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Scientists Are Developing the World's Biggest Wind Turbine With 656-Ft. Long Blades (latimes.com)
An anonymous reader writes from an LATimes article: Efforts to increase wind power mean that turbine blades are getting bigger and bigger. But a new design in the works takes the idea to levels most people can barely imagine: Blades up to 656.2 feet long -- more than two football fields. Today's longest blades are 262.5 feet. The blades at Imperial County's Ocotillo wind farm, which sends electricity to San Diego, are 173.9 feet long. "We call it the extreme scale," Eric Loth, a University of Virginia professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, said of the planned mega-blades. "There's nothing like it." The blades would look much different look from today's wind turbines. They wouldn't face the wind but would go downwind, aligning the blades to flow with the wind instead of fighting it. And instead of a single stiff blade, each blade would be broken into segments, allowing it to be more easily fabricated. In addition, the concept would allow the blades to "morph" -- spread out when the wind is blowing lightly to capture as much power as possible.
Could we find a way to keep this wonderful planet surface beautiful? Dig down power cables, make generators inconspicuous. And leave airspace free to birds, manned and RC aircraft.
Back-converted units are funny.
But a turbine that big will steal all the wind power then make the Earth stop spinning while also propelling it further out into a wider orbit and we'll all freeze and die!
You could put this on the Eiffel Tower, but it's kind of short. The Eiffel Tower is 1,063 ft tall, the towers they're planning for this are 1,574 ft.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Make everyone wear beanies with propellers on top. Not only will it generate a lot of energy, but everyone will be too busy laughing at one another to start wars.
You are welcome on my lawn.
If the technology works, Loth wants to avoid putting the big-blade facilities on land. Instead they would be put offshore — some 20 to 25 miles from the coast....
Even if the titanic turbines pass the subscale modeling tests in 2019, Loth said it would take "probably 10, 15 years" before the first facility would be up and running.
It's at least 15 years away and they know they'll never get approval to build them on land. But still a reasonable approach where the conditions are right. It's almost like they're trying to find a workable and cost effective solution, unlike other alternatives that depend on subsidies.
I just cringe, thinking of all of the Cesnas and Pipers that will be taken out when they try to land on this thing.
If we all had some way to collect and store all the methane from farts, we'd be all set for fueling powerplants.
Blades up to 200 meters long [irrelevant comparison omitted, it's really hard to imagine two vertical football fields on top of each other]. Today's longest blades are 80 meters. The blades at Imperial County's Ocotillo wind farm, which sends electricity to San Diego, are 53 meters long.
Isn't it much nicer like this? Also, don't add precision when converting units.
From TFA:
The project raises concern among bird lovers, who have long decried the number of birds and bats killed by wind turbines. The proposition of humongous facilities makes conservation groups nervous.
"The higher you go, you start potentially impacting more migratory birds that otherwise would have flown over the tops of [smaller] turbines," said Michael Parr, vice president and chief conservation officer for the American Bird Conservancy.
Researchers acknowledge the anxiety over how 656.2-foot blades â" officially called Segmented Ultralight Morphing Rotors â" would affect the environment.
If the technology works, Loth wants to avoid putting the big-blade facilities on land. Instead they would be put offshore â" some 20 to 25 miles from the coast.
"I really want to focus on going far enough offshore that we're away from the migratory patterns of the birds," Loth said.
But Parr said an offshore wind farm might not be an improvement.
"The problem with offshore turbines is that it's virtually impossible to know and track over time what impact they're having [on bird deaths] because any birds that get struck will fall directly into the ocean and be washed away by the currents or get eaten by sharks," he said.
- seriously...
I wonder if these bird lovers ever considered what coal and diesel power plant pollution does to birds, migratory or otherwise? How many birds die, I wonder, because of the pollution that is spewed into the atmosphere by the billions of tons around the world?
This turbine is a fine concept I think, though I think nuclear is the way to go of-course, why not build more wind turbines, especially in the oceans. Do it if it works. The birds will learn to avoid the turbine blades but they definitely cannot do much about the dirty air that we produce.
You can't handle the truth.
Regarding dangers to wildlife, will dragons be safe from it?
:-)
That you can fly an RC-Aircraft or a manned aircraft made out of fiber compound, aluminium is only possible because of putting mineral resources & energy to work.
All the things you wear all the things you use are made with energy because for example aluminium processing takes huge amounts of energy.
Making of all kinds of plastic takes huge processing plants - that are lit up 24/7 for safety.
That you can have fun with your RC-Aircraft is the very product of a very long and sophisticated stream of engineered processes.
Your RC-Aircraft is a by-product of these engineered processes.
And the time your vision comes true - in 50-70 yrs. - many people will be "unemployed".
And we don't have the warp drive to shoot all people into the sky.
But we have some spare nukes, that could solve the problem for once and for all.
And being a N.E.R.D. means that the computer NERDS have a CRAY2 in their Backyard and that mech. NERDS have a wind turbine in their back yard! ;)
Want to bet they "scientist" designed this in metric. What is 0.2 of a foot?
But not longer than two Canadian football fields!
it's a reverse propeller. If you want to apply torque to generate flow then you use a propeller, which has shallow blades, but if you want to capture flow and turn it into torque then you use a turbine, which has deep blades.
who will be the first BASE jumper to die jumping from the tower and how many days after its built will that take place?
I always knew it!
Let go for killing eagles, hawks and small aircraft...
The end zones are in bounds and part of the playing field.
That's 2.0000976e+08 micrometers. Sounds even more impressive.
...describe a physical object?
They wouldn't face the wind but would go downwind, aligning the blades to flow with the wind instead of fighting it.
What the fuck does that mean? How does a blade "flow"? It is a rigid object. It sits in the wind flow. And if a wind turbine fights the wind, then it isn't really a turbine, is it? A blade has a length, width, and thickness. Which is aligned with the wind? Is the windflow axially aligned or radially aligned? What is aligned? If a typical wind turbine faces the wind, and you rotate it 180 degrees is it now facing downwind? No. It is still facing the wind, because the blades are shaped to only move in one direction in a windflow. You have just put the blades on the other side of the mast and generator house. Go back to reporting on firearms, you do a better job with that.
no, fusion's about two or three years ago.
wouldn't wind shear be a really big concern?
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
when is /. gonna learn the difference between scientist and engineer?
This article has a diagram of the proposed design:
http://www.sandiegouniontribun...
You're remembering Windy Miller in Trumpton. That wasn't a documentary about wind turbines. Cut out the acid and go cold turkey now.
I wonder how many dead birds that thing will produce every year. One of the worst things about Liberals is the fact that they want to be selective about enforcing laws, letting their wind-turbine friends accumulate hundreds of kills a year in some places and then suing a nuke plant for a single dead owl found on the property whose death was apparently in no way connected to operation of the plant. They don't really CARE about the birds, they just want to use them as an excuse some of the time...
slashdot should have an automated Imperial to ISO converter...
Atari rules... ermm... ruled.