The Ocean Waterfall Dam--Counter-Intuitive Reality
What if instead of building more dams on rivers and streams to generate electricity, we built a 10 mile long, 800ft deep 350ft wide, ultra-modified dam in the Atlantic ocean about 5 miles beyond the three mile limit off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia?
Picture the Grand Coulee Dam, which since 1941, helped to reshape the Northwest with cheap electricity, it generates 6.5 x 109 watts..=6500 megawatts..=6.5 million kilowatts. It is also the largest concrete structure ever built. US households use on average about 2 kilowatts of electricity, so the Grand Coulee Dam can power 3.25 million such homes.
Currently, approximately 11,200 TeraWatthrs/yr of primary energy is required to meet total U.S. electrical demand. An ocean waterfall dam could generate 1/3 to 2/3s of that requirement.
So let's design a steel and concrete structure along the same lines. Float it into place like an oil rig, attach power lines, connect them to a distribution hub in Norfolk.
This ocean Waterfall could provide hydropower for the entire East Coast to the Mississippi River. This form of hydropower would be continuous, cheap, green and, could potentially replace all or most carbon emitting forms of energy production which would ensure its profitability.
Surely, if we can send mammoth machines into space we can build and float mammoth structures in our oceans. Let's setaside about $5 billion for a three year effort and treat the project like a JFK challenge and instead of going to the moon we save our planet earth by using the most readily available source of energy we have.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Robbrian, 28 July 2007 11:16
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Robbrian,
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
At least enough funding should be provided to fully explore the possibility. However, this sort of thing comes into conflict with the ideology of free market and control of the source of energy by a private firm. What private company could actually finance this sort of thing and accept the possible risk involved?
Ideology tends to get in the way of a lot of things in this country...including possible solutions for major problems.
Retired Monk "Ideology is a disease"
Posts: 3412 | Location: denver co | Registered: 17 April 2007
The same questions were initially posed when JFK said let's fly to the moon.
Hell, if the planet is as endangered as most credible scientists say it is, ought there not be a set of priorities at the policy level to save it?
And, if a solution is viable someone's government should step forward to put that solution in play.
I'm sure the private sector could mount a series of small scale Ocean Waterfall Dams half the size of the Coulee Dam and with the latest deep water turbine technology generate an equivalent amount of power as the full scale dam, since there would be continuous flow, storage and usage.
What really, bothers me is that our government, as you suggest is so far up the fossil fuel fuselage it can see objectively into the future.
Moreover, the craven money miesters of the fossil fuel industry don't give a wit about the kind of world their grandchildren will inherit. It's the old greed game in spades. I got mine let them get theirs. Only theirs will be gas masks and underground tunnels and synthetic veggies.
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
A "put a man on the moon" consensus could certainly provide the impetus for the search for solutions...unless it steps on corporate toes and ideologies.
A man to the moon program stimulated private enterprise...kind of like military spending. It didn't compete with it.
A national effort is required than can gather enough momentum to overcome corporate objections. Do we do it before a crises point is reached, or afterwards? Ultimately, something has to be done. The question is, when?
Private industry might attempt a small-scale project if it had a government guarantee and support....and an assurance of a viable technology for it.
Retired Monk "Ideology is a disease"
Posts: 3412 | Location: denver co | Registered: 17 April 2007
Wave energy looks like a great element to what needs to be a diversified array of energy sources. Making those locally based would be better yet. Then less energy is lost in transport, and no one area of the US is vulnerable to sabotage or accident by doing damage to a few sources of energy. It's nice to know that so much renewable energy is available.
Hey Bamboo--I like that list--is it yours?
eley
"Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground"--Sweet Baby James
Posts: 1979 | Location: Texas | Registered: 21 August 2004
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Rob your kind of "thinking" will change humanity. Creativity is the most valuable asset of this century. I like your concept.
More than ever humanity needs: -An insatiably curious approach to life and an unrelenting quest for continuous learning.
-A commitment to test knowledge through experience, persistence, and a willingness to learn from mistakes.
-The continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to enliven experience.
-A willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
-The development of the balance between science and art, logic and imagination. "Whole-brain" thinking.
_The cultivation of grace, ambidexterity, fitness, and poise.
-A recognition of and appreciation for the interconnectness of all things and phenomena. Systems thinking.
Your concept reflects alot of these principals! So, where do you start?
_
quote:
Bamboo,
I'm not an engineer nor am I a draftsman, so I can't draw my idea for publication, but I can describe it in fundamental tech-speak.
So, what needs to be done to get started is to have an abstract with drawings so that it can be distributed by PDF to environmental sites, etc. just to see what kind of reaction there will be.
If there's an indication that a large scale project could be feasible then we'd have to go to key members on the relevant House and Senate environmental Committees, Environmental lobbyists, and others who would like to take on the Fossil Fuel Freaks.
I don't know anyone in the 'save the environment world.' I know a few engineers and will broach the subject with them. If you have any such contacts, I'm open to sharing.
Thanks for your encouragement. Who knows, maybe common sense will overrule those who chase the almighty "Bitch Goddess Called Dollar" and, agree to actually consider saving the Planet by harnessing the awesome power of our oceans in a gigantic way.
Robbrian
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
I wish, it's from Michael J. Gelbs' bookHow to Think like Leonardo da Vinci(Seven Steps to Genius Every Day).
A fun read from several years ago. When I read Robs post the book just popped into my mind...
I agree about wave energy. Imagine that billions of gallons of water consistently moving in a predictable cycle. It's like a global perpetual motion machine. We sure took advantage of it when I lived on the coast.(on an individual level), I found myself saying this quite often, "I really would have liked to have made it to work yesterday, but, like there was an incredible swell". When ya need to touch the source, nothing can keep you from it.
"The moon that I love clears a path through the pines And guides a stream right to the bamboo gate."Poems by Zen Master Hsu Yun: Series I
Posts: 795 | Location: western slope, northern sierra | Registered: 18 April 2003
.... maybe common sense will overrule those who chase the almighty "Bitch Goddess Called Dollar" and, agree to actually consider saving the Planet by harnessing the awesome power of our oceans in a gigantic way.
It will happen, I'm just not sure about the time frame involved here. I feel its most important to stay connected to individuals and methods that contribute to the development of free thinking, insight and wisdom. IMHO there will always be greed and ignorance. It's sad but true that in this world one can be as stupid, greedy and as ignorant as they choose. That IMHO will never change, we will never completely arrive.
Where there is perception there is deception. It is everyones responsibility to develop insight, to see things as they are. Insight and perception lead to wisdom. Somewhere, somehow I think you have achieved this. And you get those glimpses.
Don't get too angry over those who appear to have no common sense, it could contaminate what you have to offer, which seems to be their goal sometimes.
In one of Thoms books he speaks of the "hundredth monkey" concept. Groups of animals of the same species (not just humans) develop the same thoughts, ideas or traits around the same time even if they are separated or isolated from one another. I find that encouraging relative to those who seem to have that addiction (not to any specific substance) but to the concept of more.
You got me curious. I also have a number of structural engineer friends. No systems guys though. I'm going to start asking questions.
"The moon that I love clears a path through the pines And guides a stream right to the bamboo gate."Poems by Zen Master Hsu Yun: Series I
Posts: 795 | Location: western slope, northern sierra | Registered: 18 April 2003
I found myself saying this quite often, "I really would have liked to have made it to work yesterday, but, like there was an incredible swell". When ya need to touch the source, nothing can keep you from it.
------------------------------------------------
I saw that one of my sentences above didn't really make sense. I meant we need diversity of energy sources so that one large area is not set up to be very vulnerable to an attack or accidental damage to that source of energy.
Though Rob, I really applaud your ideas, and the ones regarding the use of recycled water in a personal water turbine have got me to thinking and considering that as a more reliable source of renewable energy than some others like wind and solar, each with limitations resulting from weather conditions. The personal systems or perhaps systems sized for small communities wouldn't pose a danger to wildlife in anyway as well--that I'm imagining at this time. Perhaps I should mention that on that particular thread.
a thread you might be interested in is the one in economics entitled Dam!
eley
"Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground"--Sweet Baby James
Posts: 1979 | Location: Texas | Registered: 21 August 2004
[QUOTE]I found myself saying this quite often, "I really would have liked to have made it to work yesterday, but, like there was an incredible swell". When ya need to touch the source, nothing can keep you from it.
quote:
Bamboo,
Thanks for the info on the Dam group. I posted my idea there and will see what happens.
Robbrian
------------------------------------------------
I saw that one of my sentences above didn't really make sense. I meant we need diversity of energy sources so that one large area is not set up to be very vulnerable to an attack or accidental damage to that source of energy.
Though Rob, I really applaud your ideas, and the ones regarding the use of recycled water in a personal water turbine have got me to thinking and considering that as a more reliable source of renewable energy than some others like wind and solar, each with limitations resulting from weather conditions. The personal systems or perhaps systems sized for small communities wouldn't pose a danger to wildlife in anyway as well--that I'm imagining at this time. Perhaps I should mention that on that particular thread.
a thread you might be interested in is the one in economics entitled Dam!
eley
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
There is no doubt that there are a large number of "non-fossil, non-nuclear resources which are amenable to the harvesting of clean energy. A large-undersea dam could be one of them. However, it would only supply energy to people who lived within, say 500 miles of the onshore receiving point. Furthermore, we will have to allocate a large amount of fosssil energy resources in order to get it built, which will be expensive and in short supply. Are you willing to curtail driving by 50% in order to get it built?
Another possibility is to harvest waste heat from industry (which we will still need in the short term) by building an Atmospheric Vortex Engine, links for which I have posted elsewhere on Thom's site, In addition to the energy in the atmosphere, it could also be used to simultaneously harvest the energy contained in low-temperature geothermal resources which are widespread throughout the west. Electricity is the main product useful for transportantion as well as domestic heating via heat pumps, or directly in some cases.
Posts: 7 | Location: Denver CO | Registered: 13 August 2007
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Rob your kind of "thinking" will change humanity. Creativity is the most valuable asset of this century. I like your concept.
More than ever humanity needs: -An insatiably curious approach to life and an unrelenting quest for continuous learning.
-A commitment to test knowledge through experience, persistence, and a willingness to learn from mistakes.
-The continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to enliven experience.
-A willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
-The development of the balance between science and art, logic and imagination. "Whole-brain" thinking.
_The cultivation of grace, ambidexterity, fitness, and poise.
-A recognition of and appreciation for the interconnectness of all things and phenomena. Systems thinking.
Your concept reflects alot of these principals! So, where do you start?
_
Here's an estimate of what is potentially possible with just 1% of the oceans energy.
Wave Energy Potential on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf¹
The total annual average wave energy off the U.S. coastlines (including Alaska and Hawaii), calculated at a water depth of 60 m has been estimated (Bedard et al. 2005) at 2,100 Terawatt-hours (TWh) (2,100--10 to the twelth Wh).2
Estimates of the worldwide economically recoverable wave energy resource are in the range of 140 to 750 TWh/yr for existing wave-capturing technologies that have become fully mature (ETNWG 2003). With projected long-term technical improvements, this could be increased by a factor of 2 to 3 (Thorpe 1999). The fraction of the total wave power that is economically recoverable in U.S. offshore regions has not been estimated, but is significant even if only a small fraction of the 2,100 TWh/yr available is captured.
(Currently, approximately 11,200 TWh/yr of primary energy is required to meet total U.S. electrical demand.) WEC devices have the greatest potential for applications at islands such as Hawaii because of the combination of the relatively high ratio of available shoreline per unit energy requirement, availability of greater unit wave energies due to trade winds, and the relatively high costs of other local energy sources.
(Just think if we could harness the ocean in the form of a series of waterfall stations where water is either lifted into a catch basin and flows into penstocks, or arrives at the funnel as would a natural waterfall and then into the penstocks with their turbines, we could eliminate carbon dioxide emission almost overnight. Just a little imagination and a great deal of courage could get us there before we begin mass production of oxygen and gas masks.)
_______________________________ 1. Technology White Paper on Wave Energy Potential on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf, Minerals Management Service, Renewable Energy and Alternate Use Program, U.S. Department of the Interior 2. This estimate was made at a specified water depth of 60 m (irrespective of the distance from the shore at which that depth occurs) in order to allow comparisons of wave energies between coastal areas and to eliminate the possible, but unpredictable loss of energy of the wave through its interactions with the sea bottom (scouring) at shallower depths. Typical wave energy in U.S. offshore regions ranges from 2 to 6 kW/m in the mid-Atlantic, 12 to 22 kW/m in regions such as Hawaii with trade winds, and 36 to 72 kW/m in northwestern U.S. coastal areas near Washington and Oregon.
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
Originally posted by Robbrian: The Ocean Waterfall Dam--Counter-Intuitive Reality
What if instead of building more dams on rivers and streams to generate electricity, we built a 10 mile long, 800ft deep 350ft wide, ultra-modified dam in the Atlantic ocean about 5 miles beyond the three mile limit off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia?
Picture the Grand Coulee Dam, which since 1941, helped to reshape the Northwest with cheap electricity, it generates 6.5 x 109 watts..=6500 megawatts..=6.5 million kilowatts. It is also the largest concrete structure ever built. US households use on average about 2 kilowatts of electricity, so the Grand Coulee Dam can power 3.25 million such homes.
Currently, approximately 11,200 TeraWatthrs/yr of primary energy is required to meet total U.S. electrical demand. An ocean waterfall dam could generate 1/3 to 2/3s of that requirement.
So let's design a steel and concrete structure along the same lines. Float it into place like an oil rig, attach power lines, connect them to a distribution hub in Norfolk.
This ocean Waterfall could provide hydropower for the entire East Coast to the Mississippi River. This form of hydropower would be continuous, cheap, green and, could potentially replace all or most carbon emitting forms of energy production which would ensure its profitability.
Surely, if we can send mammoth machines into space we can build and float mammoth structures in our oceans. Let's setaside about $5 billion for a three year effort and treat the project like a JFK challenge and instead of going to the moon we save our planet earth by using the most readily available source of energy we have.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Robbrian, 28 July 2007 11:16
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
After a few searches I found this amazing information that has for all intents and purposes been supresszed/ignored/marginalized by the USG and the media. It stasggers the mind to think that we have a solution in hand that could be deployed immediately to eliminate carbon dioxide emmissions and generate clean , renewable energy for pennies per kilowatt hour.
If we use just abit of immagination we could develop something along the following.
The ownership of the turbines would clearly rest with the private sector. An enormous existing distribution system would need to be augmented to replace coal fired, nuclear, and gas systems, and to accommodate new connections due to normal economic growth.
These distribution systems would be organized in a way that allows existing fossil fuel providers partnership ownership to offset part of their short and long term decline in profits. (Excessive profits at that).
Under this system their would only be normal profits for those who owned and controlled the turbine farms. Similarly, the distribution system partnerships would operate not as monopolies or oligopolies but as regulated entities eschewing the organizational structures which have led to current monopoly pricing of fossil fuels brought about by deliberate constraints on supply.
The Gorlov Turbine has proven to be the most efficient turbine to-date. What needs to be done now is to ensure that all environmental concernes can be accommodated without significantly reducing the efficiency of the turbine.
There needs to be an awakening of the environmentl community to press for not just demonstration projects but actual deployment in the waters of oceans bounding the U.S. Already operational sites are being built in S. Korea.
Are the we not as wise as the S. Koreans?
Robbrian speaks
Published on Thursday, May 17, 2001 in the Christian Science Monitor There's power in here... and we don't have to drill for it. New Turbine Can Extract Energy from Flowing Water by Sara Steindorf and Tom Regan
Water comprises 70 percent of the earth's surface and contains enormous potential as a source of energy in the future. The Amazon River alone, which transports more water than any other, could generate enough electricity to power all the towns and villages along its shore. The same is true of other great rivers around the world. So why aren't we tapping more from water's pulse?
That's the aim of Alexander Gorlov, a professor of mechanical engineering at Northeastern University in Boston, who is trying to launch an idea that would harness the power of currents and tides. If his deceptively simple-looking prototype - a barrel-shaped 36-by-40-inch turbine - can successfully transform the awesome forces of oceans, rivers, and bays into electricity, it could radically change hydropower. And thus, it could potentially solve the world's energy problems, says the optimistic Dr. Gorlov.
TESTING A TURBINE: Alexander Gorlov’s helical turbine gets a test run in the tidal currents of Cape Cod Canal in 1997. PHOTO COURTESY OF ALEXANDER GORLOV
Today's forms of hydropower account for much of the 7 percent of world electrical output not generated by fossil fuels. Although hydropower is a clean and unlimited source of energy, it often comes at a high price. It is currently dominated by models that require huge, expensive dams - which can displace people, flood vast areas, and wipe out fish populations that need open rivers to spawn. In fact, it was Gorlov's experience with the Aswan Dam in Egypt, which he helped design and construct, that convinced him that these large-scale projects were not the best answer to hydropower generation.
Holding back further use of hydropower has been the lack of an efficient, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly device to extract energy from water - not to mention the competitively low costs of coal and oil. But the current energy crisis - with rolling blackouts in California and rising fuel prices - might be enough to boost America's appetite for renewable energy. And, Gorlov hopes, for his turbine.
Gorlov's helical turbine is based on the so-called Darrieus turbine, developed for windmills in the 1930s. The original never proved practical. The design, with its straight airfoil blades, was efficient but unstable, tending to break easily because of extreme vibrations. When Gorlov tested it in flowing water, however, he found it worked better than any other turbine, although it still had vibration problems.
After laboratory testing, he found that twisting the blades into the shape of a helix, like a molecule of DNA, would solve the problem. In flowing water, the Gorlov turbine captures 35 percent of the water's energy, compared with 23 percent for a straight Darrieus turbine and 20 percent for a conventional turbine.
That may not seem like a huge improvement, but "in this business it's a lot, because [the turbines] operate all the time, and after a while, the advantages really build up," says Jim Sysko, resident engineer at Gould Academy, and owner of Small Hydro East, in Bethel, Maine. And unlike other turbines, Gorlov's device works well regardless of the direction of water flow, making it practical in tidal flows as well as rivers.
In a tidal pool in Vinalhaven, Maine, Mr. Sysko is currently testing Gorlov's turbine which is expected to pump 5 kilowatts of energy into the Maine grid starting this fall. That's not much, but it will be enough to power the 14-bedroom motel directly above it. If the prototype proves successful, Sysko plans to install more turbines along the Maine coast.
Another test installation is now in operation in a remote area of the Amazon River in Brazil. There, local residents, who are far from the nearest power lines, use the turbines to recharge dozens of car batteries to run their television sets.
Gorlov also envisions huge underwater "power farms" that could create electricity from hundreds or even thousands of the devices linked to each other in a grid, which is anchored under water.
In full production, the cost of an installed open-river hydropower system of his turbines, Gorlov says, should be $400 to $600 per kilowatt - less than the cost of constructing other power-generation systems. And that's before operating costs of fossil-fuel plants are taken into account.
But Gorlov's turbines have other advantages, proponents say: When they generate electricity, you can't see them, you can't hear them, and they're virtually disruption-free.
"A Gorlov turbine could be airlifted into a remote community which is located near a river," says Peter Roudebush, a multi-system consultant in Boston. "If you put the turbine in the river, it gives the community the chance to generate enough power to meet many of its current needs, as well as generate more power to increase income."
GORLOV: The engineering professor’s invention is clean and quiet, he says. JOHN NORDELL - CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR STAFF
"Because this is a product that will be used in remote locations, it's extremely important that it ... be reliable," says Ed Kurth of Texas-based GCK Technology, a renewable-energy firm that secured worldwide rights to the patents from Northeastern University in February. "The design we'll have for mass production will be aluminum. And we plan to have a design that can be put together with common tools, so you can install it in remote locations."
But Joseph Ignazio, president of Helical Turbine of Massachusetts, in Cambridge, who was the first to officially test Gorlov's turbine, in 1996 in the Cape Cod Canal, foresees several challenges.
The first is storage. While the turbine can be hooked up to an electric grid, the energy that doesn't get immediately used is wasted. And unlike a gallon of gasoline, for example, there's no way to harness the energy for later use.
Adding to this storage problem is the way nature itself works. This issue was raised by Livingston Taylor, a visiting fellow at Harvard University, during a recent conference at Northeastern about the Gorlov turbine.
"Right now the Mississippi River is running very strong," Mr. Taylor told the conference. "But how many people here have seen it in September, when ... the current has slowed to almost nothing. What happens in that situation to something like the Gorlov turbine?"
Gorlov's long-term solution is to use the turbines to break down seawater into hydrogen and oxygen through electrolysis, storing hydrogen in pressurized vessels offshore. The stored hydrogen could then run through a generator to make electricity - just as a gasoline or diesel generator would.
While the technology for producing hydrogen through electrolysis exists, it is far from a system that could produce hydrogen on a large scale.
"I think it's a fantastic idea," says Sysko. "But even if there was a crash program, it would probably take us at least 10 years to get there."
Mr. Roudebush says the storage problem can be easily solved, however, if one looks at what he considers the real problem of the energy crisis: the way the electric grid works.
"Right now, the big thing about energy is there's a difference between what is generated in one place and what is demanded in another, and the grid is what transfers that energy," he says. "When a power-generating plant makes too much energy for the demand, a whole lot of it leaks out in terms of heat in transformers and all kinds of things. When there's too great a demand, people get brownouts.
"There's no reason why the grid can't be provided with these decentralized generators, like the one Jim Sysko is using in Maine. There could be millions of them powering the system, reducing the demand for more natural gas and fossil fuels, which is the whole issue," he says.
Another problem, Mr. Ignazio says, is funding. Renewable-energy development has always played second fiddle to oil, coal, and nuclear energy. And last month, President Bush proposed cutting the national budget for renewable-energy research by a third.
"We need federal subsidization," says Ignazio. "With the airplane industry, if it weren't for the federal subsidies, we'd never be able to fly like we fly today."
Yet despite problems like storage and funding, interest in Gorlov's invention continues to grow. The South Korean government recently asked Gorlov to design an arrangement of turbines for the narrow Uldolmok channel that separates the peninsula from an island. Gorlov came up with a system that could produce more than 80 megawatts - enough to power 80,000 houses - without disrupting the channel's extensive shipping. Representatives of the government met with Gorlov last month to review the plans, which they expect to include in next year's national budget. "A big plus to the turbine is that it doesn't need a dam," Ignazio says.
"There are 55,000 sluiceways [artificial channels into which water is let by a sluice] in the US where these turbines could be put to use now," says Roudebush. "Remember, we've got this concentrated version of energy that just flows by us every day. Nature doesn't waste anything."
Copyright 2001 The Christian Science Monitor
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Rob your kind of "thinking" will change humanity. Creativity is the most valuable asset of this century. I like your concept.
More than ever humanity needs: -An insatiably curious approach to life and an unrelenting quest for continuous learning.
-A commitment to test knowledge through experience, persistence, and a willingness to learn from mistakes.
-The continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to enliven experience.
-A willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
-The development of the balance between science and art, logic and imagination. "Whole-brain" thinking.
_The cultivation of grace, ambidexterity, fitness, and poise.
-A recognition of and appreciation for the interconnectness of all things and phenomena. Systems thinking.
Your concept reflects alot of these principals! So, where do you start?
_
After a few searches I found this amazing information that has for all intents and purposes been supresszed/ignored/marginalized by the USG and the media. It stasggers the mind to think that we have a solution in hand that could be deployed immediately to eliminate carbon dioxide emmissions and generate clean , renewable energy for pennies per kilowatt hour.
If we use just abit of immagination we could develop something along the following.
The ownership of the turbines would clearly rest with the private sector. An enormous existing distribution system would need to be augmented to replace coal fired, nuclear, and gas systems, and to accommodate new connections due to normal economic growth.
These distribution systems would be organized in a way that allows existing fossil fuel providers partnership ownership to offset part of their short and long term decline in profits. (Excessive profits at that).
Under this system their would only be normal profits for those who owned and controlled the turbine farms. Similarly, the distribution system partnerships would operate not as monopolies or oligopolies but as regulated entities eschewing the organizational structures which have led to current monopoly pricing of fossil fuels brought about by deliberate constraints on supply.
The Gorlov Turbine has proven to be the most efficient turbine to-date. What needs to be done now is to ensure that all environmental concernes can be accommodated without significantly reducing the efficiency of the turbine.
There needs to be an awakening of the environmentl community to press for not just demonstration projects but actual deployment in the waters of oceans bounding the U.S. Already operational sites are being built in S. Korea.
Are the we not as wise as the S. Koreans?
Robbrian speaks
Published on Thursday, May 17, 2001 in the Christian Science Monitor There's power in here... and we don't have to drill for it. New Turbine Can Extract Energy from Flowing Water by Sara Steindorf and Tom Regan
Water comprises 70 percent of the earth's surface and contains enormous potential as a source of energy in the future. The Amazon River alone, which transports more water than any other, could generate enough electricity to power all the towns and villages along its shore. The same is true of other great rivers around the world. So why aren't we tapping more from water's pulse?
That's the aim of Alexander Gorlov, a professor of mechanical engineering at Northeastern University in Boston, who is trying to launch an idea that would harness the power of currents and tides. If his deceptively simple-looking prototype - a barrel-shaped 36-by-40-inch turbine - can successfully transform the awesome forces of oceans, rivers, and bays into electricity, it could radically change hydropower. And thus, it could potentially solve the world's energy problems, says the optimistic Dr. Gorlov.
TESTING A TURBINE: Alexander Gorlov’s helical turbine gets a test run in the tidal currents of Cape Cod Canal in 1997. PHOTO COURTESY OF ALEXANDER GORLOV
Today's forms of hydropower account for much of the 7 percent of world electrical output not generated by fossil fuels. Although hydropower is a clean and unlimited source of energy, it often comes at a high price. It is currently dominated by models that require huge, expensive dams - which can displace people, flood vast areas, and wipe out fish populations that need open rivers to spawn. In fact, it was Gorlov's experience with the Aswan Dam in Egypt, which he helped design and construct, that convinced him that these large-scale projects were not the best answer to hydropower generation.
Holding back further use of hydropower has been the lack of an efficient, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly device to extract energy from water - not to mention the competitively low costs of coal and oil. But the current energy crisis - with rolling blackouts in California and rising fuel prices - might be enough to boost America's appetite for renewable energy. And, Gorlov hopes, for his turbine.
Gorlov's helical turbine is based on the so-called Darrieus turbine, developed for windmills in the 1930s. The original never proved practical. The design, with its straight airfoil blades, was efficient but unstable, tending to break easily because of extreme vibrations. When Gorlov tested it in flowing water, however, he found it worked better than any other turbine, although it still had vibration problems.
After laboratory testing, he found that twisting the blades into the shape of a helix, like a molecule of DNA, would solve the problem. In flowing water, the Gorlov turbine captures 35 percent of the water's energy, compared with 23 percent for a straight Darrieus turbine and 20 percent for a conventional turbine.
That may not seem like a huge improvement, but "in this business it's a lot, because [the turbines] operate all the time, and after a while, the advantages really build up," says Jim Sysko, resident engineer at Gould Academy, and owner of Small Hydro East, in Bethel, Maine. And unlike other turbines, Gorlov's device works well regardless of the direction of water flow, making it practical in tidal flows as well as rivers.
In a tidal pool in Vinalhaven, Maine, Mr. Sysko is currently testing Gorlov's turbine which is expected to pump 5 kilowatts of energy into the Maine grid starting this fall. That's not much, but it will be enough to power the 14-bedroom motel directly above it. If the prototype proves successful, Sysko plans to install more turbines along the Maine coast.
Another test installation is now in operation in a remote area of the Amazon River in Brazil. There, local residents, who are far from the nearest power lines, use the turbines to recharge dozens of car batteries to run their television sets.
Gorlov also envisions huge underwater "power farms" that could create electricity from hundreds or even thousands of the devices linked to each other in a grid, which is anchored under water.
In full production, the cost of an installed open-river hydropower system of his turbines, Gorlov says, should be $400 to $600 per kilowatt - less than the cost of constructing other power-generation systems. And that's before operating costs of fossil-fuel plants are taken into account.
But Gorlov's turbines have other advantages, proponents say: When they generate electricity, you can't see them, you can't hear them, and they're virtually disruption-free.
"A Gorlov turbine could be airlifted into a remote community which is located near a river," says Peter Roudebush, a multi-system consultant in Boston. "If you put the turbine in the river, it gives the community the chance to generate enough power to meet many of its current needs, as well as generate more power to increase income."
GORLOV: The engineering professor’s invention is clean and quiet, he says. JOHN NORDELL - CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR STAFF
"Because this is a product that will be used in remote locations, it's extremely important that it ... be reliable," says Ed Kurth of Texas-based GCK Technology, a renewable-energy firm that secured worldwide rights to the patents from Northeastern University in February. "The design we'll have for mass production will be aluminum. And we plan to have a design that can be put together with common tools, so you can install it in remote locations."
But Joseph Ignazio, president of Helical Turbine of Massachusetts, in Cambridge, who was the first to officially test Gorlov's turbine, in 1996 in the Cape Cod Canal, foresees several challenges.
The first is storage. While the turbine can be hooked up to an electric grid, the energy that doesn't get immediately used is wasted. And unlike a gallon of gasoline, for example, there's no way to harness the energy for later use.
Adding to this storage problem is the way nature itself works. This issue was raised by Livingston Taylor, a visiting fellow at Harvard University, during a recent conference at Northeastern about the Gorlov turbine.
"Right now the Mississippi River is running very strong," Mr. Taylor told the conference. "But how many people here have seen it in September, when ... the current has slowed to almost nothing. What happens in that situation to something like the Gorlov turbine?"
Gorlov's long-term solution is to use the turbines to break down seawater into hydrogen and oxygen through electrolysis, storing hydrogen in pressurized vessels offshore. The stored hydrogen could then run through a generator to make electricity - just as a gasoline or diesel generator would.
While the technology for producing hydrogen through electrolysis exists, it is far from a system that could produce hydrogen on a large scale.
"I think it's a fantastic idea," says Sysko. "But even if there was a crash program, it would probably take us at least 10 years to get there."
Mr. Roudebush says the storage problem can be easily solved, however, if one looks at what he considers the real problem of the energy crisis: the way the electric grid works.
"Right now, the big thing about energy is there's a difference between what is generated in one place and what is demanded in another, and the grid is what transfers that energy," he says. "When a power-generating plant makes too much energy for the demand, a whole lot of it leaks out in terms of heat in transformers and all kinds of things. When there's too great a demand, people get brownouts.
"There's no reason why the grid can't be provided with these decentralized generators, like the one Jim Sysko is using in Maine. There could be millions of them powering the system, reducing the demand for more natural gas and fossil fuels, which is the whole issue," he says.
Another problem, Mr. Ignazio says, is funding. Renewable-energy development has always played second fiddle to oil, coal, and nuclear energy. And last month, President Bush proposed cutting the national budget for renewable-energy research by a third.
"We need federal subsidization," says Ignazio. "With the airplane industry, if it weren't for the federal subsidies, we'd never be able to fly like we fly today."
Yet despite problems like storage and funding, interest in Gorlov's invention continues to grow. The South Korean government recently asked Gorlov to design an arrangement of turbines for the narrow Uldolmok channel that separates the peninsula from an island. Gorlov came up with a system that could produce more than 80 megawatts - enough to power 80,000 houses - without disrupting the channel's extensive shipping. Representatives of the government met with Gorlov last month to review the plans, which they expect to include in next year's national budget. "A big plus to the turbine is that it doesn't need a dam," Ignazio says.
"There are 55,000 sluiceways [artificial channels into which water is let by a sluice] in the US where these turbines could be put to use now," says Roudebush. "Remember, we've got this concentrated version of energy that just flows by us every day. Nature doesn't waste anything."
Copyright 2001 The Christian Science Monitor
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
In the absence of freedom there is no active creativity, in the absence of creativity there is no progress.
Posts: 23 | Location: Arlington, Va | Registered: 25 July 2007
After a few searches I found this amazing information that has for all intents and purposes been supresszed/ignored/marginalized by the USG and the media. It stasggers the mind to think that we have a solution in hand that could be deployed immediately to eliminate carbon dioxide emmissions and generate clean , renewable energy for pennies per kilowatt hour.
If we use just abit of immagination we could develop something along the following.
The ownership of the turbines would clearly rest with the private sector. An enormous existing distribution system would need to be augmented to replace coal fired, nuclear, and gas systems, and to accommodate new connections due to normal economic growth.
These distribution systems would be organized in a way that allows existing fossil fuel providers partnership ownership to offset part of their short and long term decline in profits. (Excessive profits at that).
Under this system their would only be normal profits for those who owned and controlled the turbine farms. Similarly, the distribution system partnerships would operate not as monopolies or oligopolies but as regulated entities eschewing the organizational structures which have led to current monopoly pricing of fossil fuels brought about by deliberate constraints on supply.
The Gorlov Turbine has proven to be the most efficient turbine to-date. What needs to be done now is to ensure that all environmental concernes can be accommodated without significantly reducing the efficiency of the turbine.
There needs to be an awakening of the environmentl community to press for not just demonstration projects but actual deployment in the waters of oceans bounding the U.S. Already operational sites are being built in S. Korea.
Are the we not as wise as the S. Koreans?
Robbrian speaks
Published on Thursday, May 17, 2001 in the Christian Science Monitor There's power in here... and we don't have to drill for it. New Turbine Can Extract Energy from Flowing Water by Sara Steindorf and Tom Regan
Water comprises 70 percent of the earth's surface and contains enormous potential as a source of energy in the future. The Amazon River alone, which transports more water than any other, could generate enough electricity to power all the towns and villages along its shore. The same is true of other great rivers around the world. So why aren't we tapping more from water's pulse?
That's the aim of Alexander Gorlov, a professor of mechanical engineering at Northeastern University in Boston, who is trying to launch an idea that would harness the power of currents and tides. If his deceptively simple-looking prototype - a barrel-shaped 36-by-40-inch turbine - can successfully transform the awesome forces of oceans, rivers, and bays into electricity, it could radically change hydropower. And thus, it could potentially solve the world's energy problems, says the optimistic Dr. Gorlov.
TESTING A TURBINE: Alexander Gorlov’s helical turbine gets a test run in the tidal currents of Cape Cod Canal in 1997. PHOTO COURTESY OF ALEXANDER GORLOV
Today's forms of hydropower account for much of the 7 percent of world electrical output not generated by fossil fuels. Although hydropower is a clean and unlimited source of energy, it often comes at a high price. It is currently dominated by models that require huge, expensive dams - which can displace people, flood vast areas, and wipe out fish populations that need open rivers to spawn. In fact, it was Gorlov's experience with the Aswan Dam in Egypt, which he helped design and construct, that convinced him that these large-scale projects were not the best answer to hydropower generation.
Holding back further use of hydropower has been the lack of an efficient, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly device to extract energy from water - not to mention the competitively low costs of coal and oil. But the current energy crisis - with rolling blackouts in California and rising fuel prices - might be enough to boost America's appetite for renewable energy. And, Gorlov hopes, for his turbine.
Gorlov's helical turbine is based on the so-called Darrieus turbine, developed for windmills in the 1930s. The original never proved practical. The design, with its straight airfoil blades, was efficient but unstable, tending to break easily because of extreme vibrations. When Gorlov tested it in flowing water, however, he found it worked better than any other turbine, although it still had vibration problems.
After laboratory testing, he found that twisting the blades into the shape of a helix, like a molecule of DNA, would solve the problem. In flowing water, the Gorlov turbine captures 35 percent of the water's energy, compared with 23 percent for a straight Darrieus turbine and 20 percent for a conventional turbine.
That may not seem like a huge improvement, but "in this business it's a lot, because [the turbines] operate all the time, and after a while, the advantages really build up," says Jim Sysko, resident engineer at Gould Academy, and owner of Small Hydro East, in Bethel, Maine. And unlike other turbines, Gorlov's device works well regardless of the direction of water flow, making it practical in tidal flows as well as rivers.
In a tidal pool in Vinalhaven, Maine, Mr. Sysko is currently testing Gorlov's turbine which is expected to pump 5 kilowatts of energy into the Maine grid starting this fall. That's not much, but it will be enough to power the 14-bedroom motel directly above it. If the prototype proves successful, Sysko plans to install more turbines along the Maine coast.
Another test installation is now in operation in a remote area of the Amazon River in Brazil. There, local residents, who are far from the nearest power lines, use the turbines to recharge dozens of car batteries to run their television sets.
Gorlov also envisions huge underwater "power farms" that could create electricity from hundreds or even thousands of the devices linked to each other in a grid, which is anchored under water.
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When ya need to touch the source, nothing can keep you from it. 