HARNESSING THE LIGHTNING

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXXXII, Issue 10511, 23 November 1894, Page 2

HARNESSING THE LIGHTNING

It is just possible (says an American paper) that one of these days, instead of making electricity for ourselves, we shall learn to tap the immense store of the electric fluid that pervades the higher atmosphere; that, in fact, we shall be able to “harness the lightning.” Professor Trowbridge shows that a discharge keeps in the same path for only three-tenthe of a second, and he believes that a “stepdown ” transformer—a device by which the voltage of the discharge would bo reduced —might render it fit for the service of mart, .An average thundercloud is estimated to contain about 300 horse-power of electrical energy. A flash of lightning a quarter of a mile long practically means an electromotive force of millions of volts. Reckoning on the basis that a flash occurs when the electrical strain on tha air ia I*B7 pounds per square foot, the total electric energy iu a cubic mile of the strained air just ou the point of flashing is about 70,000,000 foot-tons, or, in other words, the energy required to raise a ton 70,000,000 feet high. Electricians are now trying to think out how this enormous power can bo brought down to earth and utilised, and they talk of employing eome modification of Franklin's kite, at all events for experimental work. If they should succeed the corralling of lightning flashes may come to be a profitable occupation.