March 28, 2023
...AND CHEAPER...:
Sky-high kites aim to tap unused wind power (Tim Schauenberg, 03/27/2023, Deutsche-Welle)
At a height of 200 meters (656 feet) and more, winds tend to blow stronger and more steadily than those closer to the ground.These winds are so strong, in fact, that they could be used to generate more electricity than we need and significantly more than wind turbines on land can produce. A doubling of wind speed can theoretically generate up to eight times more power.Moritz Diehl, who heads the Department of Microsystems Engineering at the University of Freiburg, said harvesting high-altitude winds is one of the "most promising" technologies for generating renewable energy in the future."You see all the sky above conventional turbines, and you think all this wind energy is just blowing there and it's not used," he said.Stephan Wrage, CEO of the German wind power company SkySails-Power, wants to change that and make the "largest yet untapped source of renewable energy worldwide" suitable for mass use.
Posted by Orrin Judd at March 28, 2023 4:16 PM