Maglev Wind Power Generator

Wind Turbines in China
Magnetic levitation is an important new development to reduce stress from the mechanical load on the wind turbine. That such development was first announced in China is indicative of a new mandate for renewable energy from Beijing.

Clean Break tells us that in China engineers have demonstrated a full-permanent magnetic levitation wind power generator. Worldwatch Institute is heralding the announcement as a key breakthrough in the evolution of global wind power technology.

Guokun Li, chief of Zhongke Energy and lead developer on the project, made a presentation about the new magnetic levitation generator at the Wind Power Asia Exhibition 2006 held June 28 in Beijing. The new wind power technology was the result of collaboration between Guangzhou Energy Research Institute, under China’s Academy of Sciences, and Guangzhou Zhongke Hengyuan Energy Science & Technology Co., Ltd.

Li stated that he expected “Maglev” to boost wind energy generating capacity by as much as 20 percent over traditional wind turbines, which could cut operational expenses in half. Another feature was the ability of the “Maglev” to utilize winds with starting speeds as low as 1.5 meters per second (m/s), and cut-in speeds of 3 m/s, which Li anticipated could keep overall cost under 0.4 yuan ($US 5 cents) per killowatt. “When compared with the operational hours of existing wind turbines, the new technology will add an additional 1,000 hours of operation annually to wind power plants in areas with an average wind speed of 3 m/s.”

According to Worldwatch researcher Janet Sawin, global sales of wind power equipment reached $10 billion in 2004 and are estimated to reach $49 billion per year by 2012. Not known as a wind energy market in comparison with Europe or North America, observers see this announcement as part of intensification by China’s national government in the development of renewable energy resources.

Instead of single permanent magnets, magnetic levitation uses Halbach arrays.

3 Comments

jcwinnie

Posted 2006-7-6 at 9:30 am | Permalink

Official GE Press Release, via Renewable Energy Access, via Trehugger:

Wind power is expected to play a significant role in supporting China’s national target to create 30 gigawatts of new, renewable energy capacity by 2020. With a potential wind power capacity of 250 gigawatts onshore and 750 gigawatts offshore, China holds the largest wind resource of any country in the world.

Over the past two years, GE has committed a total of 700 megawatts of its advanced wind turbine technology for China, which can power approximately 700,000 Chinese homes – while preventing future carbon dioxide emissions of more than 1.4 million tons per year.[...]

GE’s 1.5-megawatt wind turbines, the largest capacity units installed in China, are among the world’s most widely sold turbines in the megawatt class, with approximately 4,500 installed worldwide. These units are becoming well-established in Asia, with 1,040 megawatts of capacity committed for wind power projects in the region.
jcwinnie

Posted 2006-7-10 at 9:41 pm | Permalink

Commenting on a Treehugger article about the same unveiling of a magnetic levitation wind turbine by China, Jason states:

I would guess that the permanent magnet system they are using is simliar to the one developed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories in the mid-90′s (which was pretty neat because it incorporated a method called a Halbach Array to maximize the downward flux lines and increase magnetic repulsive forces). It will be very interesting to see if this draws the attention of Dr. Post and his team for potential revitalization of the technology.

The theoretical limit of efficiency in a Halbach array increases as the polarity angle in decreased; this requires a large array size, so instead of the minimum of 5 magnets for a simple Halbach array you have to increase to something on the order of 11 or 13 magnets for the 99.99 efficiency percentile. This results in the flux lines extending further from the source (more repulsive force); at the sime time, however, this increases the start-up resistance to the point that this is no minor force to overcome and will require stronger shafting, heavier gearing, and in general more weight to withstand the higher torques required to overcome the initial startup.

All in all, these are only academic points and I by no means am discrediting the theories. I wrote my dissertation on Maglev transportation employing the Halbach permanent magnet array and still have a passion for the subject.
jcwinnie

Posted 2006-7-25 at 8:12 am | Permalink

Jeremy Faludi has a bit more technical information about this development. There still is little known about the actual product.

After Gutenberg