Water From Wind

ghostcorps recommends a writeup in The Australian by columnist Phillip Adams about a new windmill design that extracts water from air. The article gives few details of how it works, because patent protection is not yet in place, but what is revealed sounds promising. "[Max] Whisson's design has many blades, each as aerodynamic as an aircraft wing, and each employing 'lift' to get the device spinning... They don't face into the wind like a conventional windmill; they're arranged vertically, within an elegant column, and take the wind from any direction... The secret of Max's design is how his windmills, whirring away in the merest hint of a wind, cool the air as it passes by... With three or four of Max's magical machines on hills at our farm we could fill the tanks and troughs, and weather the drought. One small Whisson windmill on the roof of a suburban house could keep your taps flowing. Biggies on office buildings, whoppers on skyscrapers, could give independence from the city's water supply. And plonk a few hundred in marginal outback land — specifically to water tree-lots — and you could start to improve local rainfall."

Comments

Hmmn, implied refrigeration

[davecb]

Anything that creates lift creates a lower pressure, which in turn refrigerates, and eventually induces condensation.

A Mere Matter of Programming to model an aerodynamic shape that maximizes condensation and captures the resulting droplets.

--dave

Re:Something doesn't add up...

[drinkypoo]

So, condensing water from the air to water trees, from which some of the water will transpire back to the atmosphere, might improve local rainfall?

Trees improve local rainfall, because they affect weather (slow it down, for one thing.)

Deforestation has had horrendous effects on global weather. You might have noticed that the Amazon is drying up...

Stop smoking crack naysayers

[Anonymous Coward]

Compare the volume of air that any good-sized unit can draw moisture from (and assuming 100% efficiency which is BS) to the total volume of air passing across the area. That's like saying too many windmills will stop the wind blowing. Stop smoking crack.

Re:Interested....

[spun]

Things I would like to know:

Phillip Adams, this guy Max Whisson is your longtime friend. You give no details about how his device works, yet you ask for people to invest money with him. Is this a scam? You say you already have investors, yet you haven't managed to get a patent on this device yet, and so you need to keep the details secret. Why should we think this is anythign but a scam?

Re:Interested....

[Lord_Dweomer]

I'm guessing that it is more of a constant trickle. Doubt it would generate much electricity.

IANAEE (I am not an electrical engineer) but if this thing can generate water, AND wind power...wouldn't it be a self-powered fuel cell? The process of separating the hydrogen could be powered by the wind-generated electricity it would seem. I'd love for someone with much more understanding of the physics behind this to tear apart my idea but this thing sounds damned useful. Not sure how small it could be made and still maintain its effectiveness but imagine giving a portable version of this to sailors. If you could create drinking water and electricity from this while floating on the ocean that would be a real life saver.