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Harnessing the Energy of Galloping Gertie
FatLittleMonkey writes "You've all seen the footage of Galloping Gertie, the infamous Tacoma Narrows bridge. This is due to a type of turbulence called Wake Galloping, caused by airflow creating lift on the lee-side of cylinders (or cables on suspension bridges.) Now researchers in South Korea have developed a way of harnessing the turbulence to generate electricity. Their device works most efficiently at wind speeds too low for conventional wind turbines."
Anyone else read "Galloping Gertie" and immediately think Ubuntu?
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Didn't someone already design something like this, eg putting a wire across a valley and harnessing the vibration
Divide a cake by zero. Is it still a cake?
after RTFA, I'm heading this one off at the pass; Yes, the concept of generating electricity from this effect has been done before, we all remember the /. article about the generator that looked like a violin bow, which vibrated in the wind and made a magnet move in a coil. FYI, the article mentions this exact device, and its inventor. this however, is a new approach to the process, and IMOH, better suited to remote/poor villages, as it is a more durable device (at least on initial assessment).
its good to see these sorts of innovations and adaptations of initial concepts. It means people are working the problems, and, it appears, finding more than one way to 'skin that cat'.
I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
What makes you think this design would be completely uncontrolled and just let nature have its way rather than say put guide-vanes in critical places to control the reaction to the turbulence? People don't design this stuff without taking such basics into consideration.
Conventional wind turbines do this too, they rotate off axis to the wind and then lock the blades. Heck nearly every type of energy generator be it a steam turbine, natural gas, diesel generator etc have some kind of high input speed / high output power trip.
12.04 or 12.10, but not 12.0
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
No doubt you are right, it was just a flip remark. I was hoping for first post.
Imagine modifying all future power lines, especially the big towers. To utilize this.
The power lines themselves could trickle charge the grid.
Mmm, if you say so.
However, last year, the UK's wind farms produced around 22% of their maximum rated power. You know, the headline figure that's always trotted out for propaganda purposes, ignoring the real question: how much does fossil fuel use decrease as wind farms come online?
During a particularly windy day last week, Europe's largest onshore wind farm at Whitelee outside Glasgow had to feather its turbines and was drawing power from the grid so that Ecomentals could enjoy its visitor centre. Bless 'em.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Since the proposed device is taking energy out of the wind, is it possible that it could also be used as a damper or stabilizer?
Hypothetically: If the Tacoma Narrows bridge had something like this installed, would the collapse have occurred? Or, would it have, at least, taken enough energy out of the oscillations to allow the bridge to stand longer?