New Mars Forums

Official discussion forum of The Mars Society and MarsNews.com

You are not logged in.

Announcement

Announcement: This forum is accepting new registrations by emailing newmarsmember * gmail.com become a registered member. Read the Recruiting expertise for NewMars Forum topic in Meta New Mars for other information for this process.

#1 2024-10-14 18:58:19

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

I may have provided some of this before, I don't quite remember.

I am old enough to have another stroke, my last one was very minor, no permanent damage.
I could go senile sometime as well, so, as I don't believe that I could carry this to a business or patent, I had need get the notions across, just in case they may have value.

Last time I tried go get a patent, I had an episode, where I did hear voices and some were really not good and some were scarry as to be God like.

A bunch of demonic voices chanting "Christianity is stupid, domination is good.  Give up!".
But that nightmare ended, as if I were pulled out of cold water.  And then the ones who make you feel like a bunny rabbit.  They are not bad, it is just that it is very hard to be in their presence as to be so inferior.  I was asked "What is the measure of man?".  And one said, "He is superstitious, but I like him".  The last thing I remember is one that said to me "You have been given something.  Better use it".

So, of course here I am trying to use it, as apparently, I had better.

(My experience made me understand that there is a whole reality we are not aware of.  (Normally, thank God).

So, to maintain my sanity, I cannot take on heavy stress tasks.

I am only going to do a little tonight.

Windmills already have deicing options where needed.

There could be many variations on this.

One would be to run expanding air though windmill blades and to have exits at the ends of the blades that may actually help the blade assembly spin.  The air could come from a Compressed or Liquid Air Battery.

In this version I guess the air flow could help generate electricity from the windmill, as the windmill blades would be heat exchangers and so the air introduced would expand drawing heat though the blades from the outside air, presuming it was warm.

However the main intention for this is to condense water from the air onto the windmill blades.

Lets suppose a location where much energy is from solar and perhaps some wind during the day.  Now then use a heat pump to push cold air though the windmill blades, and take the heat from the air to heat up a reservoir of water.  Also compress air into a Compressed or Liquid Air battery.

At night when the dew point drops more yet, then run the cold air from the air battery though the windmill blades to condense water on the blades.  Of course, not to the point of ice.

The water on the blades will be subject to gravitation and centrifugal force.

So, it should flow off the blades on the down stroke of a blade.

And the water to perhaps water a garden or be collected with some container.

More complex would be a cup on the end of each blade and a method to squirt the condensed water at a certain point in rotation into a "Bucket".

----------------------------------------------------------
An inverse game would be to squirt some water on the blades for evaporation and draw cooled air from openings at the end of the blades, and so to the hub.

------------------------------

That is enough for tonight.

I actually see this as perhaps a tool also used outside of areas where windmills are currently valued, as the heat exchange capability has a value of it's own.

Ending Pending smile

Last edited by Void (2024-10-14 19:20:14)


End smile

Offline

#2 2024-10-14 23:50:35

Calliban
Member
From: Northern England, UK
Registered: 2019-08-18
Posts: 3,777

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

Void, I'm sorry to hear about your health problems.  I hope you feel better soon.

The idea of using wind turbine blades as the heat source for a heat pump is an interesting one.  The speed of blades as they pass through the air will have a thinning effect on the thermal boundary layer on the leading edge of the blades.  This will improve convective heat transfer coefficient, allowing the blades to absorb more energy from the passing air.  So this idea has some strengths.  One potential issue is that air temperatures decline with height and the wind is often strongest when the air is coldest (i.e during winter).  But it could work.

A similar idea is to use wind turbine shaft power to run a heat pump, whether air source or ground source.  Heat is much easier to store than electricity.  So using the wind to provide heat is an application that is more compatible with the intermittent nature of wind energy.


"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."

Offline

#3 2024-10-15 07:36:47

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

Yes potentials exist, but to make windmill blades "Vascular" will be tricky.

The version I have the most confidence in is to vent cold air though the blades from the hub area though the blades and to have a horizontal exit as a jet of air that assists in the spin of the blades.  This then would be an air motor of a sort.

But the main purpose would be to chill the blades to the condensation point of water in the air.  This would work best in humid conditions of course.

But if you had 25% Relative Humidity and dropped the surface temperature by 40 degrees Fahrenheit, so 80 down to 40 degrees Fahrenheit.  Every 20 degree drop in Fahrenheit doubles the RH%.

So 20/9 = 2.22.  Then 2.22 * 5 = 11.11 degrees C drop needed to double the RH%.

So then 20.11 degrees C to replace my 40 degrees F number to push the RH% to 100%.

My mind does not store the C value but rather the F value so i have to convert.

So, the point is a windmill/windmotor, would not necessarily have to be built in an area with excellent wind.  It may be built as a device that can pull water from the air, as its economic justification.  If it can then generate some wind power as well, then that if a plus.

Here is a very nice resource: https://globalwindatlas.info/en/

So, the idea I have is for some situations, a location may have lots of sunlight during the day say Southern California.
During the day, you may tap some of that energy to run a heat pump and push heat into a hot reservoir and may push cold air through the blades.  You may also compress and perhaps liquify air.  That could be a source of heat for the heat pump.

Then at night when you want to tap the compressed or liquified air you may use it to turn a turbine, or you may push it though the windmill blades.  Although it is not likely to be efficient, you might actually use the jets on the ends of the blades as an air motor to spin the windmill and so then generate electricity.

Nighttime is when the air tends to cool off anyway so the RH% rises.

This is all complex, but then so is Starship.  Our technology improved, we might be able to tap this.

For you in the North Sea, water would only be valuable if you could ship it to Spain, Portugal and maybe Morocco.

This method might work for Cities like New York to get water.

If L.A. could be weaned off of the Colorado river water, then that water could be piped deeper into the Great Basin.  In fact I think it might be possible in many locations to pull water from the air near the sea or on continental shelfs, and to ship the water by pipeline inland.

Australia, could do something like that.

One thing I have my eye on is the Caspian Sea Basin and also the North American Great Basin.

Placing increased water into these basins would improve fertility and habitability, but likely would have the penalty of earthquakes.

But for instance it might be possible that the Caspian Sea depression could be filled with excess water from the global ocean.  This would cost the locals, but it could also benefit them.  They would have to come up with a plan.

The scale of that notion is enormous, and perhaps ridiculous.  But still, if the North Sea could supply lots of fresh water to the Caspian Sea Basin, then the flooding of costal cities worldwide would be averted which is a thing of great value.  But of course the cities on the Caspian Sea would then be flooded.  But if the world gifted the Caspian Sea Basin with lots of fresh water, then also they may even make other payments to the Caspian Sea community.

This is actually a Terraform notion.  I was going to put it there but put it here.

Sea water could be put into the Caspian Sea as well, but that is a less desired thing I feel.

It can be noted that since the Caspian Sea is lower than the global oceans, some Hydroelectric power may be in the mix as well.

If the size of the Caspian Sea is increased, then the amount of humidity for the area would also increase.  So, then these windmills might generate more water.

But for the Dead Sea, as a small project this might be interesting.

And for the Great Basin, of course we are then to move water uphill, but it may be that these windmills would capture water locally from the air perhaps around the Great Salt Lake.

Obviously, this could be on small scale to start with.

If you reduce the evaporation of the Gret Salt Lake, and also pull water from the air it may be that you can inflate lakes in the Great Basin over time.  It is a long shot, but maybe.

The blades might be covered in a material that assists condensation.

Anyway, thanks for your concern, Calliban.  It is a weird thing that most will simply say that I had a mental episode, but to me it is a Memory that is a record of something that did happen.  Well, at least it happened in my mind.

The good news is that since that episode except for my Mini-Stroke, I have been all clear.

Back the windmill, other concepts might be possible, such as flowing water to the blades to evaporate to produce cooling.  But other concepts such as that will require even more tricky technology.

Now that I have cleared space in my head, I imagine other notions will show up.  It goes on forever.

Ending Pending smile

Last edited by Void (2024-10-15 08:34:10)


End smile

Offline

#4 2024-10-15 14:55:07

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.


End smile

Offline

#5 2024-10-16 09:59:11

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

I will seek to explain what this could be like: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolipile
Image Quote: 330px-Aeolipile_illustration.png

However our steam will be of decompressed air or boiled air.

And then we might seek to incorporate this into a windmill-like structure, to present a blade heat exchanger.  In this case we may hope to extract condensed water from the atmosphere.

Our source of compressed air or liquid air may be an "Air Battery" of some kind.

Pretty cool that we are on the edge of picking up where the ancients left off.  It is a pity that they could not hold back the flood of degenerate zombie people who overcame them.  We, however may be able to carry the load and also defeat the zombies.  It is not a guarantee but a possibility, a true possibility.

The combination of windmills with Aeolipile Turbine functions could lead to a valuable product, that is potable water from the air.

An ideal desert location for this could be Namibia.  Lets have a look at their wind resources: https://globalwindatlas.info/en/

It seems that South Africa might be pretty good also.

Namibia has night fogs that the heat exchanger windmills might pull water from.

To me it only makes sense that North West Europe could pull lots of water from the air to send to the arid Central Asia, particularly the Caspian Sea basin, in order to lower the global sea levels.  However the Caspian Sea Basin people will have to see a gain in order for them to give a consent.

In North America, the Great Basin, it is an uphill battle, but I will note that fresh water pumped into that basin will fall as rain many times before it leaves the basin surrounded by mountains.

Anyway the scheme sort of involves daytime power to create a compressed or liquid air reservoir.  Then at night the some of the air is expanded to turn turbines.  In some cases a windmill-Aeolipile.

In some cases the water spun off of the device could directly water a garden.  Or with greater complexity, the blade ends may have a cup and controls to cause the water to squirt out into a basin.  This may be needed in the North Sea concept.

While you might be compressing or liquifying air in the day, you may then also take the heat from this and store it in a reservoir.

That is quite a lot for today on this.

Ending Pending smile

Last edited by Void (2024-10-16 10:28:43)


End smile

Offline

#6 2024-10-16 10:47:07

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

And in icy weather, it should be possible to send warm air though the blades to deice them.

Ending Pending smile


End smile

Offline

#7 2024-10-16 11:23:54

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

This may seem an odd addition.  This guy actually does real world experiments, which is much better than what I do: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

This innovation reduces the cost of solar energy by 30%. Why hasn't it made an energy revolution yet
YouTube
Sergiy Yurko
3.6K views
8 hours ago

In a north latitude with a lake, then you have a bearing.  You may fear the ice of winter, but it is possible to use a bubbler to melt the ice around such a bearing and allow winter activities.

Such mirrors could be very large and produce large amounts of high heat.

Where in the warm seasons you might want to push cool air though the blades of the windmill, in the winter, you could push hot air though them as you would not be seeking to condense water out of the air.

A fresh water lake will tend to have water at 39 degrees in it's lower portions.  If you draw from this heat to melt ice, you may also direct heat from the solar collector to restore that heat that you want to use to melt the ice.

But you might store very high heat also in other thermal reservoirs.

By heating previously compressed air or boiling liquid air, and directing it though a windmill-Aeolipile you might use the generator of the windmill to generate electricity, not just from wind but from the Aeolipile.

I don't know if that will be noisy or not to an intolerable limit????  Or if it will be as efficient as a turbine.

But we are getting a different way to store and generate power than solar panels or water based steam engines.

Ending Pending smile

Last edited by Void (2024-10-16 11:32:29)


End smile

Offline

#8 2024-10-17 07:20:09

Void
Member
Registered: 2011-12-29
Posts: 7,773

Re: Windmills as heat exchangers and motors.

Vertical Axis windmills may be even more suitable for vascular flows thought the structure.

They might work better for harvesting water from the air as well.

We also have the possibility of associating a heat pump with such.  You might pull heat out of the air and that is likely to produce conditions for water condensation on the exterior of the blades.

You might flow water on the blades and do evaporative cooling.

The wind may turn these or you might use a power source to spin them.  So, far I have mentioned compressed air, but it would not be limited to that.

I seem to have some of the factors for invention but lack the business side of it.  And as my needs are satisfied as a basic person, I really don't see value in a dark struggle.

Rather, it is my hope that I can seed ideas without risking an episode of unhappiness.

The seeds along with those of others and betters could create a better world for people like me to live in and perhaps also for me, myself.

Ending Pending smile

Last edited by Void (2024-10-17 07:25:51)


End smile

Offline

Board footer

Powered by FluxBB