Lightning appears to be this limitless supply of energy, so why isn’t this being considered as a valid source of our future energy needs. Surely we could have some sort of lightning rod connected to a huge array of batteries to store all of this electricity. I’m sure there is a simple explanation, but I’m interested to hear what it is.
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Batteries work at lower voltages and higher currents. Lightning works at insanely high and unpredictable voltages in the millions of volts. The problem with high voltage is that it pierces through any material you could use to contain it, and generally it just destroys things. Lightning is so powerful it can jump from the sky to the earth through miles of air. For comparison, even high-voltage power lines are weak enough that you can hold them 50 feet in the air and the electricity won’t make the jump to the ground or people nearby.
Very little technology is designed to contain or tolerate millions to billions of volts. The technology that can would be complex scientific or industrial equipment, not something small or cheap. And this lightning capturing device would need to be small and cheap. Lightning can strike the same place twice, but it doesn’t do it repeatedly all day, every day. If you want to capture a large and reliable amount of power from lightning you’d need these devices all over the place. It’s just not practical compared to how easy it is to make a solar panel or wind turbine, or to use fossil fuels.
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