英國發明長筒充電靴 可爲手機充電

Modern festival-goers who dread ending up with a dead mobile phone battery after days stuck in a muddy field with no electric plug power points may now have a solution -- power boots.

Mobile phone company European Telco Orange has introduced a phone charging prototype -- a set of thermoelectric gumboots or Wellington boots with a 'power generating sole' that converts heat from the wearer's feet into electrical power to charge battery-powered hand-helds.

The boot was designed by Dave Pain, managing director at GotWind, a renewable energy company.

Pain said the boot uses the Seebeck effect, named after physicist Thomas Johann Seebeck, in which a circuit made of two dissimilar metals conducts electricity if the two places where they connect are held at different temperatures. "In the sole of the Wellington boot there's a thermocouple and if you apply heat to one side of the thermocouple and cold to the other side it generates an electrical charge," Pain said.

"That electrical charge we then pass through to a battery which you'll find in the heel of the boot for storage of the electrical power for later use to charge your mobile phone."

These thermocouples are connected electrically, forming an array of multiple thermocouples (thermopile). They are then sandwiched between two thin ceramic wafers.

When the heat from the foot is applied on the top side of the ceramic wafer and cold is applied on the opposite side, from the cold of the ground, electricity is generated.

After a full day's festivalfrolics music lovers can plug their phone into the power output at the top of the welly and use the energy generated throughout the day to charge their phone.

But the prototype boot does have one drawback. You need to walk for 12 hours in the boots to generate one hour's worth of charge.

喜愛參加節日活動的人再也不用擔心被困泥地數日遇上手機沒電，而且還找不到地方充電的尷尬情況了——一款充電靴可以解決這個問題。

歐洲移動運營商英國Orange公司最新推出了一款可以爲手機充電的熱電橡膠靴或惠靈頓長筒靴。這款靴子的底部內嵌發電裝置，可將穿鞋者腳部的熱量轉化爲電能，爲帶有電池的手提裝置充電。

這款靴子由GotWind可再生能源公司總經理戴夫·佩恩設計。

佩恩稱，這款靴子主要根據以物理學家托馬斯•約翰•塞貝克的名字命名的“塞貝克效應”設計而成，具體的原理是：靴底的兩種不同金屬接成一個閉合電路，然後利用它們所接觸部位的溫差在電路中產生電流。佩恩說：“長筒靴的鞋底處有一個熱電偶，如果電偶的一面受熱，而另一面受冷，就會產生電荷。”

“這些電荷會傳至鞋跟處的一個蓄電電池上，在需要時可爲手機充電。”

這些熱電偶通過電力連接在一起，形成一系列的熱電偶（也稱熱電堆），夾在兩塊陶瓷薄片之間。

當腳部的熱量作用於上層陶瓷薄片，較冷的地面作用於下層的陶瓷片時，電就產生了。

在一整天的節日狂歡後，音樂發燒友可以把手機插入長筒靴頂部的電源插孔，利用一整天所產生的電能給手機充電。

但這款充電靴有一個問題：你需要行走12個小時，才能提供可供手機用一小時的電量。

Vocabulary:

thermoelectric: of, pertaining to, or involving the direct relationship between heat and electricity（熱電的）

frolics:嬉戲；狂歡

welly: Wellington boot（威靈頓長筒靴；及膝膠靴）