this post was submitted on 25 May 2024
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Solarpunk technology

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Technology for a Solar-Punk future.

Airships and hydroponic farms...

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Holy shit this makes me happy. Now do home versions that combine with solar.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Everytime I look into the same thing, it's always that these dont have a great turndown to small single unit scale.

Where solar is quite modular, putting 1 or 2 of these turbines on a house, that are also not tall enough to get above all the wind blockers (other houses, trees), just won't make sense for a long time.

Looks like covering big box stores gets around several of those barriers, which is great.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

Turns out I haven't looked in awhile, but they have personal wind turbines to power your phone. I think putting a bank on one side of some homes could be great. In Seattle, with all of the micro-climates, hills and wind tunnels, this surely is a thing.

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=travel+wind+turbine

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

I was thinking the same thing, how easily the two units could work together.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Have horizontal ones not been more efficient?

(ringblade and wind my roof for example)

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago

Horizontal turbines are better if you have space. Verticals are better if you don't. Verticals are popular in the hobby space because they take up so little space and require less of an engineering degree to maintain (... generally). I can see why they would put verticals on their roof over horizontals if they want to extract wind in a low-profile low-maintenance kind of way.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (3 children)

I wonder if they consulted structural engineers. Putting multiple 1000 lb loads on roofs that weren't designed for it doesn't seem like a good business plan.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I think It’s safe to assume that an evaluation/inspection on the building is performed before installation.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 months ago

Should be, but my comment is more along the lines of I doubt many buildings can take additional multiple 1000 lb loads.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Walls are made to support loads and TFA does say they are mounted on the edge so roof loads will be minimal

Not to be confused with edge lords

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Commercial building like this have curtain walls. Curtain walls don't support loads, the columns are the ones taking the load.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 months ago

I'm not go worried about the load bit Zhou about vibrations.

Wind turbines vibrate, especially of you install them on turbulent airflow such as just on top of a roof. I would be worried that it would cause some long term damage to the structure.