I’d like to imagine that an intense passion for sailing coupled with a severe case of hydrophobia were what compelled Mr. J. A. Aspinwall to invent the Sail Wagon, featured in the June 14th, 1884 issue of Scientific American. Or perhaps he just had enough foresight to design an ecofriendly and cost-efficient vehicle. The Sail [...]

Talk about a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” situation. The U.S. needs to generate more renewable energy if we hope to stave off the effects of climate change. At the same time, critically endangered California condors (Gymnogyps californianus)—which today number 417 birds after the last 22 members of their species were put [...]

Which is more important, an endangered bird or sustainable energy? That has become the question in Wyoming, where a recent ruling by the state’s governor has blocked future wind-turbine development in about 20 percent of the state in a move to protect the greater sage grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus). The controversial move came after the U.S. [...]

Are surface winds around the world really slowing down? That’s the suggestion of a new study in Nature Geoscience. The authors built on previous studies indicating such a trend by analyzing surface wind data from 822 wind stations in Europe, Asia and North America. The study concludes that the widespread "atmospheric stilling" has more to [...]

Renewable energy made big national headlines October 12 as a group of investors, including search engine giant Google, announced plans to build a 560-kilometer offshore wind power transmission "backbone" off the U.S. eastern seaboard. The developers of the plan say it will make wind power more economical and enhance the reliability of the existing grid. [...]

U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced a federal blessing for the controversial Cape Wind project today—clearing a path for mammoth wind turbines to be built offshore of the Massachusetts vacation destination, the first such offshore wind farm in the U.S. Given that the United Kingdom (alone) has 1 gigawatt of such offshore wind [...]

The problem with generating electricity by harnessing the wind is that it doesn’t always blow (though it may seem that way at times). And, typically, consumers remain intolerant of power interruptions. But there may be a way to ensure a steady supply of wind, according to a new study in the April 5 Proceedings of [...]

The vision is beautiful, if not somewhat tried: a large cluster of 360 foot tall towers encircled with long, slightly cupped blades, similar to airplane wings, spinning in the wind like a wind vane. The result? An outpouring of clean electricity at the Megawatt (MW) scale. That’s what Harry Ruda, CEO of Wing Power Energy, [...]

For wind power, 2011 was a great year. California added more new wind energy to the grid than any other state, according to a report published Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Energy. A number of other states received high honors as well. These include Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Oklahoma and Colorado, which churned out at [...]

Saul Griffith likes kites – but not the kind that you might have flown during your childhood. I’m talking about kites with wingspans bigger than a Boeing 747 – kites that are capable of generating (several times) more electricity than today’s stationary wind turbines. In his March 2009 TED talk, Saul – with Makani Power – [...]