Greenward Technologies Announces Their “Next Generation” Wind Turbine Program

Oct. 4, 2010 - PRLog -- Greenward Technologies today unveiled some interesting aspects of a new system architecture for small to mid-sized wind turbines that the company plans to bring to market.  Larry Haworth, the company’s CEO stated, “We are now seeking strategic partners with global capabilities and funding to move forward on an expedited schedule to commercialize a new line of small to mid-sized wind turbines employing the advanced technology that the company has developed.”  

The company is challenging other technologies that have gotten recent attention and investment in the rapidly growing market for small wind turbines.  According to Ed Salter, the company’s CTO: “The three blade horizontal axis design is here to stay. It was the only serious contender for our Next Generation program. Many of the other supposedly new ideas that are being promoted today, including all sorts of vertical axis machines and shrouded turbines, have proven that they could not compete decades ago and the companies that previously built them have all gone out of business. However, our version of the three blade turbine is very different from the technologies used in large wind turbines of today. We start with three blade Flexible Rotor technology that uses our “Falcon III” rotor blades. The Flex Rotor provides a multitude of benefits in terms of rotor dynamics, weight and load reduction, and the Falcon III technology addresses noise problems arising from a phenomenon known as blade vortex interaction, or BVI”.

Salter knows something about flexible rotors, having built the first three blade turbine using this technology in 1976 during his eleven year tenure as CEO at Wind Power Systems, Inc. He also designed the blades that were used in a U. S. Department of Energy funded program to develop a bladder molding process for small wind turbine blades in 2004.  Alaska Applied Sciences, Inc. was the prime contractor on this research project, which gave Salter the opportunity to continue his advancements in Flex Rotor technology.  The research project was conducted with wind turbines located in North Palm Springs, California.  Salter added, “The federally funded program provided us with a test bed at a site with a brutal wind regime. The new 6 meter blades installed on the test turbines exhibited ideal dynamic performance and at 20 kilograms each, set a new standard for low blade mass for a 12 meter turbine.”  

The company disclosed that a further technology advancement included in the Next Generation design is scalable transverse flux generator technology.  According to Salter, “We came to the conclusion in 2008 that we could not achieve our objectives for cost and reliability by using a conventional radial flux generator, so we had to come up with a viable alternative. Transverse flux technology allows us to meet our cost, weight and service life numbers. It is a major contributor to meeting our specific mass target of less than 5.0 kg per square meter for our counter rotating modular turbines in sizes from 5 kW to 125 kW.”  Using these technologies, Greenward Technology plans to commercialize the world’s first expandable wind turbine array.

More information on the “Next Generation Challenge” can be found on the company’s website.

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Greenward Technologies, Inc. is an innovator and service provider in the renewable energy space. The Company advances its intellectual property from concept to reality by bringing ideas together with human and financial resources, designing, building and testing prototypes, then creating new companies to manufacture these new product lines, or licensing the intellectual property to its manufacturing partners. The Company's staff also provides its clients with concept evaluation, engineering review and due diligence services. The company is based in Austin, Texas and has a Technology Center in San Diego, California. More information can be found at http://greenward-technologies.com.