Dutch scientists develop kite power system with enough juice for 10 homes

Sure, the Netherlands might be known for its windmills, but a group of scientists at the Delft University of Technology is aiming to harness the wind in a different way: by using kites to generate electricity. A recent test generated 10 kilowatts, or enough juice to power 10 homes, and the plan is to eventually send an array of kites called the Laddermill up to 30,000 feet in order to generate nearly 10 megawatts of power. Of course, that's all in the future -- for now, we've just got two dudes, a kite, and a pretty dry video after the break.

[Via Inhabitat]

[aZTEKv2 @ Aug 5th 2008 6:10PM]

is this thing on?

[Graham @ Aug 5th 2008 6:18PM]

Im pretty sure you know the answer to that.
And yes, you did fail and made yourself look completely moronic.

[Samboini @ Aug 5th 2008 6:22PM]

They need something to harness the power of shits, because the violence and energy I hear propogating from the toilet cubicles when i'm having a slash is immense.

[Dillon @ Aug 5th 2008 6:27PM]

What happens if your kite gets tangled in somebody else's?

[randy @ Aug 6th 2008 2:49AM]

You get frustrated, plug back into the grid, and go and do something more productive with your life.

[HOOPER @ Aug 5th 2008 6:27PM]

How long does it power 10 homes?

[Phoenix @ Aug 5th 2008 7:02PM]

It's a wind system: until the kite breaks or you take it down

[Tdot @ Aug 5th 2008 7:10PM]

I'll put it into relative terms. 10 kW is power at any given moment, and electricity is usually measured in kW hours (kWh) for your power bill.

If the kite were generating 10 kW for an hour it would generate 10 kWh. The average household in Canada will use around 21 kWh per day. So if this thing ran at peak for 24 hours it would generate 240 kWh... enough to offset 10 households for a 24 hour period... if it ran at peak for 24 hours straight.

Wind is fickle, it's blowing one minute, then completely calm, etc. so the energy goes up and down. You can't run your home directly off the kite because of the changing voltages, etc. so it would need to either be fed back into the grid or stored in batteries. It peaks at 10 kW, but isn't always running at that rate... at least that's how it is with wind turbines.

So how long can it run a home? Forever if it runs at peak forever and your home consumes an equal amount of electricity as this produces. Depends on the wind and you.

[Brian @ Aug 5th 2008 7:14PM]

I assume that they mean that it delivers enough constant power to run 10 homes. In other words, it can power 10 homes as long as it is up and the conditions stay the same (provided it doesn't break).

[Jim @ Aug 6th 2008 6:36AM]

okay, there is wind and a kite which pulls on a string, but i wonder how this force is converted into electical engery... ?_?

[Dillon @ Aug 5th 2008 6:27PM]

GOOOODDDDDBYEEE!!!

Please, never post again and kill yourself. Thank you.

[Dillon @ Aug 5th 2008 6:28PM]

Too bad we can't mark comments as spam.

[whatishalo? @ Aug 5th 2008 6:39PM]

Don't you end up using all the power you just generated using the wench to get the kite back down?

[Lowest Ranked @ Aug 5th 2008 7:06PM]

If she runs on electricity, then you married the wrong wench.

;)

[Dan @ Aug 5th 2008 7:15PM]

believe you mean winch.

[Esteban @ Aug 5th 2008 7:29PM]

@Lowest Ranked

Brilliant. +1

[Ian @ Aug 5th 2008 7:54PM]

Man the winch, wench!

[Wes @ Aug 5th 2008 9:47PM]

the kite has two strings (like a stunt kite) so it can be made to dive down without as much pull as it gets on its ascent.

[Nicky-Larson @ Aug 5th 2008 6:41PM]

"What happens if your kite gets tangled in somebody else's?"

Well if it belongs to a lady, you use that chance to invite her out for dinner to make it up to her.
If it belongs to a man, Well, you know the drill,,,,,............

But apart from that, this is impressive. Amazing how Europe is advancing. :)

[Josh L @ Aug 5th 2008 7:09PM]

"If it belongs to a man, Well, you know the drill,,,,,............"

Use that chance to invite him out to dinner and make it up to him?

[Dillon @ Aug 6th 2008 3:04AM]

I highly doubt that you'll ever find a woman flying a robot electricity making kite...

[Christian @ Aug 5th 2008 6:46PM]

I dunno, I see a future with this if they can somehow make like a floating house or something powered by turbines... but I wonder how much power that will take...

[Quix @ Aug 5th 2008 6:48PM]

Airplane pilots are going to just LOVE this...

[RikF @ Aug 5th 2008 8:13PM]

in the same way that they love trees, pylons, tall buildings, gas storage tanks etc?

[Quix @ Aug 5th 2008 8:57PM]

I'd love to see this 30,000 ft tall tree to which you refer.

[shadowarmy75 @ Aug 5th 2008 9:53PM]

I'd love to see the 30,000 feet kite.

[alexmueller @ Aug 5th 2008 7:06PM]

It's like Ben Franklin of the 21st century.

[Ian @ Aug 5th 2008 7:31PM]

the article says 100 mwh

[chris @ Aug 5th 2008 8:02PM]

Hopefully they disclose the how-tos for regular folk to attempt it.

I too wondered about height versus planes. I assume there are legal issues with how high you can fly tethered things - at least in the US.

[JD @ Aug 5th 2008 8:05PM]

Omg i see a home use for this. Check it, If you get this and hook it to your home you will generate more energy then you use, which means instead of you paying the electric company they will pay you. Further more buy an electric car and you have free transportation, no cost
Further more put in a well, and then your only utility is phone and cable.

Any flaws, besides how much the thing will cost and availability of it?

[Wwhat @ Aug 6th 2008 2:52AM]

Flaw is obviously that you have to get a mate and run like mad with a giant kite every time the wind settled a bit, and youalso have to ring the doorbell at the neighbours and ask your kite back and if they have a ladder so you can untwist the string from the tree.
Apart from such minor niggles it's all smooth sailing.

[Nathan B @ Aug 5th 2008 8:07PM]

I guess they are assuming the homes aren't running 8800 SLI boxes as those use a kilowatt themselves...

[Falcom @ Aug 5th 2008 8:17PM]

I was just going to post something to this effect. 1kilowatt is hardly enough to power 1 home. Maybe an average over a day, but turn on a high end computer, refridgerator, and air conditioner and you'll burn that up real quick.

[Lowest Ranked @ Aug 5th 2008 8:20PM]

If your house does not contain a refrigerator, air conditioner, computer, or any combination of the 3, then it cannot classify as average.

[dmon @ Aug 5th 2008 8:18PM]

Hmmm what if your kite gets struck by lightning? Does it store the bolt's energy too?

[Lowest Ranked @ Aug 5th 2008 8:18PM]

By doing some basic math we can deduce that you have successfully quadruple-failed.

[JerseyBricklayer @ Aug 5th 2008 9:55PM]

You dont even have an iphone.

[JerseyBricklayer @ Aug 5th 2008 9:57PM]

You dont even have an iphone.

[wickedpheonix @ Aug 5th 2008 10:49PM]

10 homes huh? Yeah - if they're running a lightbulb a piece in a third-world country! Let's see it power MY home :P

[physics @ Aug 5th 2008 11:14PM]

I THINK THIS IS A JOKE

What was missing from this piece is any information on how the power is generated. Is it from the pull on the cable? Work (and therefore energy) is force through distance. w = f x d; 100 ft lb/s is 135.6 watts. 7374.6 ft lb/s is 10 kW.

Therefore if the cable is exerting 100 lb force, it must be through a distance of 73.6 ft/s. To operate in this mode for 10 seconds means that the cable must out-reel 736 feet and unless you have an infinite amount cable, you would have to fly the kite in some sort of pattern that had the kite fly away from the winch then back in, in a controlled fashion, basically orbiting forever.

Changing directions like this requires there be two wind layers, one flowing towards the winch and another away. The kite would have to make a controlled orbit and a controlled change in wind layers, all the while navigating the changing wind directions.

Let's assume that the kite spends just as much time moving towards the winch as moving away (this seems generous, very likely the kite would spend some time when it is moving laterally relative to the winch). Because a cable can pull but not push, it follows that you only generate energy 50% of the time. In other words, the kite must either move twice as fast during the power generating phase of its orbit (147.2 ft/s) or with twice as much force (200 lb) to generate 10kW.

Does this sound like a workable idea?

[ooglek @ Aug 6th 2008 1:05AM]

You failed to read more. The "kite" is not your traditional kite that just pulls you as the wind blows it. The foil is a combo-kite -- part normal kite, that pulls, and part plane, that descends. The kite causes a, likely erratic, sine wave of sorts, constantly pulling, then relenting, line. The back-and-forth motion is generated into electricity. Maybe the motion runs a flywheel, or when the kite pulls, it simply rotates an electric motor (and when it is descending, doing nothing).

Think of it like a rower in a row boat. They put the oars in the water, and pull real hard. This moves him forward. Then he lifts the oars out of the water, and pushes them with little effort back to position for another pull.

The same is true with this. The wind blows, and pulls real hard, and rotates a flywheel or an electric motor to generate electricity. The kite changes angles, and moves back toward earth a bit, and the unit on the ground reels in the slack, using little effort, getting ready for the kite to catch the wind again.

[vinconti @ Aug 5th 2008 11:17PM]

funny. kiteboarders would scoff at that crappy C-shaped foil kite; it is like an awful flysurfer with the world's crappiest bridle. That thing would totally brick on gusts. next time maybe they can add the sheeting dimension that every single modern kitesurfing kite has

[vinconti @ Aug 5th 2008 11:21PM]

@physics

no that isn't how it works. As the kite moves around the wind window (the quarter sphere whose epicenter is the base of the kite string), the kite develops different levels of power based on the angle of attack of the kite, which changes continuously in the window. so, facing directly downwind, if the kite is directly overhead or directly to your side in either direction, it has almost no power because the angle of attack exposes almost none of the canopy

[TechShoe @ Aug 5th 2008 11:34PM]

I don't think they'll be able to have lines running up to 30,000 feet -- surely a problem for planes as another commenter points out. I wonder how this compares to a normal wind turbine? Shared on TechShoe.com

[phanbouy @ Aug 5th 2008 11:37PM]

Overreacting a bit, Dillon?

[Mustaine @ Aug 6th 2008 4:08AM]

If it can power 10 homes, could it power a big-ass fan to blow the kite?
OMG unlimited energy. :P

[Long Jhon of the west @ Aug 6th 2008 4:54AM]

So how many do we need to produce 1.21 Gigawatts! ..when this kite flys over 88 miles an hour...

[Madragonn @ Aug 6th 2008 7:02AM]

:D omg i fly the model below this kite :D the kite shown in a peter lynn venon and i fly the phantom and i tell you theres some power behind them even on 25ft lines nevermind it going up that high :D good work

[RickyRik @ Aug 6th 2008 8:56AM]

researchers also said rubbing my balls can also generate electricity for one home.

[Zwaf @ Aug 6th 2008 6:52PM]

Hey!

I study at that University and never heard anything about it.
Anyway, 1kW average in each home? My pc alone eats up to 650Watt.