"High-altitude winds between 1,640 and 3,281 feet (500 and 10,000 meters) above the ground are stronger and steadier than surface winds. These winds are abundant, widely available, and carbon-free.
"The physics of wind power makes this resource extremely valuable. “When wind speed doubles, the energy it carries increases eightfold, triple the speed, and you have 27 times the energy,” explained Gong Zeqi "
1,640 and 3,281 feet (500 and 10,000 meters)
I feel like this needs a second look.
As a European… Are feet logarithmic? Wouldn’t even surprise me that much.
Only when viewed from the north.
And on Tuesdays.
No, but feet are analogue. Hands are digital.
They used different people’s feet.
So that “10,000 meters” didn’t scale right, clearly. But you also can’t possibly call those “high altitudes”. Small planes like cessnas fly at low altitudes, like 2,000 - 5000 ft, a 747 flys at a high altitude, 40,000 ft; 1600 ft is nothing, that’s lower than some buildings.
Ha! Watch us burn some liquid dinosaurs!
- USA
Fossil fuels are from shit the dinos ate, like plants and other dumb crap. The belief that coal-rollers are cool enough to burn liquid dinosaurs is easily the single biggest lie of the oil industry.
Closely followed by -gestures wildly-
Oil is solar power with extra steps.
Just cut out the 300 million year old middle man
Lol, got your new advert campaign… Gasoline is vegan
And Africa, and South America, and the middle east, and Europe. Don’t pretend the rest of the world isn’t still burning fossil fuels it’s not just the US
USA is pretty much the biggest country actively fighting against better methods in favor of fossil fuels, so I’d say it’s an accurate statement
Finally the stupid floating jet engine looking turbines from Big Hero 6, except IRL they actually look good.
This thread is telling me one thing and one thing only: I need to see Big Hero 6…
You don’t need to, but your life will have been without purpose if you don’t see it. Kidding, but I did see it for the first time last year, and it was pretty good
When wind speed doubles, the energy it carries increases eightfold,
Edit: I’m wrong, see edit below!
Huh? Kinetic energy increase is square, not cubic.
KE=1/2 m v^2
So every doubling of speed should increase the available kinetic energy by 4 times, not 8. 3 times the speed is 9 times the energy. Granted there are probably some efficiency gains in excess of this at the low end,
but as a rule that’s just wrong.Edit: Cool, I learned something new! I neglected to consider it in terms of power, just thought about kinetic energy.
So something like: KE = 1/2 m v^2
= 1/2 ( rho V) v^2
= 1/2 ( rho A d) (d/t)^2
= 1/2 rho A d^3 1/t^2
Where P = KE/t
Thus:
P = 1/2 rho A (d/t)^3
= 1/2 rho A v^3
Lots of other aspects I’m sure I have wrong, but I see how the cubic came to be.
Its cubic actually
https://thundersaidenergy.com/downloads/wind-power-impacts-of-larger-turbines/
I don’t understand the physics, but every model of power output from wind turbines uses V^3 for the formula
Thanks for the correction! I got way ahead of myself.
I like how everyone conveniently leaves out the part that this is an emergency backup not actual full time scalable tool.
This one in particular: maybe.
The approach in gerenal: not so much.
Have a look here: https://skysails-power.com/systems/venyo/The one you posted is not for scaling either. I just dont see how this maintenance overhead could ever scale for mass use.
I don’t know what you mean by mass use. It’s pretty clear that these approaches are meant to add to existing solutions or provide off-grid energy at remote locations.
If you can bring a standard 30 foot container there, you can consider such a kite installation, if other requirements are met.How does an ideal site look like?
Q3: How does an ideal site look like?
The ideal site has a flat topography with no large obstacles in the prevailing wind direction, making agricultural or unused land the ideal choice. However, certain obstacles, like trees, solar power plants, or industrial facilities, are acceptable within the operating area, but specific approval may be required. We are happy to support you in identifying the perfect site for your airborne wind energy project.I don’t see, you can’t use multiple installations at different locations aka scale it.
Basically every other option will almost always be better, no? I guess we’ll see as someone actually brings some of these to the market but my guess would be that this is not going to go anywhere.
I can see those kites being used at remote locations, islands, remote villages, etc.
Add some battery to it and you have a quite reliable source of electric energy.
What option would be better in these cases in your opinion?I live in remote locations as a digital nomad and this would never really work. The maintenance overhead of even normal ground wind turbines is too much for remote areas. Solar and battery storage is really unbeatable.
Some new generation wind turbines can be decent ive heard but there are also small novel solutions like mini water turbines can be surprisingly useful.
Neither the kite based solution nor the blimp based solution is fit for the purpose of serving single or few people with electrical energy.
For that scenario some kWp based on solar can be had for cheap and some kWh battery on top doesn’t cost a fortune either.
I never insinuated that the kite or blimp are the perfect solution for every scenario - rather that it may be a match for situation that couldn’t be served well by the available means.
Incredible progress on a concept that has been seeking investment for last 15 years. It doesn’t just provide 1.2mw, it also operates at a higher capacity factor than capturing winds closer to ground. I’m sure it can scale even higher.
This is useful for clean energy shipping. Design supports an unthethered airship that produces H2 and transports it at the same time. I believe the design would support forward momentum directly upwind, but some tacking angle would be supported.
This is not just a breakthrough in wind energy generation, it is a breakthrough in airship capability.
Meanwhile in the US, rich assholes are firmly convinced coal and oil are the future.
God I hate this place.
It’s late stage capitalism.
These fools are just hoarding what they have and trying to continue the « golden age ».
China will be the next superpower for sure
To be fair, coal and oil are narratives are being pushed by foreign actors too on the US. China knows exactly how to win a race, and step 1 is to tie your opponents’ shoe laces.
…produces H2?
electrolysis of water (partially from starting water reservoir, and partially from air humidity = dehumidifier step), can displace water weight with increased H2 pressure in airship. Can put an infinite amount of these over ocean with no land lease costs, but moving giant ships solves the issue of thethering them.
An untethered AWE cannot produce any power
Contentious. Thethering increases power production by restricting the “sail movement power”. The blimp part is highly/perfectly aerodynamic, and the betz limit means that a turbine does not fully “act like a parachute”. Ground vehicles that proved faster than wind speed directly upwind could use similar principle to turn a propulsion prop, that increases forward/apparent wind speed generating more power.
This relates to same incredulity for faster than wind upwind ground experiment, and needs experimental proof. But principles of sailing are indeed magical, and simply generating enough power to move forward is extremely useful, even if tacking were needed.
In all your examples there is the ground to provide a counteracting force. Maybe I am misunderstanding what you mean by untethered, but any initial airspeed difference between the wind and your system will eventually vanish and you’ll move along with the surrounding air.
I co-founded an AWE startup 8 years ago and let me tell you, literature does not support your claim.
Say what you will at least China seems produce some much needed tech in exchange for selling their people to capitalism, the latter which almost all countries do but in exchange for funnelling the 99.99 % of the revenue to billionaires and/or war (pulled the stats out of my hass).
Switching to renewables makes a lot of sense from an economic and ecologic point of view but also geostrategically. Unfortunately, Western governments have pretty much lost the ability to act on those considerations. This is due to then being beholden to a few billionaires who would rather see civilisation as we know it end than accept a few percentage points revenue drop for a couple of quarters.
Am I crazy or didn’t we see these in Big Hero 6?
a l a l a l a l h a BKinda.
Yes but, you see, that was an animated film aka a work of fiction. This is happening in reality.
Yeah and it’s amazing that they took this crazy idea from a kids cartoon and made it work!
I’d be more interested about the cable that is going to bring all that power to the ground level. With traditional tech that would weigh a shit-ton. Light weight generator would be easy peasy compared to that.
Maybe there’s energy intensive processes that they could do up there instead. Something like Haber Bosch. Then bring the products down.
City in the clouds
Will it be run by Billy Dee Williams?
