Seminar for building developers and architects Speakers

Dr Dennis Leung HK University mechanical engineering dptDr Michael Leung HK University mechanical engineering dpt

Mr Doug Woodring Motorwavegroup.com and vice chairman of the environment dept of the American Chamber of commerce

Mr Lucien Gambarota Motorwavegroup.com

this presentation can be dowloaded at www.motorwavegroup.com/new/motorwind/mediain power point or PDF format

South China Morning Post quote March 14th 2007

“” But wind power has one major problem: the exorbitant cost of power generation. At 0.5-0.6 yuan per kilowatt hour, real costs are roughly twice those of electricity produced in a conventional coal-fired power plant.

Moreover, wind farms are not as reliable as traditional power plants. Vestas' turbines need a wind speed of 4 metres per second to produce power, and 15 metres per second to reach maximum output of two megawatts. The Dongshan turbines are active for roughly 35 per cent of the year, which is considered good for an onshore site. “”

by Tom miller

Analysis on wind power .

Wind power is a very mature technology ,but still under used .Reasons : conventional wind turbine technology are designed for winds of at least 10 m/sAt 15m/s the wind generator can be amortized in about 20 to 30 years at actual energy prices .

wind turbines are very expensive and very large in size

installation and maintenance are very complex .only professional trained staff can do it .

so our research has focused on how to develop a technology that can solve these issues

Small size wind generator that can work with low wind speed and that are easy to install and maintain

Performances of one of the biggest wind turbine manufacturer : Windpower of Denmark

Real data are available from HK electric Lama wind generator

The red bar is the wind speed in Hong Kong and in the world in general

The blue bar is the wind speed in Tsim Tsa Tsui

The green bar is the wind speed

in Ocean Park

1 kg of oil = 42 Mj in heating value can generate approx 4.6 kWh of electricity .

It takes about 1 kg of oil to make 300 grs of plasticone turbine weights 300 grs .

How long do you think it will take to produce 4.5 kWh ?.

JUST ONE MONTH

For winds of 10m/s one turbine can generate 6.25 watts .In one month 4.50 kWh. In 10 years : 540.00 kWh = 117 kgs of oil worthin 100 years : 5400 kWh.= 1.17 tons of oil worth

By Kevin VoigtFor CNNAdjust font size:HONG KONG, China (CNN) -- Lucien Gambarota sees energy everywhere.

The 49-year-old Italian inventor -- whose day job for years has been creating toys and connecting Chinese manufacturers with European companies -- decided to get into the energy business when he saw his electricity bills triple during the long, hot summers in subtropical Hong Kong, where he is based. "Suddenly I'm paying (US$1,000) a month for electric bills, and I thought, 'This is really crazy'," he says. "Hong Kong is surrounded by natural energy --the waves of the sea, the wind."With investors and a business partner, Gambarota formed Motorwave Ltd., an alternative energy producer. The company is working on techniques to harness wave movement to collect energy and extract hydrogen for fuel cells and tapping into the sweat of treadmill runners at a local gym to generate electricity.

The company's latest creation, developed in conjunction with the University of Hong Kong, is a micro-wind turbine: a device small enough to be placed on rooftops or apartment balconies yet able to generate as much as 40 percent of a household's energy needs, Gambarota claims."Most wind turbines are huge and require technology equivalent to building an airplane or a submarine," Gambarota says. "I wanted to create something that can easily be mass-produced, easily maintained and works in (lower) wind conditions."

Gambarota and his partners are hoping to ride the "clean technology" wave. Alternative energy development -- be it from hydrogen, renewable mixture of gasoline distilled with fermented grains or solar power -- is suddenly creating buzz among entrepreneurs and venture capitalists.

Alternative energy has become the hottest technology ticket in the Silicon Valley tech industries of the United States. Spurred by oil prices that reached $77 a barrel last summer and a call from U.S. President George W. Bush to decrease the "oil addiction" of the world's largest economy, funding for clean technology firms increased 266 percent last year, raising $300 million in the third quarter alone, according to the Silicon Valley Index, published by the non-profit group Joint Venture.

Gambarota: Thinking small the keyIn Hong Kong, Gambarota is thinking big by thinking small. Research done by his company, Motorwave, shows that remote communities in South Pacific islands that invested in large wind turbines usually abandoned the technology after three years. "Why? The turbines would require repair from (a) manufacturer who would take two or three weeks to fly in," he says. "It's a pragmatic problem -- you can't go a few weeks without power, so they just go back to gas-powered generators."

Gambarota's design uses eight 25-centimeter propellers on a single turbine that hooks to a generator. Like the toy Legos, the props can be linked up to create higher and higher power yields. The pieces are small enough to be mass-produced by plastic mould injection, and the engine used is already readily available on the market.

"It's simple enough people can repair it themselves," he says. While conventional turbines need wind speeds of 10-meters-per-second to operate, his turbine can generate power with wind levels as low as two-meters-per-second. The selling price of the units -- which so far have been contracted to be installed at a World Wildlife Federation office and a Hong Kong seaside school -- starts at $150."Renewable energy (products) are going through the roof, so we're hoping this is a product that will appeal to people everywhere, be it in rural or urban environments," he says.

Gambarota: Riding the clean technology wave

A) EfficiencyB) operating rangeC) performances for same surface

m/s

kW

Charts for Motorwind consumer products

Charts for Motorwind consumer products

C) performances for same surface andD) for the same price

m/s

kW

And still these data about wind power do not reflect the reality .

Wind does not blow at constant speed . Wind comes in “ GUSTS “ . packs of air every 5 to 10 seconds .

Example of wind Gust in a US wind farm

oops

Advertising rights and carbon credit

if we want to trade carbon credits : each individual ownerwont be able to get anything ,but if we regroup all capacities within an entity (company) we can all generate extra profit .For the moment we keep all rights on advertising and Carbon credits .case by case negotiation will deal with these issues

What about showing a little bit of Hong Kong technology

when 3 billion people are in front of their TV and demonstrating that we care about

environment ?

On a typical 3 floors 700 square feet house roof top we can install 60 to 100 turbines = 3 to 5 square meter .

On a typical housing estate building we can install 500 turbines to 1500 = 25 to 75 square meter .(Lama wind generator = 2000 square meter (diam 50m) )

(we can install 1.5 square m of turbine per meter of roof)

we just need 25 to 80 buildings to have the same surface and we can produce 2 to 10 times the same power (depending on Wind speed) .

Specific problems and solution for big size wall turbine

A)resistance to extreme conditions .Based on our tests and calculation .one single turbine 5 m/s = 0.125 N10 m/s = 0.5 N20 m/s = 2 N 50 m/s = 12.5 N (typhoon conditions)

for a 1000 turbines (50 square meter ) = 12 500 Newton = 1.25 tons force there is 17 posts to hold the frame : pressure on each post = only 74 kg force of course we take a security margin .each post will be able to withstand 1 ton force = 10 Kg N

Stability

the inherent advantages of using this technology is :we have 50 % of the turbines spinning Clockwise and the other 50%anti clockwise .we have then a double gyroscopic effect that gives an incredible stability and does not have any effect on the weight load .On each barres of the frame there basically no vibrations

Weight

a 1000 turbines with frame weights approx 940 kgsthe loading weight is only approx 56 Kg per post .For calculation purpose we can take : 19 Kg / M2 the load is mostly on the wall and not on the slab

Volume

one aspect is : occupied volume ==> space or area Motorwind occupy only the width of a turbine x length of the frame .For a 1000 turbines (50 m2) occupying 31 meters = 6.2 square meter of land

for a conventional wind turbine of 50 m2 (8 meters in diameter ) the land used is : pi ( R + safety zone ) *2 = A = 78.5 square meter of land .

Easy maintenance

In Motorwind the cost ratio turbine/frame is approx 1 to 3 .we can therefore make better use of the frame by doubling the number ofturbines without changing the frame .the output will increase by about 50 to 60%.we can increase the efficiency per square meter to about 60 % instead of the maximum 44% we can extract per square meter for 10m/s wind speed : nearly 200 watts .We have kept this feature secret for public use .

Turbines density .By shifting rows we can increase turbines density /square meter by 15 % adding another 15% in electricitygenerated .This design can only be used for a more rigid frame ,because it decreases the flexibility .The extra cost on the frame will still justify the efficiency improvement .Venturi effect + double rows + rows shifting = the most efficient wind generator .

Electrical

Consumer product 8 turbines

Consumer product20 turbines

Next step : a 46 cm turbine for higher productionand even lower cost

16 blades

8 blades

WHAT IS SO GOOD ABOUT THIS SYSTEM?

A) IT CAN BE MASS PRODUCED AND THEREFORE CHEAPER (10 TIMES CHEAPER)THAN THE OTHER EXISTING WIND TURBINES.B) IT WORKS WITH VERY LOW WINDS : STARTING AT 2 M/S WHERE CONVENTIONAL WIND TURBINES REQUIRES AT LEAST 7 TO 8 M/S IN HK THE AVERAGE WIND SPEED IS 5 M/S (18 KM/H OR 10 KNOTS)C) VERY HIGH EFFICIENCY : ABOUT 80% TO COMPARE WITH LAMA HK ELECTRIC WIND TURBINE OF 13.5 % D) IT CAN TAKE ANY SHAPES E) IT IS VERY LIGHT WEIGHT F) IT CAN BE INSTALLED ANYWHERE (THE OTHER NEED TO BUILD A ROAD )G) IT CAN BE “INVISIBLE” IF WE USE THE SAME COLOR AS THE BACKGROUND .H) IT CAN OCCUPY USELESS LAND (EXAMPLE THE FENCE SEPARATING HK AND MAINLAND)I ) IT CAN BE USED IN INDIVIDUAL HOMES ON THE ROOF TOP OR BALCONY OR GARDENJ) IT IS VERY EASY TO MAINTAIN