Windside - A Different Kind Of Wind Turbine
The common picture we have of wind turbines are the ones which stand on tubular towers and have three rotor blades, varying in different sizes. The design is very much similar to the windmills of old, which were used to pump water and grind grain. However, Risto Joutsiniemi had already developed another kind of wind turbine over two decades ago - the Windside vertical wind turbine. Its a unique product which has many advantages in comparison to the horizontal wind turbine, most notably that they are able to operate at very low wind speeds and in extreme temperatures.
I became aware of Windside a few years back when we were doing research at the University about wind turbine manufacturers in Finland. The Windside turbine stood out, being completely silent and able to operate in different environments - from the freezing and snow swept mountains of Antarctica to the blazing Sahara desert, the Windside turbine worked in the harshest of environments. Add to this that it can already operate in wind speeds as low as 1-3 m/s and that it doesn't kill birds and you've got a superb product.
The company is not currently marketing their product for energy production, but as wind turbines for charging batteries, sending signals, pumping water and providing light, heat and ventilation; aimed at the professional market. The turbines are used on ocean buoys, remote telecommunication posts, expedition ships and lighthouses. Nevertheless, they are currently developing a product for energy production, so we are curious to see what they come up with. Somewhere in the depths of their website they explain that the current turbines could be scaled up to tens of meters, which would be an interesting development.
Windside has over 340 shareholders, but they are looking for a main investor that is ready to invest about €20m. I speculate that this will go into R&D and production of their new turbine. The majority of their clients are professional marine, safety and telecommunications companies, but if you have a cottage on an island and are looking for a way to power your TV, you also can buy one of their smaller models at Bauhaus in Finland. The lack of marketing for the consumer option really has me puzzled: every cottage owner I talked to loved the idea of the turbine, but has never heard of it. Given that Windside says their product has a lifetime of 100 years and can then be recycled, I am perplexed as to why they do not market themselves more to consumers.
The bottom line is that I am still fascinated by the Windside turbine, and should I one day become a cottage owner I will get one to power the fridge. But I wonder if the archaic website together with the limited marketing is helping the company in its search for an investor, especially if I see the efforts their competitors Helix Wind and TMA make. It also seems a turn in strategy would be advisable, and to concentrate equally on consumers and professionals - and in future on energy production. Wind energy is growing in importance in today's energy mix, so it would be sad to see Windside being unsuccessful in the age of renewable energy.
Photo courtesy of Wikikko.
There's yet another competitor to Windside, the Lauttasaari (Finland) based Cypress Wind : cypresswind.com. This is the company behind the cellular network base station wind power solution: http://www.elisa.com/english/index.cfm?t=7&o=7120.00&did=15558
Hei Tuomas, thank you for the info, Cypress Wind is a new name for me, and interesting to know that there's even more competition.
Will be very interesting to see how (well) a large vertical turbine works.
From the website: "The Windside Wind Turbine produces a minimum 30-50 % more electricity per year than other wind turbines with the same swept area." The swept area of a vertical turbine is of course only a fraction of a "traditional mill". For example a 10m high vertical turbine will have a swept area of about 10m2. A similar sized mill (with blades of 5m length) sweeps approx 75m2. If the mill produces 100 units/yr of energy then the vertical turbine can be expected to generate roughly 22 units/yr, including the claimed 50% higher efficiency.
Don't get me wrong, I like the vertical turbines, they're great for certain applications, such as residential deployments. But one needs quite many more of them to get the same amount of energy.
Disclaimer: I'm Dutch, so supposed to like mills ;)
P.S. In case the good folks at Windside read this: "a minimum 30-50% more" is an oxymoron; almost like a Matti Nykänen quote.
I have to admit that it is very difficult to believe the statement of better efficiency of vertical ratator compared to traditional mill. I have seen numbers of highest theorethical efficiency of abt. 50% of traditional mill, and 20...30% for vertical rotator. Practical efficiency is of course much, much lower.
Vertical mill may still give you more electrical power per year, because:
- it works with wider range of windspeed, and in turbulent wind. So it rotates if there only is any sort of air movement.
- It's more reliable (no gearbox, less moving parts), so downtime per year is much smaller.
- the range of rotation is smaller and rotation speed is lower, so the "blades" don't need electrical heating in freezing conditions. Traditional mill becomes easily eccentric when it icy, so the mill either needs heating or it needs to be shut down.
I believe there is a place and conditions for traditional mills and for vertical rotators. But highest currencies are made with traditional wind power plants. Vertical rotation is for place where reliability goes before everything.
By the way, I agree that website of Windside really needs some upgrading..
Hei Robert & Tuomas, thank you for the good comments.
@ Robert, I have not much of an idea what Windside is working on at the moment, I just suspect it is a similar design just scaled up. I think this could work for larger scale energy production if they get it right. Add in some nice colours and it goes through as art which produces electricity. I'm curious to see what they come up with. For the moment their products are well suited for the applications they're intended for, and in household energy production they should be good option for an additional energy source.
@ Tuomas, you're correct, there is a place for both designs at the moment. But if Windside is able to produce their current product on a larger scale, I do believe they might win against rotor wind turbines; given the advantages of the design as you listed them. Problem is, Windside is a small company which doesn't seem to think very big. And if you don't think big, you're not going to make the next innovation.
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