New Generator Boosts Wind Turbine Efficiency 50%

MagnetDroid writes "A startup company based in Vancouver has developed a new kind of generator that could harvest much more energy from the wind. The design could not only lower the cost of wind turbines but increase their power output by 50 percent to as much as 100 percent, in some locations. Normally, when wind speeds drop, a turbine's engine becomes less efficient. The new engine, from ExRo Technologies, runs efficiently over a wider range of conditions. The design replaces a mechanical transmission with what amounts to an electronic one. Magnets attached to a rotating shaft create a current, but individual coils can be turned on and off electronically at different wind speeds." The company will begin field-testing a small, 5KW wind turbine by early next year.

Comments

I wonder...

[michrech]

...how something like a CVT would work for a wind turbine.

Decent Summary, Thanks

[schwaang]

The first thing I wondered was "what makes this design different?"

Magnets attached to a rotating shaft create a current, but individual coils can be turned on and off electronically at different wind speeds.

This is a nice, simple explanation of why this design can be kept efficient in a wider range of wind speeds.

Since we love to bash some of the lamer summaries, I think this one deserves a bump on the plus side.

Re:PICS OR GTFO

[jacquesm]

He has a point, even if 'pics' won't make much difference the vapourware will stick. There is this thing called Betz' law and it is pretty specific about how much energy you can extract from any moving medium.