The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015)

Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by adrianN on Saturday September 07, 2019 @04:20AM (#20902522)

I skeptical that this system can scale to decent power output. A 100W conventional turbine is not a threat to birds either, because it's tiny. Modern wind turbines produce something like 10MW. That's 100000 times more power. Even small residential turbines are in the kilowatt range.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by OskarS on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:15AM (#20902703)

Yeah, I'm skeptical too, but I still think it's a worthwhile investment to see what comes out. Probably nothing, but we need as much investing as possible in climate-friendly power sources. This bet might not pay off, but you do enough of them, one might pay off big.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by atoav on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:13AM (#20902697)

And the bird threatening factor of one wind turbine compares to one cat (at least in Germany).

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by kgabis on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:16AM (#20902709)

Cats don't kill large migratory birds. But wind turbines do.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by shakna on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:57AM (#20902835)

There was a 2007 legal case that, though the jury ended in deadlock (as to whether or not the shooting of a cat was legal), suggests that cats do in fact kill migratory birds. Stevenson v Galvestone, I believe.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by j88439h84 on Saturday September 07, 2019 @06:09AM (#20902869)

That's interesting, and I'm curious why someone would know this. Are you in the field?

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by shakna on Saturday September 07, 2019 @09:46AM (#20903735)

I started getting cluster headaches a couple years ago, so it isn't true anymore, but I used to have a photographic memory. Useful for picking up lots of entirely useless information.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by j88439h84 on Saturday September 07, 2019 @01:38PM (#20905283)

I see. Thanks for sharing that.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by tomohawk on Saturday September 07, 2019 @07:30AM (#20903141)

Initially, or later, when the large, mechanical apex predator has cleared the area?

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by atoav on Saturday September 07, 2019 @10:01AM (#20903796)

I am quite convinced that the areas where there are wind turbines in Germany don’t intersect much with the area where there are cats.

Germany e.g. has a many offshore wind parks and cats can’t really swim that well.

And I wouldn’t call something that rotates completely unimpressed of flying criters a “predator”. Maybe you could call it a trap. Or a hazard.

Are glas windows considered a predator?

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by whazor on Saturday September 07, 2019 @04:34AM (#20902569)

The small size makes it ideal for putting some in your garden. Probably comparable to solar panels. Transport of electricity is also expensive so there are some benefits.

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by adrianN on Saturday September 07, 2019 @12:02PM (#20904605)

There might be some niche applications of this, but I really doubt that you should call it "The Future of Wind Turbines".

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Re:The Future of Wind Turbines? No Blades (2015) by IshKebab on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:35AM (#20902769)

Transport of electricity isn't expensive enough that this really makes sense anywhere.

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