How can potato generate electricity

The electromotive force diminishes and the battery stops working. Usually, what happens is the production of hydrogen at the copper electrode and the zinc electrode acquires deposits of oxides that act as a barrier between the metal and the electrolyte. This is referred to as the electrodes being polarized. To achieve a longer life and higher voltages and current flows, it is necessary to use electrolytes better suited for the purpose. Commercial batteries, apart from their normal electrolyte, contain chemicals with an affinity for hydrogen, which combine with the hydrogen before it can polarize the electrodes.

Figure 1. Placement of the nail, penny and alligator clips. Figure 2. Activity setup to create a potato battery to power an LED clock. Brainstorming: In small groups, have students engage in open discussion. Remind them that no idea or suggestion is "silly.

Take an uncritical position, encourage wild ideas and discourage criticism of ideas. Ask students how many items they can think of that run on batteries. As a class, record their ideas on the board. Quick Poll: Before the activity begins, ask the class a question and tally their responses on the board. Ask: Can we get electrical energy from a fruit or vegetable? After they finish, have them compare answers with a peer or another pair, giving all students time to finish the worksheet.

Hypothesize: Ask each group what would happen if we added more potatoes in a row to our circuits? Answer: Adding more potatoes in a row is the same as adding batteries in a row. The voltage of each piece of potato is added up. Thus, the voltage of our circuit would increase. On the other hand, the current of our circuit would not increase. Current is not dependent on how many potatoes but is related to the size of each potato individually.

Problem Solving: Present the class with the following math problems and ask students to calculate how many of each vegetable or fruit are needed to light the bulb. Diagramming: Engineers must understand how circuits work in order to develop cool new technologies. Draw a picture of your potato battery. Label the battery voltage and the resistance light bulb. Draw an arrow to show the current flow from the copper end to the zinc end.

List two cool products that an engineer could develop that run off a fruit battery. If the LED clock, light or small light bulbs do not work, check the setup of the potato battery. Perhaps the ends are not all connected from negative to positive, or perhaps there is not enough potato voltage.

Check the voltage of the potato using a multimeter or voltmeter. Another possibility is having enough voltage, but not enough current to light the bulb, which is why it is recommended to use only very low-volt LED clocks or bulbs. Also, try using more potatoes i. Lemons and oranges also work well for this activity. They work best if you first roll them on a table top, which breaks down the cells inside so more juice flows through the fruit current.

Some people have more conduction success using copper strips instead of copper pennies can also wrap the pennies in copper ribbon. At activity end, before students disassemble their potato batteries, it is fun to have the entire class connect their fruit batteries in series, making "a serious tater circle.

Have students try the activity again using different fruits or vegetables! Many fruits and vegetables work, such as lemons, limes, apples and carrots. Have students compare and contrast the performance of different fruits and vegetables. Have students complete the activity again using an electrolyte solution, such as salt water or vinegar. Have them compare and contrast the performance of different electrolyte solutions. To add a math component, have students use the multimeter to compare the flow of electricity for several different fruits as well as to the total amount of fruits used.

Ask them to graph the results and hypothesize what is happening. Have more advanced students experiment with parallel and series configurations using different numbers of potatoes. Accessed September 28, Pithy answer. Yet in Sri Lanka, for instance, the locally available potatoes are rare and expensive.

So a team of scientists at the University of Kelaniya recently decided to try the experiment with something more widely available, and free — plantain piths stems. Physicist KD Jayasuriya and his team found that the boiling technique produced a similar efficiency increase for plantains — and the best battery performance was obtained by chopping the plantain pith after boiling.

With the boiled piths, they found they could power a single LED for more than hours, provided it is prevented from drying out. Despite all this, some are sceptical of the feasibility of potato power. Still, zinc is quite cheap in most developing countries. And Jayasuriya argues that it could still be more cost effective than a kerosene lamp. A zinc electrode that lasts about five months would cost about the same as a litre of kerosene, which fuels the average family home in Sri Lanka for two days.

You could also use other electrodes, like magnesium or iron. But potato advocates must surmount another problem before their idea catches on: consumer perception of potatoes.

Try the same experiment with different electrolyte sources, such as lemons, tomatoes or apples. Do all foods produce the same amount of voltage?

Take pictures at the beginning, midpoint and end of the experiment to document your observations. Include the photos with your report. Test your multimeter by crossing the positive and negative wires. The multimeter should show no voltage or current. Although the voltage produced will be very low, use caution when working with any kind of electric components.

Science Project on Electricity in a Potato. Read more about us. How to Produce Electricity from a Potato? Greentumble Energy December 14, Was this article helpful?

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