Rainwater Power, has anybody heard of it ?

Question

I'm sure I've read somewhere that you could generate electric power by rainwater, I mean by using special panels the force of the rain hitting them would generate electricity, I want to try it out, does anybody know anything about it?

Answer 1

It's pie in the sky but lightening ... give that a go.

Answer 2

I saw this on the Green channel a few weeks ago.  Only generated small energy amount but they used it I think to generate the power needed to run the sprinkler system in the garden (using the collected water).

Answer 3

You mean like if we collect rain water on the roof of a tall building and pour it down it should produce some kind of energy.Ya,that's true but I feel no one has done much with rain water rather than collecting it for a car wash.That's also beneficial.

Answer 4

(I don't think you'd be able to generate that much energy this way, but here's a go)

Sound like some kind of piezo-electricity, using the impact force of water drops, to squash a material to generate electricity.

perhaps have lot of little spring loaded pistons, arranged so a rain drop forces it down with it's impact. Use a spring to automatically reset the piston, and two one way valves/per cylinder, and you're got a lots of small simple replicating pumps capable of operating in parallel. Connect a windscreen washer pump (running in reverse) and you might be able to extract some power from the pressure difference the pumps generator.

Answer 5

yup there is such a thing firstly the rain water is harvested ie it is collected and stored in tanks/reservoirs.When enough rainwater is collected it is passed through great force downwards pushing turbines thus generating electricity.Done in places with extra heavy rainfall

Answer 6

Do not wast you time on such an idea. There is no way you can control the electricity and the power density will be too small ie Amount of power generated per area of space. Hydroelectricity is the best way to harvest the sun's energy using water