grate vid. Check out the comments,some of the first post are from @#*!@ bird nuts. :flaming:

I've heard of kites being used to produce power before. But how exactly does it work?

Traditional sources of electricity (except solar) work by turning a generator (coil of wire in a magnet, electrons induced to move by a changing magnetic field). How does sweeping the sky with a kite turn a generator? Or is that a secret?

Force of kite pulls on a reel paying it, spinning the generator. At a certain point the kite is de-powered and some of the power is used to reel it back in. Several work in opposing cycles, like pistons in a car. Always sounded awkward to me. Nevermind having to clear large swaths of airspace all the way to the jetstream.


If this guys had a different spin, they did not share it. Not a great vid, IMO.

This link will reveal all

http://www.makanipower.com/

But they left us a nice document!
:bigok:

https://storage.googleapis.com/x-prod.appspot.com/files/Maka...

I recall back in 2006-2007 (long before my kiting interest took off) I was approached by a guy wanting some help getting a contract with a utility company to demonstrate this sort of tech, but at much higher altitudes. Long story short, the project seemed a bit hair brained, but valid enough that it might work. For various reasons though the project never went anywhere. There are organizations that are into promoting and developing kite/wind power that can be found on google and youtube. I think this video kind of show why it's going to be a hard sell - if it takes a 747 sized wing to generate 6 mW, it's going to cost a lot. If there is drop in the wind, the kite might suddenly falls out of the sky and someone might die or at the least you might have to buy a new 747 size wing.

I guess my cynical mind, with the MO, "follow the Money" lead to Microsoft Bill, needed a good tax Write-off, and this Was A "Noble- Effort"
there is no problem where there is too much money than can be thrown at it!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qd_hEja6bzE&t=283s

but Recently he has moved onto buying up most of the farmland in US to start farming Crickets.

Here's a link to a company in the Netherlands that has a portable generator powered by a kite. Essentially a computer "flies" the kite actively in the power zone and the kite tension turns a generator drum to produce electrons that are stored in the battery system. Once the kite spools out, the kite's angle of attack is reduced and some of the generated power reverses the drum and winds the kite back down for another trip up. Rinse, lather, repeat, etc.... It's clever, portable and completely green when the wind blows. They are marketing these systems as an emergency backup generators for windy locations or as green stand-alone generators where there are reliable winds.
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Still pretty cool, though, as a way to store and convert the wind energy into potential energy to be used for other purposes.
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TheKitePower