Architects and engineers express doubt about Bloomberg's windmill proposal
Posted by CITIZEN POWER ALLIANCE at 1:17 PMA serious consideration of harvesting wind energy on New York’s skyscrapers and bridges, however, requires the abandonment of any fanciful idea about installing windmills on the Empire State Building or the towers of the Brooklyn Bridge.
First of all, it is unlikely that any existing structure would be able to withstand the extra swaying, twisting, vibrating and weight that turbines impose. So the tower’s structural framework would have to be retrofitted to handle the new loads, adding enormously to a project’s cost with relatively little yield.
Second, the familiar windmill or wind farm turbine has a horizontal rotor with radiating blades. These would pose a tremendous liability in the city, where a flying blade could do great damage. (Five people were killed in 1977 by a helicopter blade that snapped off atop what is now the MetLife Building on Park Avenue.)
There are vertical-axis wind turbines, some of which resemble giant food processor blades, that can collect wind from any direction and have been the choice of several architects who considered wind farms for the city.
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