The European Tribune is a forum for thoughtful dialogue of European and international issues. You are invited to post comments and your own articles.
Please REGISTER to post.
Then when you need to go again, the engine needs to start back up. (Obviously it's more complicated than that!) So the immediate reaction of the hybrid-car-denier community was "that's going to wear out your starter motor really fast!"
But obviously it doesn't wear out your "starter motor" because there is no starter motor. It's some combination of traction motor or motors, depending on the system, but the old-fashioned starter motor with Bendix drive engaging the flywheel is not in the picture at all.
Similarly with wind turbines, what you have today is a pretty complicated system with high-load gearing between the hub and the generator, plus what amounts to a helicoptor rotor blade management system to deal with varying wind strengths. The gearing can be replaced by direct drive connections, and one would think that over time the blade management system could also be simplified. So there's lots of space for technical improvements that go in the direction of simplification of the mechanical system--potentially down to something with very few moving parts.
Meanwhile, despite 60+ years of investment in engineering, nuclear reactors are fundamentally complicated, dangerous, and expensive.
by Frank Schnittger - Mar 11 11 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Mar 8 3 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Mar 6 4 comments
by gmoke - Mar 7
by Frank Schnittger - Mar 2 1 comment
by Frank Schnittger - Mar 5 2 comments
by gmoke - Feb 25
by Oui - Mar 261 comment
by Oui - Mar 259 comments
by Oui - Mar 244 comments
by Oui - Mar 246 comments
by Oui - Mar 23
by Oui - Mar 231 comment
by Oui - Mar 211 comment
by Oui - Mar 191 comment
by Oui - Mar 19
by Oui - Mar 18
by Oui - Mar 175 comments
by Oui - Mar 16
by Oui - Mar 165 comments
by Oui - Mar 1510 comments
by Oui - Mar 155 comments
by Oui - Mar 147 comments
by Oui - Mar 1312 comments
by Oui - Mar 12
by Oui - Mar 1113 comments