Squeezing more electrons through the wires with 'magic' balls.
Named after a mythological Norse Watchman, these balls monitor power line temperatures, allowing up to 30% more electricity to flow.
Much of my understanding of the world involves tubes. Some examples of essential tubing:
Gastrointestinal tract (open-air nutrient extraction tube)
Circulatory system
Electrical grid
Sewage system
The internet
All tubing at some point is limited by capacity. Capacity is determined by variables like smoothness, size, and straightness, combined with the viscosity of what’s flowing through it. Choose your piped material (blood, electrons, poop) and update the analogy accordingly!
With tubing, we’re always looking for opportunities to maximize flow. More than a yogic aspiration, maximal flow moves the most content with the least effort, reducing energy needed as well as wear-and-tear. Moving electrons along a power lines is no different.
Most of my memories of high-tension power lines are associated with mountain biking in the tidy right-of-ways beneath them. Near our home in Albuquerque, I’ve had my eye on a gnarly power line trail in the East Mountain area. It’s gnarly because it just goes straight up the mountain, topography be damned. As a former landscape architect, the lines always had a jarring, dissonant quality against their surroundings. Mountain ranges, streams, canyons—power lines are like honey badgers: they don’t care. They cut an engineered swath across a landscape filled with otherwise organic shapes and contours.
Although I generally view them as a visual blight, I get it: it’s easier to build and maintain something straight, accessible and visible, so we’re not going back. Hence, I like the idea of using IoT technology to more fully achieve capacity for infrastructure that exists. To keep up with the increasing demand for electricity, we’re going to need to pull every efficiency lever we can find!
The balls monitor the temperature of the power lines. Temperature is important. All things have a desired temperature range in which they run smoothly/efficiently. Generally speaking, heat is an adversary to electrons. Electrons, like my friend Dave, run well when its cold and get grumpy (and slow) when overheated. The colder the conductor temperature, the higher volume of electrons that flow through the material.
The company that makes the balls is named Heimdall, which is the name of a mythological Norse Watchman. In this case, of course, they are watching the temperature.
Side note: I don’t know how many Scandinavian companies you interacted with, but they love they seem to share a passion for naming products based on mythological figures. Go figure.
In any case, the moderm incarnation of Heimdall is a bit more vanilla. Gone are the alpenhorns and rainbows, and in their place: a stainless steel ball:
Plus, drones, obviously. In addition to signaling technological prowess, these drones actually serve an essential purpose of installing the balls efficiently.
In any case, keep your eyes cast towards the sky for balls on a power line near you soon. Hopefully this technology, combined with other incremental gains in efficiency can prevent additional power lines from being constructed.