Disney's new OTA charging technology has plenty of potential

by Alan Friedman

Feb 21, 2017, 1:42 PM

The folks at Disney do a lot more research than trying to figure how how much to raise theme park ticket prices. Lately, they have been looking at quasistatic cavity resonance. It is based on Nikola Tesla’s coil circuit that produces an energy field. The idea is to allow someone with a mobile device to walk into a room and have the phone in his pocket charged OTA without wires and without pads. Yes, this is a charging solution that Energous has already started to address with its WattUp product.

Disney built a mock living room to test its wireless charging technology. Devices such as a smartphone, a lamp, a remote control car and a fan were charged up by the roaming energy. 1900 watts were sent into the room; any more could be dangerous to the human body. In the middle of the room is a long copper pole containing a ring of 15 capacitors. The wall, floor and ceiling are made from aluminum panel.

When things are turned on, the current is running up and down the copper pole at a speed of 1.3 million times per second. The current goes up and down through the room, creating a circular magnetic field that travels around the pole. Multiple devices can be charged at the same time depending on the design of the receiver employed. Disney has advanced the system so that it provides power regardless of the orientation of the device. Furniture placed inside the room by Disney did not negatively affect the circulation of the energy.

Disney scientists say that the technology can be scaled down to "charging cabinets" or scaled up to huge warehouses. A lot more testing needs to be done before all of the potential of this system becomes available to the public. You can learn more about how this all works by clicking on the video at the top of the story.