Disney BH6 XPRIZE Challenge Winners: High Altitude Power Generation
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[Dominique] Hello, my name is Dominique.
I'm from San Leandro, California, and I am twelve years old.
The problem I am addressing in this video is global warming and climate change.
The idea I have here will not exactly solve
or get rid of climate change,
but it might be able to prevent it.
The ways we generate energy today,
or the main ways we generate energy today,
pump hazardous gases into our atmosphere
that increase global warming.
We need to find more ways to get energy from renewable sources
and ones that do not pump hazardous gases into our atmosphere.
This idea here could be one of the new major contributors of electricity
from renewable sources.
This design shows two helium balloons
and a lattice of five to ten air turbines right below it,
and it's tethered to earth with a rope and an electrical cord.
So this set up would go at high altitudes
when wind speeds are a lot faster
and generate more electricity than most ground-based plants.
So I made a proof of concept prototype,
so I'm going to go into my back yard and show you it.
See you there.
Here is my proof of concept prototype for my design.
So this is just showing that it's possible
to use an air balloon to lift a turbine up into the air
so you can generate electricity.
So unfortunately, I don't have enough wire to bring it high enough up
so if wind's going fast enough to make electricity—
but I can show you that it's actually floating on its own.
This wire isn't supporting it.
I'm just letting it go here.
Thank you.
These are some of the advantages of my design
over ground-based turbines.
This graph shows the power generation of the turbine.
It generate its peak power at about fourteen meters per second.
You will rarely find these conditions at sea level.
However, at altitude, you can find consistent and strong wind speeds
to support max power generation.
[Thank you for watching!!!!!!]