Vestas Winnovation Competition

This time I can write about a very fortunate opportunity and experience - the Vestas Winnovation challenge. Vestas invited 30 students from all around the world to Copenhagen for a 48 hour competition. During that time, we have presented our submitted solutions to challenge in front of a committee of leading researchers.
The trip was a great experience to meet an interesting company and other students from all around the world.

Wind Speed at your House

Have you always wondered, how much energy you could produce with a wind turbine on your property? But spending thousand's of dollars does not sound appealing.
Then take a look at the 3Tier website. After publishing there solar maps, extended it with a wind map. Pretty nice tool ...
I know the stuff is not really new, but for completeness I wanted to mention it.

Own Research Project at Oregon State University

The North America Wind Power website featured an article about the research project I am working on these days.
Enjoy reading it ...

Please post comments, if you have questions about it.

New Wind Turbine in the Netherlands

This morning I found this article on my daily routine browsing through energy sites. I thought the design of a Swedish company is interesting.

But what sparked my curiosity was the background of the first picture, it's Schiphol airport from where I left a few days earlier. I wish, I would have found the article earlier ...

Source of the picture: http://devicedaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/energy-ball-01.jpg

5 Must-Read Texts about Renewable Energies

In the past, I was looking for profound literature about renewable energies and in particular wind energy. Here is what I have found so far:

1) Fundamentals of Renewable Energy Processes
Da, R., (2005). Fundamentals of Renewable Energy Processes. Amsterdam: Elsevier Academic Press.

Da presents a well written introduction to all kinds of renewable energy sources. I recommend chapter 1 - Generalities and chapter 16 - Ocean energy.

2) Renewable Energy
Boyle, G., (2004). Renewable Energy. Oxford: Oxford University Press in association with the Open University.

Boyle wrote a nice illustrated textbook for renewable energies. His main focus is on renewable energies in the UK, but this does not matter for the good purpose of the text. His chapter on hydro and wave power are highly recommended.

3) Power Electronics Handbook
Rashid, E., (2007). Power Electronics Handbook. Boston: Elsevier / Academic Press.

Rashid et al. created an excellent monograph about power electronics. A chapter is devoted towind power applications, its controls and an other chapter covers issues of the important issue in renewable energies of power quality. He also covers artificial neural networt applications in power electronics.

4) Wind Energy
Mathew, S., (2006). Wind Energy. Berlin: Springer.

Mathew is provides a comprehensive summary about wind energy from the aerodynamics to the generator. He covers the two statistical models for wind data - Rayleigh and Weibull and talks about the energy estimation based on the models. Interesting in the book is the chapter about wind pumps. Finally, Mathews talks in-depth about the environmental impact of wind energy converters and the economics of wind energy.

5) Wind Energy Conversion Systems
Heier, S., (2006). Grid Integration of Wind Energy Conversion Systems. New York: Wiley.

If you always wanted to know how to derive fundamental equations for wind turbines from the aerodynamics to the energy conversion then this is your book! I was looking for a profound derivation of the power coefficient equation (you know Cp) and the Simulink documentation referenced this book. I was reading the issue from 1998, but as I am writing the post, I discovered that there is a updated version out.

Do you think, I missed a very important textbook about renewable energies then let me know. I'll be more then happy to add it to the list!

4 Important Links about Wind Energy

Are you looking for up-to-date information on renewable energy sources?
Here are four links to good blogs and websites, I am checking for more information on this interesting topic.

1) Energy Portal of Wikipedia
If you are looking for short explanations of some converter types, the energy portal of Wikipedia could be your start of your search. It also provides a comprehensive site on renewable energy sources (Link).

2) cleantechnica.com
Are you looking for the latest trends and developments in the field of renewable energy source, then this is the site. always up-to-date and multiple update a day, the site can be seen as a news portal for clean technology.

3) The Wind Machine
Interested in Wind Energy particular? Then look at the blog about wind energy - called the Wind Machine. The authors publish the latest developments, economic aspects and business deals in the field of wind energy.

4) National Geographic on Wind Power
The National Geographic site offers a fairly interactive site about wind energy and its impact. You can even "design" a simple wind turbine. This site is definitely worth to check it out. Links to other explanations of other alternative energy sources can be found here (Link).

Energy Bill passed Congress

Last night I found a good article in the New York Times about the energy bill which passed Congress on Saturday (08/04/2007).
The bill forces "utilities to make a significant share of their electricity from solar, wind, geothermal, water and other non fossil fuel sources [...]" (quote NYTimes)

I personally appreciate the bill, because it does not just force utilities to use renewable energy sources, it also takes a look to efficiency.
It does not mean, like some Representatives said, that we have to sit in the dark. Bills like this one, can help to sharpen the awareness for energy consumption. And that should be our main goal. We in the industry nations have a 10 times higher (or more) energy consumption than in other upcoming industry countries. And we should be a model for them. So think about your consumption - everything helps, even switching out the light when you leave a room. Just think about your own consumption ...