NEW USE FOR WINDMILLS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18322, 12 August 1921, Page 6

NEW USE FOR WINDMILLS

GENERATION OF ELECTRICITY. " Many attempts havo been made to »lve the problem of efficiently utilising the winds as a means of generating electricity. The niniculties arise from the extreme- -variations in the force of the wind and from the liability, even in windy regions, to periods of calm during which no power at all can be obtained, ihese conditions suggest that wind power should be used only as an auxiliary to some other source ot energy, such as the burning of coal or oil. Now that fuel of all sorts has multiplied ~ in price, there is all the more reason for considering the possibility of turning the wind to account. Hitherto tne usual plan has been to use a large slow-speed windmill to drive a dynamo at a high speed through gearing —a rather wasteful arrangement. During the war, however, there was in Great Britain a remarkable development in the design and construction of small high-speed dynamos on aeroplanes. These dynamos were direct-coupled to propellers, or rather "impellers,'' driven by the wind created by the aeroplane in flight. A British firm has devised a scheme for fitting three or more of these wind-dynamos on the swivelling top of a vertical pole; with a vane to keep them in position against the wind. Each equipment gives 60 watts, and the arrangement forms a cheap and efficient auxiliary to the ordinary country-house lighting installation. The energy produced is, of course, stored in accumulators in the usual way. The operation of the plant is entirely automatic, and it is so light and simple that it presents no obstacles in erection and maintenance.