Sustainable Offshore Wind Farms

Most of my sustainable projects relied on offshore wind farms. I got feedback that current technologies would not allow some of my ideas. Then, I came up with a sustainable offshore wind farm building platform. It relies on vertical wind turbines that are connected with each other in lattice structure. This design eliminates the need for wire tethers and complex floats and more.

The platform starts with the construction of aluminum refining and extrusion facilities on a shore with dedicated harbor. The proposed wind turbines will be constructed mainly with anodized aluminum. Even the electric generator wires will be out of aluminum. The objective of this is to minimize the number of exported materials to construct a wind turbine. Aluminum is abundant and its cost is mainly the cost of electricity. My proposition is to create a sustainable cycle in electric generation; use aluminum to build wind turbines, use generated electricity to manufacture more aluminum. The vertical wind farm would start from the harbor and extends towards the sea.

Offshore vertical wind turbines have their center of gravity in line with their main axis. This simplifies the design and allows a lattice of wind turbines to be constructed one after the other. Lattice would be constructed using hollow or filled aluminum rods. Each turbine tower would touch the seabed. Then they would be connected with each other just below the most ships’ waterline. I propose this underwater structure to form the neutral line for the electric grid of the wind farm. The phase of the electric grid would be carried by the curved rods connecting each turbine. Additionally, these rods will support the turbines from the top to increase the structural rigidity. Therefore, no need to lay expensive underwater power cables from the wind farm to the land. Aluminum structures double as support and electric connectors. This design requires transmission transformers on top of each turbine.

Simplified lattice construction can be automized using electrically operating robots to make the process even more sustainable.

Increased power generation on the shore would result in a larger harbor and more facilities. Raw materials imported would be shipped to this harbor and energy intense processing would be done on the shore facilities before being sent to the inner land for use.