Up, up and away!

“Let’s go fly a kite, up to the highest height” sings a university professor as he makes a scientific breakthrough that could revolutionise the concept of renewable energy, sending green energy figures sky-high…

Being a professor of sustainable engineering, Dutch and an ex-astronaut, chances are Wubbo Ockels probably isn’t singing the classic Mary Poppins tune, but as he does have cause for celebration, who’d blame him if he did suddenly burst into song?

Yes, the hard-working, but ever so slightly eccentric, Dutch scientist wowed the world last weekend with his successful attempt at creating electricity using something straight from the toy box – a giant kite.

Ockels and his team, from the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, managed to harness enough wind power using a 10-sq metre kite tethered to a generator to produce 10 kilowatts of power – enough electricity to power ten family homes.

The experiment was such a success that the team have now planned to test a 50kW version of their invention, called the ‘Laddermill’ project, and have dreams of eventually building a multiple kite version, that they claim could generate 100 megawatts of electricity, effectively enough to power a town of 100,000 homes.

The concept is simple enough. The Laddermill is made up of a number of kites connected to a cable, forming a huge loop. Working on the same principle as the wings of an aeroplane, the wind causes an upward lift. Changing the attitude of the kites will make the lift either higher or lower. The kites on one side of the loop are placed so that they produce the maximum lift, while the kites on the other side will give a much smaller lift.

This results in a difference in force between the two ends at the ground. The cable is attached to a wheel on the ground, and the force difference will drive the wheel. By connecting the wheel to a generator, electricity will be produced, converting renewable wind energy into power for our homes and businesses.

Ockels and his team aren’t the only people in search of energy from a higher place. In 2007, Google bought out Makani, a Californian-based company partaking in similar experiments.

So what makes this simple concept so appealing? Well apart from the aesthetically pleasing view of hundreds of colourful kites flying high in the sky, the proposition of a cost-effective kite farm could spell the end of wind turbines, which are to many, an expensive, noisy, eyesore.

“Environmentally-friendly” wind turbines have been slammed by just about everyone since they were first introduced in Britain back in the early fifties. If people aren’t complaining about the noise of them (which isn’t even that loud – there’s one practically on my doorstep, and I can’t hear it!), or the fact that they ruin the landscape, then there’s always the environmentalists’ argument that they are a threat to bats and birds.

But what makes the kites really special is their ability to reach higher altitudes, where the energy source is more abundant and reliable. The blades of a standard wind turbine sit about 80 metres from the ground, where the wind speed is about five metres per second. At 800 metres though, wind speed rises to seven metres per second, meaning a considerable amount more energy could be generated. It’s virtually impossible to build a turbine to this height, but flying a kite that high is, well child’s play really.

Ockels’ kite farm may prove to be a renewable energy triumph, but only if he can power past the cynics scepticism of his design, and get the money to fund the project. Ockels has said that commercial systems large enough to power whole towns could be operational within the next five years, if the money is made available; otherwise the technology could languish in the lab for a decade or more.

With many a misanthropist ridiculing his idea, I really hope Ockels doesn’t shelve his ‘giant kite farm’ plans. Because if the kite generators do ever make it out of the workshop, they may silence the critics who have complained about the noise and hazard that comes with wind turbines. And, with renewable energy sources sprouting up just about everywhere these days, they are becoming a lot cheaper for customers, which could force the “Big Six” to consider lowering their energy costs.

I guess only time will tell…

 Pram wheels

Toyota Prius drivers: smug champagne environmentalists, or eco-friendly innovators?

It’s a debate that’s raged since the introduction of Toyota’s ground breaking hybrid car, exacerbated by the emergence of the G-Whizz electric vehicle in recent years.

The doubters gained a foothold when it was announced the Prius is not as environmentally sensitive as most envisaged. The problem lies in the construction of Prius components, the worst culprit being the battery.

The nickel used in Prius batteries is mined and smelted at a site so ecologically stark that NASA regularly uses the area to test moon roving vehicles. Known locally as the ‘Superstack’, the plant spreads sulphur dioxide all across northern Ontario, Canada, in the form of acid rain. The battery then chalks up a series of transcontinental miles (via China, Europe, Japan and the USA) in order to be moulded into the finished article.

However, before you nod sagely and say ‘hmmm yes, I always knew that car was a con’, Toyota is staging an epic comeback.

The third generation Prius, due to be launched next year, will be part solar powered. Well, at least the air conditioning will be solar powered anyway. The solar panels will be made by Kyocera and will provide some of the two to five kilowatts used by the air conditioning system.

Is that enough to counter-balance the landscape wrecking rain cloud pumped out at the battery factory?

Of course it isn’t.

 Shiny Happy People? Not exactly…

There’s something I just can’t let pass right now, and it’s a three pronged attack.

My bugbear bleeds neatly into yesterday’s npower bashing on Times Online, and I know I wanted everyone to stay positive and concentrate on the pleasing aspects of their energy supplier, but it’s possible today’s post may degenerate into something of a rant (I’m just so complex).

I’m taking the line ‘I know that this is vitriol, no solution, spleen venting’ from REM’s magnum opus ‘Ignoreland’ as my call to arms, so forgive me. I’m so mad i could throw a yoghurt at someone, even though i haven’t been mixing sleeping tablets with alcohol, and i don’t have an ego problem.

Ok, so it’s three pronged……….

(1) npower announced a new eco-friendly initiative yesterday called the ‘Climate Cops’ scheme. Effectively, it’s a series of lectures and practical courses aimed at young students in order to make them more ecologically switched on.

The campaign is fronted by the professionally chirpy Fearne Cotton, and the gainfully unemployed Piers Morgan, with Mr Morgan choosing the winning school at the end of the twelve month course. The school judged to have applied itself most unswervingly to its chosen green project will receive a cheque for £20,000, which must be spent on improving the school’s ecological infrastructure.

I digest the press release, I believe it to be a worthy cause and, despite the recent troubles npower has experienced, I think it’s a step in the right direction. So I write a news article on this development (see the ‘Energy News’ section), and proceed to go about my business in a typically eager and dedicated fashion.

Until……..

(2) …….it’s brought to my attention around mid-afternoon npower has raised online dual fuel tariff prices by a whopping 20%. Great, thanks very much for that, I’m really glad I fought your corner.

Essentially, the Sign Online 10 tariff has been scrapped, and replaced by the new, more expensive Sign Online 11 tariff.  A quick bit of maths in the office shows the Sign Online 11 tariff is still the cheapest on the market (by £10 from British Gas Click Energy 5), so all is not lost.

Like a scratched record (and not even a good one, this is like a scratched copy of ‘How can we be lovers if we can’t be friends’ by Michael Bolton) the same reason has been trotted out for this price rise as those we heard previously this year: escalating wholesale costs and exorbitant crude oil prices.

Which would be fairly easy to stomach, if……….

(3) ……Shell and BP hadn’t announced combined first quarter profits of £7.2 billion this lunchtime.

How much money do they want? What can you even do with £7.2 billion? There aren’t enough consumables in the world to spend that amount of money on! It makes me want to throw up, and I’m not even an anarchist or especially right on.

Right, let me just take a breath for a moment.

That’s better. The BP profit represents a rise of nearly 50% on last quarter, whereas Shell can boast only a paltry 12% gain. The increase has been driven by higher petrol and diesel costs set by the companies in the light of (you guessed it) rising crude oil prices.

Just to conclude, rather than absorb some or all of the rising crude oil costs, petrol companies have elected to rip us off at the petrol pumps, and energy companies have chosen to rip us off in our own homes.

Gee, thanks. Again.

I think I’ll listen to ‘Everybody Hurts’ now, just to cheer myself up a bit.

Anyone else feel like venting?

 Marsh Warbler just out of shot

News this week that’ll keep Bill Oddie ‘twitching’ for all he’s worth (that’s bird spotting terminology by the way, although he may have an impediment, I don’t really know), involves proposals for a new onshore wind farm on the Isle of Lewis being rejected due to the harm it could cause to local wildfowl.

Plans for the 181 turbine wind farm were scrapped when, under European law (calm down Clarkson), the area in which the wind farm was to be situated has been deemed a ‘special protection area’ for rare and endangered bird species.

So, in the clamour to save the world from the evil clutches of noxious fumes, greenhouse gases and man’s own hell-bent need for self-destruction, it’s actually one of the living creatures we’re doing all this for that’s preventing the construction of a renewable energy source complex. Hmmmm…….

Don’t get me wrong; I’m by no means a Chelsea tractor toting, wildlife hating, myopic urbanite. I’m from the country and grew up in a house with a huge garden. It backed onto rolling fields inhabited by Friesian cows and retired ponies (who I talked to and befriended, in the absence of other children my age).

However, I have a confession to make. I love the way wind farms look. I think their aesthetic quality is second to none, and they make for a perfect marriage of nature and engineering. When suddenly they appear over the brow of a hill on a twisty country road, it gives me a buzz. The most breathtaking wind farms are those built at sea, particularly the one at Caister, on the Norfolk coast.

So where do I stand on this debate? Well, I’ll nail my colours to the mast. I’m a huge advocate of wind farm technology, and if a few birds have to be sacrificed in order for wind power to be harnessed, so be it.

Bird/animal/wildlife lovers, please lambaste me with your comments.

Just to throw another canister of diesel onto the fire (causing an o-zone busting mushroom cloud), I was given a free bag for life at Marks and Spencer ‘Simply Food’ last weekend, and when I visited the same shop yesterday night, I forgot my free bag for life and got another free bag for life. Now I have two free bags for life, one for this world, and one (if the environmentalists get their hands on me) for the afterlife.