One of the major hassles of wind energy is that is that all most of the turbines are only placed where there is a lot of wind & wind energy is not something that can be constantly harnessed. This is because we have been creating wind mills that have giant blades & expect enough wind to move them around. When there is not enough wind around then they are offered almost rendered useless. A simple solution for that would be to make wind mills that would run even with little wind around or should I say even if there is gentle breeze around.
The concept sounds simple but most of us, in fact none of us have really tried this before. But Lucien Gambarota & the Engineers at the University of Hong Kong have taken this very simple concept & made it in to a wonderful reality. They have designed windmills that are little plastic wheels that run with a wind that is as little as 2m/s. The scientists even claim that they can even spin around, at wind speeds as little as 1m/s.
They can nearly go spinning all around the year, 24 hours a day. While each one offers very little energy individually, they collectively provide with enough energy to be major contributors towards the wind energy share. The concept of many little turbines is similar to that of the one on wind roof a couple of days back. It looks really nice & innovative. I still say put then on trains that run so fast.
