Harnessing The Power Of Lightening

The astronauts have often been astonished at the amount of visible lightening bolts that hit the earth each day around the world. It is estimated to be over 11,000 bolts flash everyday. Can we capture that energy? Can it be done? It is truly an area of untapped potential for a huge energy source for the whole globe. Towers around the globe take many hits to survive and disperse the energy by cables to the ground. Many have thought we could harness it to generate hydrogen.

I have not been able to find any confirmation that anything is underway with this idea. Everyone is looking at trying to use one individual device to capture lightening bolts. We do it to some degree when we put lightening rods on tall buildings. We have used small capacitors to capture and store energy in automotive points and ignition systems in older cars, before electronic ignition systems. We have millions of miles of electric infrastructure in all countries around the world. What if we use these lightening rods throughout the system hooked with capacitors. The network could use other nearby capacitors in the network to share and dissipate, then store the lightening charges. The capacitors in collaboration with transformers already used in the electrical infrastructure could release the electricity in a useable state. By using this idea, countries could discover green energy savings over time. It just seems to me that the theory is right. Could this be an idea for a innovation hub to confirm and design. It would take a massive manufacturing effort to equip the systems with the appropriate equipment.

Check out lightening spotted from a night orbit from space!