14 Kg C contains 7×10^^20 atoms
1 trillion is 10^^12
The body contains about 7×10^^8 C14 atoms

C14 half-life is 5,730 ± 40 years.

This is 3600x24x365x 5730=180701280000 seconds, or 1.8×10^^11 seconds.

So on average, (7/1.8)x10^^(8-11) = 3.9x10^^-3 atoms/sec  decay.

Each decay provides .157 (Mev) of energy = 7x10^^-18 Wh or 2.5x10^^-14 Watt seconds

Thus, all of the C14 in a 70 Kg human will deliver 3.9x10^^-3 x 2.5x10^^-14 Watts of thermal power. This is about 10^^-16 Watts, or one ten-thousandths of one trillionth of a Watt thermal, 30% of which is converted to electricity in the NDB cell.

 

Your math makes sense, my info was from reading an article.

Edited September 7, 2020 by Strangelovesurfing

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

1 hour ago, Strangelovesurfing said:

Your math makes sense, my info was from reading an article.

Yep. I read the article after you posted it. It's their fantasy, not yours. The other article was the one that mentions implanting plutonium or uranium into the diamond, and that actually makes technical sense, But in some sense it does not matter whether they are off by a factor of a trillion on the amount of C14, or they use P or U. There are no useful radionuclides that decay without emitting much of their energy as gamma radiation, and you need a whole bunch of mass to convert that gamma radiation into heat and thence to electricity. Almost all radionuclides also emit neutrons. This includes C14, P, and U. Neutrons are even more problematic as they create additional radioactive atoms and require even more shielding mass.

 

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

On 9/6/2020 at 1:07 PM, Dan Clemmensen said:

Thus, all of the C14 in a 70 Kg human will deliver 3.9x10^^-3 x 2.5x10^^-14 Watts of thermal power. This is about 10^^-16 Watts, or one ten-thousandths of one trillionth of a Watt thermal, 30% of which is converted to electricity in the NDB cell.

Your math looks ok but your premise is flawed. You started from "natural" distribution of the C14 isotope, but of course the NDB company isn't going to fill their cell with natural carbon, but will fill it entirely with C14. However, that said you're still on the right track. Minimal power output can be expected and it's no battery as I said elsewhere.

Many many years ago I did some research on the particle decay from natural sources affecting memory chips (yes that used to be a thing). It was never stopped, but what we (the industry) did was add forward error correction to repair the twiddled bits. You've hit on a major flaw, which is this thing will be spewing particles, which are bound to interfere with electronics around it. So now it won't even make sense for a cell phone or digital watch. 

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

6 hours ago, Ward Smith said:

Your math looks ok but your premise is flawed. You started from "natural" distribution of the C14 isotope, but of course the NDB company isn't going to fill their cell with natural carbon, but will fill it entirely with C14. However, that said you're still on the right track. Minimal power output can be expected and it's no battery as I said elsewhere.

Many many years ago I did some research on the particle decay from natural sources affecting memory chips (yes that used to be a thing). It was never stopped, but what we (the industry) did was add forward error correction to repair the twiddled bits. You've hit on a major flaw, which is this thing will be spewing particles, which are bound to interfere with electronics around it. So now it won't even make sense for a cell phone or digital watch. 

I retired from the satellite communications industry in 2016, so I am painfully aware of the electronics problem and its modern mitigations, including FEC, redundant processors, etc. The problem here is not the electronics, but the effects of ionizing radiation on the human body when the source is in your pocket.

As to the amount of C14: the company's paper stated that the device has less total C14 than was found in a normal human body. My assumption was therefore that the amount in the device was equal to the amount in a 70 Kg human, so yes, I assumed that the concentration inside the device was much, much greater than the "natural" concentration. A 70 Kg human has 14 Kg of C and Therefore 14 nanograms of C14. The device might have .14 grams of C, so the C14 is concentrated by a factor of 10,000. If the device has more C14 than this, then their paper is incorrect, and the radiation dose is higher.

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

C14 undergoes beta decay and the electrons are of low energy - easy to block.

Potassium in your body is more radioactive.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

12 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

C14 undergoes beta decay and the electrons are of low energy - easy to block.

Potassium in your body is more radioactive.

My calculations assumed that the device would capture all of the energy as heat. But let's assume for fun that it actually captures the actual electrons, creating a potential difference between the resulting N+ Ions and the electrons. We still have a decay rate of 3.9x10^^-3 atoms/sec, or roughly one electron generated every four minutes when the amount of C14 equals the amount in a human body, and the Wattage cannot exceed the Wattage I computed (one ten-thousandth of one trillionth of one Watt).

That beta decay converts one C14 into one N14 plus one electron plus one antineutrino, releasing .16 MeV  of energy that's divided randomly between the three resulting components. You are correct: a pure C14 NDB will not be a radiation hazard. It will also be worthless. That brings us back to the alternative discussed in the other source of embedding Plutonium or Uranium. Those batteries will emit gamma and neutrons.