The camera zooms out.

On a more general note: These sort of videos are what they are; one side of the argument. Nothing more. Nothing less. This shows a very direct incident. The problem with other methods of energy creation (mainly burning fossil fuels) is that the majority of the casualties are from indirect incidents. Pollution causing a loss of fertility in the breeding population would be a good example of where a population could be massively affected, but it wouldn't be obvious what was happening and there wouldn't be the opportunity for such an attention grabbing video.

No-one is saying these wind turbines are perfect, but despite what we see in this video we'd need data from both sides of the equation to make an informed decision. What might ave been catastrophic for that bird may actually be the saviour of the species.

In the same way there are people who have been permanently deafened by airbags or injured or even killed by tem going off accidentally in cars. But I'm pretty sure no sane person would argue that they are a harmful addition to a car as they have demonstrably saved many, many thousands of lives. What we're seeing in this video is the equivalent of watching an airbag go off when it shouldn't a causing a crash. It's a terrible thing for sure, but without the overall figures you can't say it means airbags are bad (or good).

@GeeSussFreeK

I tried to stay way from issues specific to the use of nuclear technology for a reason. There's very little in your reply that I can respond to, simply for a lack of expertise. So bear with me if I once again attempt to generalize and abstract some points. And I'll try to keep it shorter this time.

You mentioned how construction times and costs are pushed up by the constant evolution of compliance codes. A problem not exclusive to the construction of power plants, but maybe more pronounced in these cases. No matter.

What buggers me, however, is what you can currently observe in real time at the EPR construction sites in Olkiluoto and Flamanville.
For instance, the former is reported to have more than 4000 workers from over 60 nations, involving more than 1500 sub-contractors. It's basically the Tower of Babylon, and the quality of work might be similar as well. Workers say, they were ordered to just pour concrete over inadequate weld seams to get things done in time, just to name an example. They are three years over plan as of now, and it'll be at least 2-3 more before completion.
And Flamanville... here's some of what the French Nuclear Safety Authority had to say about the construction site: "concrete supports look like Swiss cheese", "walls with gaping holes", "brittle spots without a trace of cement".

Again, this is not exclusive to the construction of NPPs. Almost every large scale construction site in Europe these days looks like this, except for whatever the Swiss are doing: kudos to them, wonderful work indeed. But if they mess up the construction of a train station, they don't run a risk of ruining the ground water and irradiating what little living space we have in Europe as it is.

Then you explain the advantages of small scale, modular reactors. Again, no argument from my side on the feasability of this, I have to take your word on it. But looking at how the Russians dispose of their old nuclear reactors (bottom of the Barents Sea) and how Germany disposes of its nuclear waste (dropped down a hole), I don't fancy the idea of having even more reactors around.

As for prices, I have to raise my hands in surrender once again. Not my area of expertise, my knowledge is limited to whatever analysis hits the mainstream press every now and then. Here's my take on it, regarding just the German market: the development, construction, tax exemption, insurance exemption, fuel transport and waste disposal of the nuclear industry was paid for primarly by taxes. Conservative government estimates were in the neighbourhood of €300B since the sixties, in addition to the costs of waste disposal and plant deconstruction that the companies can't pay for. And that's if nothing happens to any of the plants, no flood, no fire, nothing.

That's not cheap. E.ON and RWE dropped out of the bid on construction permits for new NPPs in GB, simply because it's not profitable. RWE CEO Terium mentioned ~100€/MWh as the minimum base price to make new NPPs profitable, 75.80€/MWh for gas-powered plants. Right now, the base (peak) price is at 46€/MWh (54€/MWh) in Germany. France generates ~75% of its power through NPPs, while Germany is getting plastered with highly subsidized wind turbines and solar panels, yet the market price for energy is lower in Germany.

Yes, the conditions are vastly different in the US, and yes, the next generation of NPPs might be significantly cheaper and safer to construct and run. I'm all for research in these areas. But on the field of commercial energy generation, nuclear energy just doesn't seem to cut it right now.

So let's hop over to safety/dangers. Again, priorities might differ significantly and I can only argue from a central European perspective. As cold-hearted as it may sound, the number of direct casualties is not the issue. Toxicity and radiation is, as far as I'm concerned. All our NPPs are built on rivers and the entire country is rather densely populated. A crashing plane might kill 500 people, but there will be no long term damage, particularly not to the water table. The picture of an experimental waste storage site is disturbing enough as it is, and it wasn't even "by accident" that some of these chambers are now flooded by ground water.

Apologies if I ripped anything out of context. I tried to avoid the technicalities as best as I could in a desperate attempt not to make a fool of myself. Again.

And sorry for not linking any sources in many cases. Most of it was taken from German/Swiss/Austrian/French articles.

>> ^Barbar:

Applying the oversimplified version of laws that you learned in early physics classes to reality can often leave you in stunned silence when reality seems to defy them. Things like the dimples on golf balls or sailing ships moving upwind are classic examples of things that you wouldn't expect to even be conceivable unless you saw it in action.


Conceivable or not, none of the things you mentioned break the first law of thermodynamics.

One situation where the system could work would be if the car was driving into a strong headwind. This would give an energy input into the system. It could be perhaps developed to extend the blades if there is a strong enough headwind, and retract them if there isn't, but if there is no breeze, there will be a net loss from using the blades.

If the car is driving through stationary air then the air it's passing through will have no kinetic energy. After passing over the blades the air will be moving, it will have gained kinetic energy. That energy will have been taken from the car. It's as simple as that. No complicated equations needed. You'd need the complicated equations if you wanted to calculate exactly how much energy is lost, but you don't need them to see that energy would be lost.

If wind is factored into it then the air already has kinetic energy, which would be extracted by the fan, but the wind would be and external source of energy (in the same way that a wind turbine isn't in any way a perpetual motion device, it's obvious where the energy is coming from).

I'm not sure why people seem to think this is an elementary problem. I seriously doubt that most people in this discussion studied anywhere near the math and physics required in the calculation in middle school, or even high school, or college for that matter. Having studied physics and math at all those levels, I know that wind turbines were NEVER part of the discussion. After looking up the relevant equations, I can see why -- they're certainly not trivial, and would probably required significant calculus to understand (derive). In university my physics courses were directed towards electricity, so I didn't get a chance to play with wind tunnels -- although I'd still love to!

Applying the oversimplified version of laws that you learned in early physics classes to reality can often leave you in stunned silence when reality seems to defy them. Things like the dimples on golf balls or sailing ships moving upwind are classic examples of things that you wouldn't expect to even be conceivable unless you saw it in action.

First case is simply wrong. Wind generators are turbulence generators, period. If they don't generate drag they don't work.

As for the second case it would be far more efficient to simply have the electric motor work in reverse so that it uses the car's momentum to generate electricity AND braking power. No need for fancy extra gadgets that would cost tens of thousands per unit and would never be more efficient than a simple system converting momentum to energy through the drivetrain.

>> ^zeoverlord:

sure it is, first case would be if it's used to correct turbulent air that would otherwise cause extra drag, in such a case it would have a double effect, both by reducing drag and generating power.
Second case would be if you had a turbine with deployable blades that extend every time you brake, sure the gain would be small, but it is a gain non the less.
Though clearly this car does not use either of these, and the only way this would add energy instead of wasting it was if he lived in a really windy place.
>> ^Drachen_Jager:
It is impossible to build a wind turbine generator on a car that increases efficiency through wind generated by the vehicle's own travel.

sure it is, first case would be if it's used to correct turbulent air that would otherwise cause extra drag, in such a case it would have a double effect, both by reducing drag and generating power.
Second case would be if you had a turbine with deployable blades that extend every time you brake, sure the gain would be small, but it is a gain non the less.

Though clearly this car does not use either of these, and the only way this would add energy instead of wasting it was if he lived in a really windy place.
>> ^Drachen_Jager:

It is impossible to build a wind turbine generator on a car that increases efficiency through wind generated by the vehicle's own travel.

That is the dumbest thing I've ever seen.

Don't people know you can't get energy from nowhere? The fan produces friction, that friction creates electricity, but it also slows the car down, the amount produced will never surpass the amount of energy spent pushing the car forward. Additionally there is inevitable loss in the generator, wiring and batteries.

It is impossible to build a wind turbine generator on a car that increases efficiency through wind generated by the vehicle's own travel.

Everyone involved in the production of that bit needs remedial physics classes.

http://videosift.com/video/Liquid-Helium-And-Party-Balloons
>> ^brycewi19:

I've heard that helium is getting quite expensive. Something about supply being limited.
Wouldn't that have to factor in to the feasibility of this being financially practical?

>> ^zor:

>> ^sillma:
What a waste of perfectly good helium.

Right. Helium is not a good choice. Should have used hydrogen because it's renewable. They can use the energy to make more from water and if it explodes no harm no foul since there are no people on board.


But a 35 foot wide burning anything crashing to the earth has got to be bothersome.

>> ^sillma:

What a waste of perfectly good helium.


Right. Helium is not a good choice. Should have used hydrogen because it's renewable. They can use the energy to make more from water and if it explodes no harm no foul since there are no people on board.

Your video, Airborne Helium Wind Turbine Prototype 2012, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

>> ^doogle:

omg they created a real-life prototype of Google's App Engine logo.
http://screenshots.en.sftcdn.net/en/scrn/70000/70210/google-app-en
gine-1.jpg


OMGZ ! ! ! ! !

I'm just going to assume you're either passionate about wind power or just didn't like my unique brand of humor, powered by coal.



>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:

Wow, QM. I didn't know you had that many monitors.
"One 1.8 MW wind turbine at a reasonable site would produce over 4,700,000 kWh of electricity each year, enough to meet the annual needs of over 1,000 households."
(the average household in the UK, with 2 parents and 2 children, uses approximately 5500 kWh of energy per year. -Strathclyde University statistic)
>> ^quantumushroom:
I like those pinwheels at the end, but together they could power the 3000 monitors I watched this sift on.

Wow, QM. I didn't know you had that many monitors.

"One 1.8 MW wind turbine at a reasonable site would produce over 4,700,000 kWh of electricity each year, enough to meet the annual needs of over 1,000 households."

(the average household in the UK, with 2 parents and 2 children, uses approximately 5500 kWh of energy per year. -Strathclyde University statistic)
>> ^quantumushroom:

I like those pinwheels at the end, but together they could power the 3000 monitors I watched this sift on.

I want a dyson sphere. Get some people on that, could ya?
>> ^ChaosEngine:

>> ^gwiz665:
Nuclear is not perfect, but it's the best we have right now. Coal and Oil are much worse. Wind, Solar and Geothermal are better, but not nearly the same scale as Nuclear.

There are several issues with nuclear and Chernobyl/Fukushima style disasters are frankly the least of them.
Leaving aside the obviously thorny issue of waste management, the other issue arises when you amortise the cost over the total lifetime of the nuclear plant. It's just not that cheap in terms of energy or money to build, run and then decommission.
As for renewable energy, it's nowhere close to providing the energy levels we need yet. Also there are other environmental issues with some renewable energy generation methods as well. Hydro requires large dams (concrete is an eco-nightmare) and can destroy habitats. Geothermal can affect the landscape (subsidence and sapping geysers are two common effects). Lots of people complain about wind turbines as visually unappealing (personally I find the aesthetically pleasing). I'm not saying renewable technologies are bad, merely that there are still issues with them.
In real terms, fusion is where it's at.