Alternative Energies and Design
May. 28th, 2008 03:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
helwenHave started reading this very cool page on Biomimicry: Are Humans Smarter Than Sea Sponges
Goes into how folks are studying nature and trying to use designs and processes from nature for things like getting power from ocean waves (with 'blades' like kelp that get moved by the waves) or considering how the humpback's fin design might work for windmills in low-wind locations. Also talks about stuff like how the parts could possibly be created by being 'grown' (if biochemically, then has reaction has to be able to happen at room temperature). Will probably take me a while to get through it all... whee!
Was talking about some of the above with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fitzw, and had a thought as we were talking about a bunch of stuff of this not-so-crazy idea, which involves....
Stirling engines are cool devices, the design for which was originally invented in 1816 by Robert Stirling.
How they work
I like Stirling engines. They can be useful at different sizes, and although usually made of metal, parts of them can be made of wood. (Some parts must be out of metal though). They work using heat, and there are folks who are doing stuff at industrial sites with making them more efficient by using the waste heat from various processes, saving fuel. You can even get them to work with solar power, if they're small anyway...
I haven't given a lot of though to how one would make a Stirling-type engine (or something completely different that uses temperature differentials) in a sustainable fashion -- living on a farm, I tend to think more of what scrap stuff might I be able to find and re-use, but...
Wouldn't it be cool to have a whale-fluke windmill with a Stirling engine? I was thinking that the engine could be paired with wind and solar (and yes, I found examples of both online, so it's not original to me) -- here's a Wikipedia entry on all this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirling_engine (just not with the whale-fluke blades)
Doing a search for "stirling engine wind" got me not only the above link but also links for sites doing real world construction of solar- and wind-power combined with Stirling engines.
Page with lots of links for Stirling engine info, from large-scale power projects to plans for building your own little engine: http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/StirlingEngine/index.html
***
T'would be very cool to build something like this, whether for generating and using/storing power, or cooling, or whatever. And of course we'd have to make it look nice, maybe paint or stain it, carve some detail-work in here and there... sort of... steampunk... as it were.
Goes into how folks are studying nature and trying to use designs and processes from nature for things like getting power from ocean waves (with 'blades' like kelp that get moved by the waves) or considering how the humpback's fin design might work for windmills in low-wind locations. Also talks about stuff like how the parts could possibly be created by being 'grown' (if biochemically, then has reaction has to be able to happen at room temperature). Will probably take me a while to get through it all... whee!
Was talking about some of the above with
fitzw, and had a thought as we were talking about a bunch of stuff of this not-so-crazy idea, which involves....Stirling engines are cool devices, the design for which was originally invented in 1816 by Robert Stirling.
How they work
I like Stirling engines. They can be useful at different sizes, and although usually made of metal, parts of them can be made of wood. (Some parts must be out of metal though). They work using heat, and there are folks who are doing stuff at industrial sites with making them more efficient by using the waste heat from various processes, saving fuel. You can even get them to work with solar power, if they're small anyway...
I haven't given a lot of though to how one would make a Stirling-type engine (or something completely different that uses temperature differentials) in a sustainable fashion -- living on a farm, I tend to think more of what scrap stuff might I be able to find and re-use, but...
Wouldn't it be cool to have a whale-fluke windmill with a Stirling engine? I was thinking that the engine could be paired with wind and solar (and yes, I found examples of both online, so it's not original to me) -- here's a Wikipedia entry on all this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirling_engine (just not with the whale-fluke blades)
Doing a search for "stirling engine wind" got me not only the above link but also links for sites doing real world construction of solar- and wind-power combined with Stirling engines.
Page with lots of links for Stirling engine info, from large-scale power projects to plans for building your own little engine: http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/StirlingEngine/index.html
***
T'would be very cool to build something like this, whether for generating and using/storing power, or cooling, or whatever. And of course we'd have to make it look nice, maybe paint or stain it, carve some detail-work in here and there... sort of... steampunk... as it were.
