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Non-Tech : Alternative energy
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To: Doren who wrote (4337)2/25/2008 8:12:26 PM
From: Road Walker  Read Replies (4) of 16955
 
You would be using more energy since cars are designed to glide through the air and do so very much more efficiently than they have in the past. Any fans or blades would create drag...

So turbine blades behind a grille would create more drag than hitting a flat surface? And, assuming that's true (not intuitive but maybe right), it would be more than the incremental energy created?

Any fans or blades would create drag which is actually heat loss, then in the transmission of the wind energy to the generator you would have heat loss, there would be heat loss in the generator, and loss from the generator to the battery, and in charging the battery there would be heat loss. When you eventually used the energy there would be more loss down the chain.

There is always loss of energy down any energy chain. That doesn't mean you can't add incremental energy. It's always a cost/benefit analysis.

Frankly stopping the vehicle with brakes to add power seems intuitively like a negative way to charge a battery. Adding power through wind resistance, which would be there at all times anyway, seems intuitively more efficient. Unless somebody can explain why fan blades have more drag than a solid surface... you would think they would have less (because of dispersion) or the same???

Certainly fan blades have less drag than applying brakes. And at 50 MPH they might have a lot more generative energy???

Maybe I'm completely off base. If someone would convince me of that I will go quietly into the night and humbly admit my mistake.

BTW, it anybody reading the thread does agree it sure would be nice to hear from them. I feel like an 18th century heretic.
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