Resonant nuclear battery may aid in mitigating the greenhouse effect

A new process for the direct conversion of radioactive decay energy directly into electricity of a usable form is currently being developed by Peripheral Systems, Inc. of Portland, Oregon. United States Patent 4,835,433 was issued May 30, 1989 to protect this Resonant Nuclear Power Supply. When developed, this system promises cheap, reliable power from a package small and light enough to be mobile and an energy density great enough for use as a space-based power supply. One of the potential domestic applications could be to power electric automobiles. Use in highly populated areas would have a tremendous beneficial effect on the ecology. The principle of operation for the resonant nuclear power supply is an LCR (inductance capacitance resistance) resonant tank circuit oscillating at its self-resonant frequency (at resonance, the inductive reactance and the capacitive reactance cancel to leave the ohmic resistance of the circuit as the only major loss of energy). A means for absorbing the natural radioactive decay energy emitted from an alpha or beta source is provided in the primary tank circuit and contributes an amount of energy, by means of the beta voltaic effect, in excess of the energy required to sustain the oscillation of the LCR primary tank. A transformer is impedance matched to this oscillating primary circuit for efficient energy transfer of the excess energy to a secondary output circuit, which yields net electrical power in a high-frequency usable form to drive a load