Intriguing New Wind Generators
07 August 2009
The opposition often faced by conventional wind aerogenerators due to their impact on the landscape and the possible danger to avian and bat fauna led to the design of a new class of generators without external mobile parts.
Two firms, the Italian Western Co. and the US company Solatec, recently announced to have designed a new concept for wind energy exploitation.

Western Co. made public the details of its Tornado Like device, rather small and bladeless, which should be able to produce electric energy even from very weak winds. The wind entering from the base would be forced upwards, increasing in energy thanks to the whirling motion caused by the peculiar internal shape of the generator.

The Fuller Wind Turbine System designed by the US company Solatec (formerly known as Solar Aero) is more similar to a conventional turbine, but smaller and without moving parts exposed, which would make it more suitable for wildlife protection. Its operational wind speed would be 8 knots, and low maintenance would be a key to long life at low cost.
An interesting feature would be the possibility to transform the produced electric energy into hydrogen, in order to create a storage and be independent from the fluctuations of the energy source.

At present both firms are still searching funds for the prototype development, therefore only time will tell if these new alternatives will be viable or not."
 

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