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Capturing A River's Energy With Wings

Brown University's Water Wing project, a device designed to harness river energy, appealed to Tom Derecktor, CEO of BluSource Energy Inc., because the potential for harnessing river energy is "24 hours a day."
Ambar Espinoza / RIPR
Brown University's Water Wing project, a device designed to harness river energy, appealed to Tom Derecktor, CEO of BluSource Energy Inc., because the potential for harnessing river energy is "24 hours a day."

Humans have been harnessing energy from rivers for thousands of years. Think water wheels from Ancient Greece and modern hydropower plants, like the Hoover Dam. Brown University engineers have a new take on a hydropower device that could harness enough energy to power communities in remote locations or along fast-flowing rivers.

Research engineer Jen Cardona, Brown University engineering professor Shreyas Mandre, and graduate student Michael Miller tested their Water Wing project along the Taunton River throughout the summer. The Water Wing performed exactly as they anticipated.
Credit Ambar Espinoza / RIPR
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RIPR
Research engineer Jen Cardona, Brown University engineering professor Shreyas Mandre, and graduate student Michael Miller tested their Water Wing project along the Taunton River throughout the summer. The Water Wing performed exactly as they anticipated.

At a marina along the Taunton River, researchers are getting ready to test an instrument designed to generate electricity from moving water. The device has slender rectangular paddles that mimic the movement of flying or swimming animals, “such as bats and insects and whales,” said graduate student Michael Miller.

Miller said the paddles, or “wings,” produce electricity as they flap up and down. The motion creates a vortex. “So it’s the same motion as a whale’s tail, but instead of thrusting through the water, we’re taking energy out of the water,” said Miller.

The team built this prototype to produce one kilowatt of energy – enough to power a small house. They call it the Water Wing. Engineers have attached it to a boat to simulate how the wings would move in a flowing river.

Brown University engineering professorShreyasMandrecanfeelthe energy the wings are making.  He’s holding a rope that’s attached to the wings. When the boat gets going, “…the wings will start to move and we'll feel it, because it will pull [on the rope]. You should feel it, too (chuckles).”

As the boat speeds up the rope pulls hard. It feels like a kite tugging at the string. The device can adjust the angle and span of the paddles, like a bird adjusting its wings, to capture the movement of water.

Mandresaid water currents are promising sources of energy. Tides are predictable. Rivers never stop flowing. You don’t have to wait for the wind to blow or the sun to come out.

In the United States, tides and river currents have the potential to power 67 million homes.  But keep in mind. It’s an energy source that still remains largely untapped because it’s been hard to design a device that works efficiently underwater.Mandrethinks the Water Wing is the answer. It’s working exactly as he expected.

“Our wings – they don't have a special shape,” saidMandre. “They can just be a blade of steel, a blade of metal, a rectangular blade of metal. So we can make them as long as we want and intercept a large area of the flow, even if the flow is moving slowly, we can generate more power with relatively simple machinery.”

Relatively simple machinery also keeps costs down, saidMandre. Many of the existing tidal energy devices are expensive to make because they’re big and bulky, often with rotating parts.

The Water Wing team converted a pontoon party boat into a research vessel for this project. They got rid of the couches, coolers and speakers. In their place, engineers from BluSource Energy made a large opening at the bow of the boat from where they lower a pole with two rectangular paddles, or wings, mounted to it.
Credit Ambar Espinoza / RIPR
/
RIPR
The Water Wing team converted a pontoon party boat into a research vessel for this project. They got rid of the couches, coolers and speakers. In their place, engineers from BluSource Energy made a large opening at the bow of the boat from where they lower a pole with two rectangular paddles, or wings, mounted to it.

The Water Wing’s simple, but efficient design appeals to TomDerecktor, who’s partnered up with Brown University on this project. His small businessBluSourceEnergy engineers and manufactures renewable energy projects.Derecktorbuilt the Water Wing and finds the paddles easy to work with.

 “If they were damaged, you could snap them off, you could replace them with a new one,” saidDerecktor. “You can work on the generator – all those things. It swings up and swings down. So ease of maintenance is a great strong suit and a great selling point of all of this.”

Many states, including Rhode Island, are trying to mix up their energy portfolio. But Derecktorthinks this type of tidal energy device is more promising for communities in remote locations or along riverbanks, where the flow of water is fastest in shallow areas.

 “You know you're not going to compete with natural gas the way it's selling in this country,” he said. “But at locations where your fuel costs are challenging or where you have a steady flow, it seems criminal not to harness that.”

The Water Wing is still in a test phase. The team’s goal is to build one that produces 50 kilowatts. They want to take it to the Amazon River, where that amount of energy can power an entire village. 

GeorgeHagerman, a renewable energy expert at Virginia Tech University, thinks starting out in a river, instead of the ocean, is wise.

“[It] gives them a chance to look at the viability of their technology,” saidHagerman. “Will it hold up over time? What kind of maintenance schedules? What needs to be replaced periodically? What pieces and components? I think their strategy makes a lot of sense.”

Hagermanagrees the Water Wing’s design sets it apart from other devices that have been developed so far.

The U.S. Department of Energy is funding this project through a program that’s competitive to snag. The team’s challenge in the next couple of years will be to figure out how to attach a bigger version of the Water Wing to the bottom of a river – and make sure it works. If they can accomplish that, then it’s off to the Amazon.

Do you have insight or expertise on this topic? Please email us, we’d like to hear from you:news@ripr.org

Copyright 2015 The Public's Radio

Ambar Espinoza’s roots in environmental journalism started in Rhode Island a few years ago as an environmental reporting fellow at the Metcalf Institute for Marine & Environmental Reporting. She worked as a reporter for Minnesota Public Radio for a few years covering several beats, including the environment and changing demographics. Her journalism experience includes working as production and editorial assistant at National Public Radio, and as a researcher at APM’s Marketplace.

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