Wind Power Without the Mills

Re:Wind Power Without the Mills by reneherse on Monday May 11, 2015 @04:35PM (#9527673)

In this case, why bring the worker to the repair site when you can bring the repair site to the worker? This new technology is in the form of a cantilevered mast. It would be a basic engineering problem to design the structure to be raised and lowered when repair is needed.

The primitive model is a tabernacled mast on a sailboat.[1]

[1] http://imgur.com/XwMCxbv

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Re:Wind Power Without the Mills by startupfounder on Monday May 11, 2015 @07:43PM (#9528598)

> It would be a basic engineering problem to design the structure to be raised and lowered when repair is needed.

I'm a big sailer too. I used to crew on racing boats and classic schooners.

Let's say we have a cantilevered mast and can swap it out "quickly". For 2MW worth of generation that would be a massive engineering feat and would mean that you have inventory not being utilized stored in the warehouse. Not just a generator or blade, but an entire system unutilized sitting around! Also most sailing masts are fairly light (aluminium) and short (30'). A 2MW wind mast would be 10x a sailing mast and hold all of the generator and electronics, not just a hollow tube that needs to be structurally sound. also masts are designed to be rigid and are held in place using shrouds and stays. A wind mast designed to move can not be held in place using guy-wires as that defeats the purpose of the dynamic wind mast.

Workers on these wind farms are making between $10 and $25 each and every hour. Some specialized workers are making double that at times, but let's keep the average of $20/hr.

It doesn't make economical sense even if you didn't need a crane to swap it out. And yes you would need a crane as this would be a multi-ton structure.

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