Nice idea but I think building an erector/launch cradle on one end and a set of ballast tanks on the end of a conventional barge would be more cost effective.

Nice idea but ... what about 4 wind turbines connected together as a cross. By powering the turbines they become motors and you can then fly the assembly as a quadrocopter. Fly above where you want to put them, press a button to split and they fall towards the sea. A spike in the base of each, combined with the force due to acceleration, and each turbine should plant itself in the seabed.
Plan B - build the turbine/quatdorcopter as a group of 4 on a circular tube. Land the tube on water, then submerge with the tube becoming the base for the group

@Richard - I thought we were trying to save power here? and how do you propose powering those blades while it\'s in the air? Sounds more like pie in the sky rather than wind turbine in the sky... *should plant itself in the seabed*... hard cheese if it doesn\'t!! LOL

This approach seems much faster and less labor intensive. I think it will be a winner.

Richard, while some turbines are built upon foundations on the seabed, these are deep water turbines and therefore remain bouyant. So no spikes etc.
My one class in Naval Architecture tells me that both bodies would have to be ballasted such that upon detachment they do not slip relative to each other. That may seem simple but I bet in practice it is much more difficult.
This design reminds me of the US Navy\'s research vessel that uprights itself at sea to create a work platform. On that note, why does the barge have to support the entire tower? Why not use part of the bouyancy of the tower and create a smaller float at the generator end? It would seem to make uprighting the contraption much easier.

Wow--seems so obvious--of course--after someone else has worked out all the details.
Richard, I think you might have watched a bit too much of Inspector Gadget.

Better yet why dont we just stick decommissioned helicopters in the ocean to generate power?

re; Peter Kowalchuk-Reid
I hope that is snark.

Vahrman: lay off the weed, or at least don\'t post when stoned. In addition to failing to address the huge battery bank required to drive the blades, the fluid dynamics in the design of a blade to extract power from 30 mph winds at 6-8 rpm is far different than that of one designed to be driven by a 1,000 hp turbine engine at 300 rpm and tip speeds approaching mach 1.

Isn\'t is amazing that this very low efficiency approach to trying to extract energy from 3 bladed propellers designed in 1946 prevails.
It\'s asl if efficiency in the engineering world is being totally ignored... a rupture in logic that blindly continues.
The best way to extract energy from the wind is to resist it like a spinnaker not a damned propeller.
There is something corrupt in deep denial going on as if humanity is incapable of understanding the the Betz limit can be easily hit and never with these absurd contraptions.
Bill