A New Idea to Harness Energy From Black Holes - Universe Today

Fifty years ago, English mathematical physicist and Nobel-prize winner Roger Penrose proposed that energy could be extracted from the space around a rotating black hole.

Known as the ergosphere, this region lies just outside an event horizon, the boundary within which nothing can escape a black hole’s gravitational pull (even light).

In it, they propose a new method whereby energy could be harnessed from a black hole by breaking and rejoining magnetic field lines near its event horizon, the boundary within which nothing can escape a black hole’s gravitational pull (even light).

This causes infalling matter to turn into two flows of charged particles (aka. plasma), one of which will be pushed up against the black hole’s spin and pick up negative mass-energy, causing it to fall past the event horizon into the black hole.

What’s more, the high relative velocity between captured and escaping plasma streams is what allows for the process where massive amounts of energy can be extracted from a black hole.

Achieving an efficiency greater than 100 percent is possible because black holes leak energy, which is given away for free to the plasma escaping from the black hole.”.

There are also theories about how tiny black holes could be used to power interstellar spacecraft (the black hole drive), or how an event horizon could become a means of propulsion (the Halo Drive).

This latter idea works in much the same way as a gravity assist maneuver, where a spacecraft would use the event horizon of a spinning black hole to slingshot itself towards distant stars at speeds approaching the speed of light!

As Asenjo indicated, theoretical studies into black hole-physics are especially important in a time when global efforts like the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) are allowing for the first images of black holes to be captured:.

“Our increased knowledge of how magnetic reconnection occurs in the vicinity of the black hole might be crucial for guiding our interpretation of current and future telescope observations of black holes, such as the ones by the Event Horizon Telescope.”