IEEE Spectrum: Floating Wind Turbines Could Expand Offshore Possibilities

To take advantage of the wind blowing over deeper water, there is movement now to use floating wind turbines as a way of avoiding the need to anchor into a deep sea bed. According to one company, the biggest turbines currently available could feasibly work on such floating rigs.

Marine Innovation & Technology's WindFloat can theoretically support giant 5-MW turbines. The floating rig, made up essentially of three platforms with the turbine tower extending from one of them, is designed to withstand the rigors of a "100-year storm," according to a paper published in the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy earlier this month (by company employees). And according to Principle Power, who has purchased the technology for WindFloat, several projects are in the works that could see turbines in the water by 2011 or 2012...

Other companies, though, are already steps ahead: Norwegian oil and gas giant Statoil recently completed construction of its first floating turbine several miles off the coast of Norway. Dubbed the Hywind, the company will spend the next two years testing the turbine before moving forward with further installations.

According to UPI, the WindFloat prototype is being "built in collaboration with electricity company Energia de Portugal should be in the water by the end of 2012". Principle Power has a floating wind project planned for off the Oregon coast too, but it's in the early stages.

i'd personally like to apologise for only harvesting 2.3 kw from my roof.

and not wearing white clothes for albedo.

also.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

Still working on how to fund it with carbon credits though......

"The future is already here -- it's just not very evenly distributed" William Gibson