vertical wind turbines

[Michael]

What if the feds and states installed them between the upper and lower impact rails on the barriers along the interstates? They would be run by the "wind" that cars and trucks generate as they drive by. Each tiny vertical turbine would be essentially meaningless, but millions (billions?) should make a substantial contribution to the power supply.

[Fritz]

http://www.tangarie.com

http://www.helixwind.com/en/index.php

there were some others, but they seemd to have disappeared.

[cbelt3]

Michael wrote:
What if the feds and states installed them between the upper and lower impact rails on the barriers along the interstates? They would be run by the "wind" that cars and trucks generate as they drive by. Each tiny vertical turbine would be essentially meaningless, but millions (billions?) should make a substantial contribution to the power supply.

Functionality barriers include infrastructure (cabling, etc..) and wear factors. A better candidate will be posting them on top of the noise walls that are all over the place in urban areas.

The big problem the US has with energy systems like this is the 'Big Project' mentality that locks most governments and corporations into refusing little stuff like this. Not recognizing that millions of kilowatt range generators will produce gigawatts.

The other big problem is storage. This is the real elephant in the room. The sun doesn't always shine, the wind doesn't always blow, rivers ice over, tides are sometimes big and sometimes smaller. Your generation capacity needs to be significantly higher, and your storage capacity needs to be huge in order to maintain grid demand 24/7.

[OWC Jamie]

Black wrote:
[quote=billb]
Noticed lots and lots of those being installed in parking lots on the existing light poles last time I was in Italy.

We've got a number of them installed on parkways and parking lot perimeters around Chicago.

Is this something we may see on roofs eventually?
Sorry but I'd rather visit Italy.

[Ken Sp.]

I've seen these before in California

[ztirffritz]

cbelt3 wrote: The other big problem is storage. This is the real elephant in the room. The sun doesn't always shine, the wind doesn't always blow, rivers ice over, tides are sometimes big and sometimes smaller. Your generation capacity needs to be significantly higher, and your storage capacity needs to be huge in order to maintain grid demand 24/7.

I've thought this too. The problem is that people always think of the energy storage in terms of cost thinking of conventional power generation systems. With renewable systems the storage can be incredibly low-tech and inefficient. I've often thought that wind turbines should be connected to pumps to compress air, pump water into an elevated tank, or lift massive weight into the air. Then, when the power is needed just release the water, drop the weight, open the valve...and collect the potential energy. The advantage of this is that it is a KNOWN quantity of energy that will be producing for a known quantity of time.

[cbelt3]

zt-
Electrical storage is done on a large scale in this country by generating companies. They use these storage sites to deal with the fact that energy demand is higher at peak times (Weekday mornings during factory startup, etc..). Energy storage ranges from potential to chemical energy storage. Energy storage involves lots of loss.

One popular solution is the 'reverse hydroelectric' reservoir. Water is pumped up a hill with the electricity, and when demand peaks, it flows back down through a generating turbine. Compressed air storage in large caverns is also used, but mostly experimentally. Large scale batteries (Sodium cells) are under research.

[Acer]

With diffuse generation systems, you need diffuse storage systems, otherwise you are back to Grand Centralized Projects.

What we need is a battery in the basement next to the hot water tank.

[Filliam H. Muffman]

One of the utilities in California tried to build off-peak storage but some design mistakes cut the efficiency and output significantly.

Batteries in your basement are not really economical unless you put in enough to supply your entire energy use for 3 days, and the company that installs it will give you a 15 year guarantee. I would love to see a long term plan to integrate PHEV's into grid storage.

[Bill in NC]

Or sell old PHEV batteries as 'whole-house' w/ inverters as 'whole-house' UPS systems.

Charge them after midnight, use them for peak shaving during the day?

Also cheaper to run than a generator if the power fails.

Filliam H. Muffman wrote:
One of the utilities in California tried to build off-peak storage but some design mistakes cut the efficiency and output significantly.

Batteries in your basement are not really economical unless you put in enough to supply your entire energy use for 3 days, and the company that installs it will give you a 15 year guarantee. I would love to see a long term plan to integrate PHEV's into grid storage.