Flywheel UPS

DrZap writes: "Saw this in a trade magazine, a UPS using a flywheel to store kinetic energy instead of batteries. Environment friendly and everything!"

Comments

Re:That makes no sense.

[maggard]

How many companies do you know of that can go digging around to make a huge hole to fit 1000 lbs of metal?

First off 1000 lbs of metal isn't that much, it's equivalent to about 5 sysadmins or 4 coders (values may vary depending on your OS & languages.)

The space required to store a flywheel of this size would be about the same as two parking spots. Seriously. An inner concrete wall, an outer concrete wall and a lot of sand in-between. Figure 15' on a side max, two stories high.

One can find that sort of space in any building. Heck, that fits in the machine-rooms of many office towers alongside the water-pumps and transformer; the only issue would be the static load and inertia problems on upper floors.

Furthermore this is about the same volume many mid-size backup generators take when one figures in clearence, muffler, etc. Lots of new tech-buildings are built with platforms in back for these & there's usually a few decks left empty for expansion.

If one didn't want the flywheel inside the building proper (though it would be quite safe) there's always the dead-corner in a local parking structure. Heck, this could create a whole new market for the bottom of elevator-shafts - tuck the flywheels down there.

Where have I seen this before?

[Brento]

Hmmm, a quick search on Google turns up plenty of hits for this stuff - it's not THAT new.

http://www.afstrinity.com/
http://www.activepower.com
http://www.acumentrics.com
http://space-power.grc.nasa.gov/ppo/projects/flywh eel/papers/powertrades-oct98/ - a NASA study from 1998

All with URLs displayed, for you who fear goatse.cx. Somehow, this doesn't look like that new of a technology. (And besides, I thought a REGULAR UPS was heavy!)

Give yourself enough time to switch to pedal power

[BierGuzzl]

Woah.. with that nifty thing, rig up a pedal powered system to pick up where the ups stops-- for those Rolling blackouts you just get your employees to move from their desks to their designated stationary bicycle.

Who'da thunk it? -- an employee fitness program and disaster contingency program all in one!

You think this is *heavy*?

[sacremon]

Do folks realize what the UPS's that server farms are like? Try 5000lb. Where I work, we've got ten such UPS's. For media or bandwidth providers, all you really are looking for your UPS's to do is be on line till the diesel generators can in. Our 25 tons of batteries will last us about 15 minutes. That's enough time to get the 4MW of diesel generators going.

The real attraction to these is that they live for a long time. Even if you have power problems, they won't be stressed very much, and in the long run, you save money by not having to keep on buying new batteries when the old ones inevitably die, regardless of use.

The only question I have is...

[President of The US]

...how often do I have to change the hamster?
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