How tesla electricity can create wireless power | The Economist

Nikola Tesla built a tower to broadcast electric power. It failed. Soon, sending power through the air might be the norm Subscribe NOW to The Economist: The inventor, Nikola Tesla, dreamt of wireless power. Among his work in the realm of electricity he built a coil, later named the Tesla coil, which could illuminate lamps from across a room and throw the occasional bolt of lightning at the nearest conductor. Tesla coils remain popular today, though often for their ability to put on a fantastic lightning show. Nikola Tesla believed in wireless power with such an enthusiasm that with the financing of JP Morgan, he constructed a giant apparatus, the Wardenclyffe Tower, at his lab in Shoreham Long Island in 1901. This was before the world was wired. The idea? To send wireless power around the globe. Here’s how it works. Run an electric current through a coil of copper wire and the coil will produce a short-range magnetic field. Place a second coil within this field and an electric cur