Ultra-Micro Urban Architectural Wind. A clumsy name for really small wind power; smaller even than the residential turbines sometimes pressed into service in the urban environment (because wind makes so much sense in these places, even if the technology doesn't yet). Aeroelastic flutter (inspired by the Tacoma Narrows Bridge failure, as manifested in the brain of Humdinger President Shawn Frayne) may offer ways to harvest the wind at the venturi heights, in the urban canyons, between buildings. The Windy City? They're all windy if they have tall buildings.
Humdinger has been out there for some time working on the WindbeltTM, a small elastic membrane in tension that oscillates because of the aeroelastic flutter created by the wind. I haven't heard much from Humdinger lately, so I decided to check in with a few questions. But first, a brief description of their products:
On to the questions. These were posed to Jordan McRae, Humdinger's lead aeronautical engineer, and a co-owner of the technology.
Discovery: Jordan, when I Google Humdinger, I don't see much recent activity. What are you guys up to these days?
Humdinger: We're all on vacation! Well...a media vacation. As Shawn, our President, would say: "It's best to wait for a technology to stand on its own legs before unleashing the world on it." Or something like that. We've been hard at work refining the design and testing the Windcell and Windcell Panels. The highest priority now is getting one or more installations set up with a few of the Windcell Panels to see how they perform in the wild. This will be done first in Hong Kong and then possibly at a site in Hawai'i. We've just moved into a larger laboratory facility in Hong Kong, as well as hired an excellent mechanical engineer, Angus Fok.
Discovery: Your technology is enticing, because its urban wind possibilities fit the distributed energy model nicely, and conventional wind (the megawatt stuff) doesn't. Conventional wind doesn't seem to be cost competitive when you shorten the blade length (the rotor swept area) to something that would work in an urban setting. So, does your technology work? Does it work at production scale? Any plans to produce at production scale?
Humdinger: It does indeed. We have fully demonstrated the microBelt's capability to fulfill its application in a WSN. For the Windcell and Windcell Panels we are in the end stages of research and development and are currently establishing an installation at one of our facilities in Hong Kong. Through wind tunnel studies and prototype manufacturing we've achieved both our rated energy outputs and targeted pre-manufacturing costs. Humdinger Wind Energy uses a licensing business model. Rather than mass manufacture the WindbeltTM technology ourselves, we are identifying industry partners that we'd like to license the technology to and work with to bring the technology to market. It is through this cooperation that we would complete the final stages of life cycle analysis and the large scale manufacturing.
Discovery: I read that Humdinger is cost competitive (like US$1.00/Watt). Is it?
Humdinger: One thing that has changed within Humdinger (and many other small wind energy companies) is that we've begun to talk about the technology in terms of its energy and cost per kWh rather than an arbitrary power rating. Nonetheless the result is the same. Yes, the Windcell Panel is cost competitive with a targeted manufacturing cost of $0.03 - $0.05 per kWh. (This is essentially equivalent to the $1.00/W rating). I say targeted, because as I already mentioned, the Windcell Panels are not yet being mass manufactured. However, we have produced many Windcells and Windcell Panels in small quantity orders which give us our targeted production scale costs. This is in fact a conservative projection and many of us within the company believe it can and will go lower as we improve the design of the panels. From a mechanical perspective the WindbeltTM is very simple: a membrane, a frame and a generator. There are no bearings and there is very small amount of moving mass in the system which means the frame isn't required to handle high loads. Yet the most expensive part of the system is the frame. We are currently working on some designs that would result in requiring less material in the frame and therefore a lower manufacturing cost.
Discovery: Thanks Jordan. Best of luck to you, and please keep us posted on your progress.
To all the potential manufacturing and venture capital partners out there, please respect the fact that Humdinger is on a media vacation. Do not flood them with inquiries about manufacturing their product, or try to throw a bunch of money at them just because you think they could radically transform the way buildings produce and use energy. They're busy.
Photo: Humdinger
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