Offshore wind farms have great potential to generate electric. However, traditional horizontal wind turbines are difficult to scale and install on deep water. I would like to propose a scalable design to harvest maximum energy from the offshore wind.
The idea is to build a wall of wind concentrators. Carbon fiber fabric would be ideal to concentrate the wind. These fabrics will be attached to curved poles in sections. There will be two opposing poles to strengthen the poles to form a circular shape. This will also allow two directional wind concentration; sea to land and land to sea winds.
The electric generators with optimal blades will be placed parallel to the sea surface. The upper altitude wind will be concentrated towards the ground to allow such design. Additionally, this will allow easy installation and serviceability.
The poles will only need to withstand the wind and they will not need to carry heavy weight like the towers of horizontal wind turbines. The light weight carbon fiber fabric will be tighten or loosened by carbon nanotube cables. If the wind speed is too high the cables will be loosened to lower the stress on the poles. The fabrics will be in sections which will allow dynamic wind concentration. If the wind is strong, only lower sections will be tightened and upper sections will flow freely. This dynamic concentration ability will allow almost constant wind speed on the electric generators. Hence almost constant electric generation.
This much simpler design can be scaled up easily and reach much higher heights to harvest more wind energy. Additionally, they can be extended side by side to form a kind of wall to minimize the area occupied on the sea. Finally, this wall would reduce the wind speed hitting the land during hurricane times. Hence reducing the natural disaster damage on the cost.
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