WWII veteran creates bird-friendly wind turbine

Studies funded by the Department of Energy over 30 years ago conclusively proved that concentrator ducts don't help. I strongly doubt he really got "double the output" or a measurable increase at all. That's as much exaggeration as the purported output of William Allison's turbine, which nobody else has ever been able to confirm. (Preemptive strike before Island Architect brings up his name for the umpteenth time.) While diffuser ducts do work, the problem remains that a large duct for a large turbine would be heavy and expensive, which is why utility scale turbines haven't been built with those, either.

Best say first that I love inventions...but.. Too bad that physics say that the longer the turbine blades are the more efficient the wind turbine gets. And also I am quite sure that when you have a "wind cone" it doesn´t let the air compress it self but makes like an air "bubble" and thus the new air goes around the inlet. (Much like the old "cone goggles" for motor-bikers). Data suggest that turning the cone around and flaring it more will give more help for this turbine. Where the cone creates a low pressure behind the blades and then sucks more air into the turbine. But this is already patented..(sorry).. But to protect bats I'd suggest some type of speaker that operates at the bat range of hearing and thus scares them away. (Is there really any hard data on how many birds and bats that actually die from hitting wind-farms?) The blades spin fast enough that a bat should "see" them even if it goes past fast. Keep trying my fellow inventor, but I do feel like this way is not going to work well enough.

This does in actual fact not compress the air at all. It is called the venturi effect. When air is forced through a narrow section like this, the air speeds up, but both the temperature and pressure drop. It does however increase the yield on the rotor.

I hate to say it: He's not the first to try this approach, won't be the last, and it won't work once again. It may be bird friendly, though it is by no means more efficient: It is simply not possible to draw more than 37% of the energy out of any section of free flowing air: The remaining air is simply going to flow around the obstacle, that is the turbine, or the duct, should there be any. It's just physics and should already have been discovered before WWII.

One of the main objections to the existing 3 rotor based windfarms is their blight on the landscape. Whilst most Doctor Who fans might be thrilled to gaze out at a swarm of flying Daleks hovering menacingly over the English countryside, I can't imagine many other people being delighted at the prospect.

We are starting to see wind turbine wings 75 meters long - just trying to imagine the size needed for one of these compressor to perform similar makes my head hurt. I simply don't see it especially since the whole concept is questionable.

This gets "invented" several times every year. If people really cared about bird strikes, they'd get serious about painting turbines purple, which makes them stealthy to insects, and thus not worth the risk for hunting birds. Birds are smart enough to not get struck, but the pressure changes from a near miss wreck their lungs.

@Martinkopplow, and Ed. The maximum amount of power that can theoretically be extracted from an area of wind is the Betz limit, and it is 59.3%. If you take more than that, you reduce the local wind speed too much and hit diminishing returns. Shrouded fans are useful for limited spaces, but are otherwise always uneconomic. Adding the shroud material to the blade tips helps more.

It's common sense that if you 'funnel' the air you can use a much smaller (and therefore cheaper) turbine, because it will be driven by much faster wind than without the funnel. Look at all the examples above.
This guy's invention isn't particularly brilliant, I and I'm sure thousands of others have thought of exactly the same thing before, but as for Gadgeteer's brilliant comment: "While diffuser ducts do work, the problem remains that a large duct for a large turbine would be heavy and expensive," LOL! Never heard of ripstop nylon? Or Dacron? The problem with 99% of new wind turbine designs is that the designers are unable to think of the magic words 'cost per kilowatt', and instead want their turbine to LOOK 'modern'.
Efficiency is irrelevant, ALL that matters is COST PER KILOWATT. Wind turbines should be made with Dacron and use concentrators made of the same.
Would love to see the 'Department of Energy' papers which claim concentrators don't work! Who do you believe? Me, or your own lying eyes? LOL!
Just look at some of the concepts at http://salientwhiteelephant.wordpress.com/
For example, the Circular Wind Dam, an excellent idea. The whole point of using concentrators is that they can be built out of very cheap materials, i.e. Dacron, or bricks, strawbales, etc. thus reducing the size of wind turbine needed to extract the same amount of energy as a much larger, un-'concentrated' one would.
And LOL at the commenters claiming that the wind would just 'go round' the concentrator... LOL!
I can't believe you can't even grasp such a simple concept - if the wind speed is 10mph, the air that enters the concentrator will be moving a lot faster by the time it reaches the turbine at the end. Do you think that sufficient wind will somehow move BACKWARDS and thus go AROUND the concentrator (LOL) to prevent the wind speed at the turbine being much higher than that of the rest of the wind?

Wow seems like a pointless "invention" to me. Are people aware that birds die? I mean they die, period. Sometimes they get the flue, sometimes they fly into windows, sometimes other birds get them.
wind turbines only have value if the produce more electricity then it cost to make. The most cost effective turbines have 3 blades and are as big and high as possible.
If this confuses people, oh well. If you were really concerned about birds you could do more research into blade color, reflective material, sound or "scarecrows" to keep birds away from moving blades.
I am happy this ww2 vet is doing something, but Please don't call something so silly news, its been done before and it wasn't worth noting then.