Pages

▼

Friday, 4 February 2011

"Free" energy

Those Sons of Fun over at Yanko Design come up with a way of generating electricity by installing vertical rotors on motorway dividers that are spun by the breeze of passing cars.

Does anybody run the numbers on these things?
at

7 comments:

  1. eonFriday, 4 February 2011 at 03:04:00 GMT-8

    But, but, all us peons' are going to be on mass transit! Ray LaHood says so! So who's going to be driving anywhere?

    But that, like reality in general, doesn't matter. To the enviros, this thing "looks good", and it's "appropriate technology". With those two cachets', it doesn't matter if it will actually work, and if it won't pay for itself, so much the better- that means taxpayer subsidies from here to eternity. ("Taking money from bad people and doing good with it", in their Robin Hoodish estimation. And they get to play with the money, of course.)

    However, it won't last. Those rotating green things are probably going to be made of plastic, and will prove an irresistible target for gangboys with hot cars and baseball bats. I anticipate regular major-component replacement costs being the single biggest expense of the system.

    cheers

    eon

    ReplyDelete
  2. SergejFriday, 4 February 2011 at 04:51:00 GMT-8

    Prayer wheels for Blessed Gaia? I am not Buddhist, but it seems to me that bringing one's mind in line with that of the Buddha connects to something deeper.

    ReplyDelete
  3. WunderbearFriday, 4 February 2011 at 07:19:00 GMT-8

    See, I think the problem is that it appears to make sense if you just look at it, and don't use that much logic. I mean, it made sense to me. (Okay, it helps if you're a bit thick as well)

    ReplyDelete
  4. jayessellFriday, 4 February 2011 at 09:32:00 GMT-8

    Wasn't this invented/designed/patented by a professional basketball player?

    Not kidding.

    I just can't remember who.

    ReplyDelete
  5. LandaFriday, 4 February 2011 at 09:32:00 GMT-8

    Did the designer at least have someone calculate the efficiency of his rotor blades or did he just design them to look nice?

    No wait… don't answer that :(

    ReplyDelete
  6. LandaFriday, 4 February 2011 at 09:34:00 GMT-8

    jayessell, I think I saw something like that in a german magazine (PM Magazin for those keeping count) sometime in the 90ies.

    The only difference is the number of blades, the color and that the blades of the old design were supposed to swing into a neutral position if the wind became too strong.

    ReplyDelete
  7. IronmistressMonday, 7 February 2011 at 01:49:00 GMT-8

    This thingy is called Flettner Rotor. It was invented in 1922, and it employs the Magnus effect to capture kinetic energy and translate the linear energy of wind or airstream into rotational energy of the axis. [E.g. to run an electric generator.]

    Despite the outlandish appearance, that thingy actually does work.

    ReplyDelete

Rules for submitting comments:

1. No profanity. I maintain the pretense that this is a family-friendly site.

2. Stay on topic. A bit of straying and off-hand commenting is okay, but hijacking the discussion is right out.

3. No ad hominem attacks. Attack the subject, not the other person on the thread and keep the discussion civil.

4. No spamming or commercial endorsements. These get deleted immediately.

Tip: Beware of putting hyperlinks in your comments–especially at the end. For some reason, Blogger interprets these as spam.

Note: Due to the recent spate of anonymous spamming, registration for comments is now required.