Wind Power Without the Blades

[Joanne98]

By Alyssa Danigelis

Noise from wind turbine blades, inadvertent bat and bird kills and even the way wind turbines look have made installing them anything but a breeze. New York design firm Atelier DNA has an alternative concept that ditches blades in favor of stalks. Resembling thin cattails, the Windstalks generate electricity when the wind sets them waving. The designers came up with the idea for the planned city Masdar, a 2.3-square-mile, automobile-free area being built outside of Abu Dhabi. Atelier DNA’s “Windstalk” project came in second in the Land Art Generator competition a contest sponsored by Madsar to identify the best work of art that generates renewable energy from a pool of international submissions.



The proposed design calls for 1,203 “stalks,” each 180-feet high with concrete bases that are between about 33- and 66-feet wide. The carbon-fiber stalks, reinforced with resin, are about a foot wide at the base tapering to about 2 inches at the top. Each stalk will contain alternating layers of electrodes and ceramic discs made from piezoelectric material, which generates a current when put under pressure. In the case of the stalks, the discs will compress as they sway in the wind, creating a charge.

“The idea came from trying to find kinetic models in nature that could be tapped to produce energy,” explained Atelier DNA founding partner Darío Núñez-Ameni.

In the proposal for Masdar, the Windstalk wind farm spans 280,000 square feet. Based on rough estimates, said Núñez-Ameni the output would be comparable to that of a conventional wind farm covering the same area.

“Our system is very efficient in that there is no friction loss associated with more mechanical systems such as conventional wind turbines,” he said.



Each base is slightly different, and is sloped so that rain will funnel into the areas between the concrete to help plants grow wild. These bases form a sort of public park space and serve a technological purpose. Each one contains a torque generator that converts the kinetic energy from the stalk into energy using shock absorber cylinders similar to the kind being developed by Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Levant Power .

Wind isn’t constant, though, so Núñez-Ameni says two large chambers below the whole site will work like a battery to store energy. The idea is based on existing hydroelectric pumped storage systems. Water in the upper chamber will flow through turbines to the lower chamber, releasing stored energy until the wind starts up again.


http://news.discovery.com/tech/wind-power-without-the-blades.html

[kristopher]

1. That sounds very innovative.

I look forward to seeing a more technical evaluation, though. I see some potential areas where it may be decidedly inferior to horizontal axis turbines, and some areas where it may make up for those deficiencies.

Thanks for posting.

Rec.

[Joanne98]

2. I love out of the box thinking.

[MadHound]

3. Interesting, but there's already a bladeless way of harvesting the wind out there

It's called a windbelt, and the device is really quite interesting. You could easily fit a bank of of ten windbelts on your house and generate most, if not all of your electrical needs in winds as low as four miles per hour.

<http://www.humdingerwind.com/>

[jaxx]

4. They take up a lot of land space.

But it's interesting to find other ways to harness the energy.

[Winterblues]

5. If this design works with wind, why wouldn't it work in the ocean?

Let the tidal currents move the stalks around...

[WhiteTara]

6. wow. it is much cooler from the ground view

and awesome from the overhead view. I love the aesthetic accent of the project.

[JCMach1]

7. Masdar is the real deal...

[Evasporque]

8. In response coal mining companies produced this massive design for new shovel.

[felix_numinous]

9. Awesome, green energy ideas

are really endless, once people free their minds to think outside the box. :)

[Scurrilous]

10. K & R

:thumbsup:

[lonestarnot]

11. Wow. Way cool if it works. Guess that means Don Quixote can be forgone.

:( for Don Quixote.

[Desertrose]

12. K&R. This is awesome!!

Looks pretty cool, too.

[Cowpunk]

13. Ever wondered what it's like to be a flea?NT