Power from the People

I know I read a little too much science fiction, but I loved the sound of this one: Some Canadian researchers have figured out a way to capture the kinetic energy generated from walking to create electricity.

Right now it's limited to powering something on the body of the walker, such as a cell phone charger or insulin pump, but I can't help imagining some way to store the energy. Picture it: we all wear these things, store the electricity in batteries, and every night dump that day's generated electricity to the grid for a discount on our electric bills. And a resulting decrease in need for coal or other new power plants.

A girl's gotta dream.

Full story at the New York Times.