Power Protection FEATURED ARTICLE

In a bid to make everyone truly connected while being unconnected, innovators at one college are working on technology that will hopefully enable people to power up their devices via their wireless Internet.

An idea that might seem more firmly rooted in science fiction than reality, it’s nevertheless happening, Popular Science reports. According to a story at the technology publication’s website, “PoWiFi, short for power over Wi-Fi, tricks routers into sending out a constant signal that’s captured and converted into DC power by a harvester. Scientists at the University of Washington are currently working to make it happen.”

According to the scientists, here’s how it works: Wi-Fi already transmits a small amount of power to carry data, up to one watt by FCC guidelines, compared to the five watt output of a typical Android (News - Alert) or iPhone charger. This technology captures that power that’s already being sent, and puts it to work.

“We have a huge Wi-Fi infrastructure already in place,” Vamsi Talla, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Washington, and researcher who worked on the project, told Popular Science. “If we can repurpose existing infrastructure for power delivery as well, then we can actually enable wireless power delivery in homes and offices.”

The concept is kind of mind-boggling, although it isn’t entirely new.

“Companies like Energous have already brought products to market that send power over similar Wi-Fi signals, and they claim to be able to charge cell phones,” PS says. “Yet the novel feature of PoWiFi is the ability to harness power with pre-existing hardware, and the University of Washington team says their routers transmit both power and data in the same signal.

It still remains to be seen whether this technology can be expanded for larger powering efforts. But it’s a step in the right direction for those who long to be “off the grid” (as it were), but still need power for their gadgets.