What is Digg?Sponsored by FUNimation Enertainment
Rei's Hot. Watch 8 Minutes of the new Evangelion 1.01 Movie view!
funimation.com - Available Now on DVD. The rebuild of the ground breaking anime Neon Genesis Evangelion
46 Comments
- drmangrum, on 06/22/2009, -1/+9I've seen this in a documentary before, and it has some very large problems that make it completely unrealistic:
The tethers have to large enough to transfer the current...that's VERY heavy.
The tethers have to be strong enough to withstand the sheering forces at that height. EXTREMELY heavy.
The generators have to be able to withstand high winds, extreme cold, lightning strikes, etc.
It's a good idea on paper, not so much in practice. It's just cheaper to build a terrestrial system. - BDOUG, on 06/22/2009, -0/+6In response to the naysayers, there are lots of different designs for high altitude kites and power capturing mechanisms for same. Not just the one in the article. There's also the kite conveyor. There's another one that converts ground-level torque to energy. Perhaps none of the designs thus far are feasible, but that doesn't mean it's not still an idea worth pursuing.
Let's not turn engineering challenges into an excuse to just toss the whole thing out as a complete waste of time. Alternative energy is too important to put all our eggs into one basket and if folks are pursuing different projects around the globe that's a good thing. You naysayers are probably the descendents of the people who laughed at the Wright Brothers.
Solar, nuclear, wind, algae, etc, they all have issues. This is not a reason to give up, it's a reason to keep trying. It will probably take a combination of things in the end to lower our dependence on fossil fuels anyway. - pegothejerk, on 06/22/2009, -0/+6we already have lots of crap up there. planes.
- doctechnical, on 06/22/2009, -0/+6Kite Eating Trees all over the world thrash their limbs in anticipation.
"Good grief." - PhilliesBlunt, on 06/22/2009, -0/+3Flight lanes?
- inactive, on 06/22/2009, -0/+3The scariest part of the article is that even at these altitudes, the wind doesn't blow about 5% of the time. What happens to the kite?
- askantik, on 06/22/2009, -1/+4Am I the only one that heard about this like 2-3 years ago? And it never really got anywhere from there.
- gerrylazlo, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2It rapidly converts into a ground-based turbine.
- atlasdugged, on 06/22/2009, -2/+4Benjamin Franklin still impacting us today...
- itstodd, on 06/22/2009, -5/+7The author is more than miles high....
- TheUngod, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2Not to mention...what if it falls down?
- Jedidadof2, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2Did anyone notice the clicky on the right side??? "US Winds dying down, study suggests."
I found that amusing. - EvilNapkin, on 06/22/2009, -1/+3I don't think this is a good idea.
1. Those air currents move all the time (100's of miles)
2. Air Planes
3. high voltage wire running from the sky to the ground during a thunder storm = not a good idea - blapierre, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2"Cant we just work on making ***** efficient solar panels?"
You should get right on that. - unfilterthought, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2Two words. Carbon Nanotubes.
- trizzleatl, on 06/22/2009, -0/+2wind is strong.
- inactive, on 06/23/2009, -0/+1miles high strings could get caught up in engines.
- davidbrowne, on 06/26/2009, -0/+1Seems like there is a lot of nonsense in this article. How often do you hear that so many solar panels or wind turbines can power the whole world. I'm also unsure at how they calculated the wind power density per unit area. Per unit area of ground or rotor swept area? Either way it seems incorrect.
For the case of the 5% of the time wind not being present, if a large AC cable is being used to transmit power to earth, why not just do the reverse and send power back to keep the turbine in the air?
The best design I've seen for a 'floating turbine' is the Magenn ; http://www.magenn.com/ - plhofmei, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1"Their simulations hint that if carried to unlikely extremes, blanketing the entire planet with such devices would cool the Earth's surface, reduce precipitation and boost sea ice levels"
More energy, more ice caps. Two problems solved! - AsianVoodoo, on 06/23/2009, -0/+1haha I'd like to be miles-high right about now. And hell all the more reason to if I could power even a TV screen let alone a house or a city while doing. The ultimate in GREEN energy. lolz
- billricardi, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1Oh god... people, its ALREADY BEING DONE! Too late to nay-say.
http://www.ted.com/talks/saul_griffith_on_kites_as ...
We've had a bunch of Saul's talks on the front page, don't you know what the guy does for a living? - rif42, on 06/23/2009, -0/+1Please support real wind turbine projects and sky sail instead of this pie in the sky idea.
- diggydougie, on 06/22/2009, -2/+3It's done after the first plane hits a cable.
- billricardi, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1Except for this one:
http://www.ted.com/talks/saul_griffith_on_kites_as ...
Oh facts, how you suck the life out of a good rant. :( - blinky04, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1"The sky might literally be the limit for wind power"
You don't say... - drmangrum, on 06/22/2009, -2/+3You don't "harvest" wind. It doesn't cease to exist. Think of it like one of those old paddle wheel style turbines they use in mills. Using the force of the water in a river to power the mill didn't change it's course.
- gerrylazlo, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1Peanuts Blows.
- plhofmei, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1.
- pegothejerk, on 06/22/2009, -1/+2Not really. We already use very large kites to move large ships on the sea more efficiently.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7205217.stm - billricardi, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1Did you not watch the video?
Click the video. At 3:20 he shows the first positive production of power using the system. He even says WHERE it happened! They're generating kilowatts now, working on megawatt scale. Click the damned link. :P - davidbrowne, on 06/26/2009, -0/+1coincidently ran into this article; http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/06/highalti ... , which is where they seem to of plucked their power density figures from, without including the 'swept area' description
- bboyjkang, on 06/22/2009, -0/+1The 11 Most Interesting Wind Turbine Designs
http://gcaptain.com/maritime/blog/the-most-interes ...
check out the "Salsam Sky Serpant"
http://gcaptain.com/maritime/blog/wp-content/uploa ... - marwana, on 06/22/2009, -2/+2I don't think anyone is suggesting we abandon any and all plans for renewable energy. The problem with ideas like this is that they rarely if ever address the obvious problems that crop up. The weight of the kite and cable, the danger to jetliners, the fact that the wind isn't always present, these are all real issues and the idea would carry more credibility if the author had addressed them even in passing.
A variety of ideas is great, but hair-brained ideas that don't even pass the smell test is both a waste of time and opens the entire effort to ridicule. - gkiltz, on 06/24/2009, -0/+0Get it above the clouds and, once you overcome the resistance of any system that can get electricity to the ground, you have burned up all the electricity in plane old ohmic resistance!
- mickstephenson, on 06/22/2009, -2/+2Thats completely untrue, just to create a watermill you need to create a small dam and completely slow down the pace of the river and it could have a large effect on how the course of a river evolves after the installation of a water wheel. Also he is correct that on a large enough scale you could alter air currents as you are sapping energy from the air currents.
The law of conservation of energy doesn't just cease to exist in regards to large atmospheric systems.
Harvesting energy seems like a reasonable enough term in the context you're using it. Although a harvest implies a short period of collection and a long period of cultivation, so isn't really appropriate IMO. - inactive, on 06/22/2009, -2/+2Alternative energy? Go fly a kite.
- Guachapeli, on 06/22/2009, -0/+0The large and small wind turbines is already present in renewable energy. Good to know it works:
http://ecovivencias.blogspot.com/2007/11/video-de- ... - rif42, on 06/22/2009, -4/+3unpossible, it has to hold up its own weight and the weight of a 10 km power cable and additionally it has to generate power. This design is not gonna fly.
- cowsgonemadd3, on 06/22/2009, -2/+1Well they won't do it if they are just a idea. Just get out and start making them so we can get on with this green energy thing and save the environment!
- inactive, on 06/22/2009, -3/+2Yeah...what could go wrong with that plan.
Cant we just work on making ***** efficient solar panels? - LiquidIse, on 06/22/2009, -2/+1This idea is completely retarded. There is a reason engineering is based around EFFICIENT solutions, instead of trying to make miles of high density cables be supported by a 35,000ft high kite. I mean really, who takes this seriously?
- mrmudgeon, on 06/22/2009, -1/+0Where is this rig actually installed and generating power? Before you go around whacking "nay sayers" please answer that question.
- Bloodwine, on 06/22/2009, -2/+1What about airplanes? They didn't mention them as one of the issues with mile-high kites, but I would think that'd be an issue.
- mrmudgeon, on 06/22/2009, -1/+0There is no production or near production system like this today. This is a bit like solar power from space. It is simply too expensive to ever be effective as a power source. It is much cheaper to build out transmission capacity to places like the Dakotas than to do something that would be very hard to do.
It may seem fun to have big kites flying above New York, but what about the aircraft? - Pinkertinkle, on 06/22/2009, -4/+1Bew bew bew.
- ousthouse, on 06/22/2009, -7/+2I know NOTHING about weather, but it seems like harvesting wind would result in changes in the weather. Is this not true?
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is 