Posted on 05/20/2015 6:58:43 PM PDT by Jack Hydrazine
What do you get if you take the blades off a wind turbine? A better wind turbine.
That sounds like a joke, but that’s actually more or less the model of a new wind turbine prototype. Instead of blades that turn in the breeze, the turbine is just a hollow straw that sticks up 40 feet from the ground and vibrates like a guitar string when the wind thrums by.
The Spanish engineers who founded Vortex Bladeless in 2010 said they were inspired by the Tacoma Narrows Bridge disaster (maybe not the best pitch for clean energy to a disaster-wary public, but I’ll leave that to their marketing department). Here’s how it actually works, from Wired:
"Instead of capturing energy via the circular motion of a propeller, the Vortex takes advantage of what’s known as vorticity, an aerodynamic effect that produces a pattern of spinning vortices. Vorticity has long been considered the enemy of architects and engineers, who actively try to design their way around these whirlpools of wind. And for good reason: With enough wind, vorticity can lead to an oscillating motion in structures, which, in some cases, like the … Tacoma Narrows Bridge, can cause their eventual collapse."
"At the base of the cone are two rings of repelling magnets, which act as a sort of nonelectrical motor. When the cone oscillates one way, the repelling magnets pull it in the other direction, like a slight nudge to boost the mast’s movement regardless of wind speed. This kinetic energy is then converted into electricity via an alternator that multiplies the frequency of the mast’s oscillation to improve the energy-gathering efficiency."
The result is a turbine that’s 50 percent less expensive than a bladed one, nearly silent, and, as one of the turbine’s engineers put it, “looks like asparagus” (sorry, Quixote). And while each Vortex turbine is also 30 percent less efficient at capturing energy, wind farms can double the number of turbines that occupy a given area if they go bladeless. That’s a net energy gain of 40 percent for you non-mathletes out there.”
Plus, the turbine has no gears or moving parts; theoretically maintenance could be much easier than a traditional bells-and-whistles spinning one. No shade to my three-bladed friends, but I can’t complain about a cheaper, more accessible wind-powered future.
Never thought of it that way — to me the wicked ayatollah takes a crap in the white hut.
They show up on weather radar in some areas and look like precipitation.
"Of course I am concerned."
You can think of a simplified model of it in this way [which is actually a valid physical metaphor]: When water falls over Niagara falls, it reaches the basin with an enormous kinetic energy. That energy has to be dissipated, and it is, through frictional forces, which not only heat the water but also erode the basin at the foot of the waterfall.
[This pressure, which arises from a gradient in gravitational potential energy, is no different from the gradient that arises between two areas of different barometric pressure.]
If you put a hydroelectric dam, or just a water-paddle in the falls, the water will arrive with considerably less energy when it reaches the bottom. But note: we haven't changed the gradient. The is still just as much of a potential energy difference at the top and bottom of the falls as there was before. This means there is going to be less water thrown up into the atmosphere as water vapor, and less erosion at the base of the falls because of the energy we've extracted to do work.
Same thing happens with turbulent fluid flow impeded by turbines when gases are involved. The pressure differential cannot be alleviated as quickly if we put a turbine in the way and take work from it; it will take longer to equilibrate, and there will be reduced wind velocity downstream. As a result, you may very well see weather changes downwind. Probably not... because we trap a very small fraction of the atmosphere's energy in a wind turbine, even an array, but there are still observable effects.
bfl
I have trouble believing that. The energy conversions I’ve dealt with always have losses and the losses have always been represented by the generation of heat.
Yes, it might result in the slowing of the earth's rotation, which could cause permanent daylight savings time. This extra sunlight, with a reduction in cooling breezes, would cause global warming. On the other side of the earth, where the sun don't shine, it would experience global cooling. Then, every time some liberal says we are a bunch of racists, we can just tell them to go put it in that area of the earth, where the sun don't shine. I have always taken great pleasure in telling libtards to stick it where the sun don't shine. This will give me another opportunity to do just that. 😂
Trees have the same effect.
Oh the huge manatee!
The Age of Folly.
Only with a huge government subsidy
Windfarms are leftist investment sumps.
wealthy people get together in a consortium, get government to pony up to build the windmills after taking over peasant land and ruining local property values, then though laws in place force local power companies to purchase power generated. Whether they need it or not. So the taxpayer gets hit twice, in the building of the boondoggle and in their power rates.
And there's the problem w/ the idea. The tube has to be anchored at the base which means the shedding vortices's which drive the vibrations of the top of the tube will induce bending moments at the base. The result will be metal fatigue which will lead to failure of the tube. Just bend a paper clip back and forth a bit and you will get the idea.
The other problem which is waved off is how do they intend to extract electrical energy from the device. There is talk of "magnets" which are described as parts of a "non-electric" motor when what is needed is a generator. The vibrating tube will have it's greatest motion amplitude at the unconstrained top end and no motion at all at the base. Wear is the generator to be mounted, 40 feet in the air?
Regards,
GtG
This is true — a colleague once calculated the temperature drop in Europe if all European energy were generated by windmills. It was a few Centigrade degrees.
This paragraph is utter nonsense. Either the author had no clue what he was saying, or the "scientists" didn't explain it to him. If this thing could actually put out nearly the same energy as a wind turbine, it may not slice and dice birds, but it would certainly beat them to death if they tried to land on or near it.
True for a heat engine. The Carnot efficiency sets the upper bound on efficiency and how much heat loss there will be. Extracting energy from the atmosphere is entirely different. Sure you will generate some heat in bearings, gearbox, generator, but you are extracting far more energy to convert to electricity. Of course, more heat is lost during electricity transmission and end-use, but those can be long distances from where the energy was removed from the atmosphere. There will be conservation of energy, but could be large-scale local or regional effects.
Wind will never be a huge chunk of the mix, so it’s not a big deal. Just an interesting curiousity.
Not only that, but could you imagine what would happen if you put a bunch of these on an island? It could possibly capsize.
Bingo.
It took 12 posts, but I knew someone would lock onto it.
I’d like to know how fast the wind needs to be moving in order for this to be effective.
It wasn’t a light breeze that brought down the Narrows Bridge.
The interesting part of this is that you CAN, quite possibly, build this like an antenna, or set of antennas, on the outside of a moving automobile. When the car is in motion, the windvane generates power.
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