By James Pero For Dailymail.com
Published: 20:44 BST, 16 April 2019 | Updated: 20:50 BST, 16 April 2019
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Scientists have engineered creative ways to capture the energy of nearly all of nature's most fundamental forces; from water and wind, to solar, and now for the first time ever, snow.
According to researchers at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) the device, called a snow-based triboelectric nanogenerator, or snow TENG, leverages a basic chemical reaction to create static electricity that can be harnessed for power.
'Static electricity occurs from the interaction of one material that captures electrons and another that gives up electrons,' said Richard Kaner, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry, and a member of California NanoSystems Institute at UCLA.
'You separate the charges and create electricity out of essentially nothing.'
Snow could be just as handy as wind and water in creating a source of electricity with a newly developed technology. A hiking shoe with the device attached is pictured above
A simple device created by UCLA researchers is capable of converting snow into electricity.
Using a piece of negatively charged silicone, scientists say they can harness the positively charged snow when the two collide and produce
