Energy + Design

I was talking to Parameshwar this morning and he told me about his post graduation course in sustainability with TERI. He had some interesting facts to share with me.

I had always assumed that windmills are those vertical fans. We make gross assumptions here. Wind mills were mills - they used the mechanical energy to do work. (one such tableau model can be seen at the Nehru Science Centre). That means, the rotation of the fan would be used to do mechanical work (and it was not converted into electricity). What we confuse them with, are wind turbines. Wind turbines convert rotation of the fan into electrical energy. Unlike the vertical fans, there are also horizontal ones, which are very beautiful and perhaps more efficient. It would be really interesting if we started incorporating them in our designs. There are so many types of wind turbines - the helical, horizontal, vertical, etc. We don't even know half of them...These are extremely sculptural and would make great design elements instead of installing dead statues on our sites... 

You can just google them as 'types of wind turbines'

He also said that for tapping geothermal energy, one has to dig almost 10 kilometres below the earth surface. India almost does not have any scope to tap geothermal energy because there are no volcanic bellies here. The ones which we had, have now gone dormant, and hence not really usable. Iceland, which he said is the land of fire and ice, is fetching a lot of geothermal energy. Why I am writing this here is because I was assisting the Services course last year. While teaching Electricity, we pass by these facts so breezily, and students make it petty when then reproduce then in their answer sheets. However, we could possible engage such details in building design. The building forms could become huge machines generating electricity. We haven't considered inhabiting machines that probably could sustain our projects...

Regarding hydroelectric power stations, I had always presumed that the turbines must be placed directly under the water fall. But it's not so. Water collected in the reservoir is taken through pen stocks to the power station. Pen stocks are 2 metre wide pipes which push the huge turbines that produce electricity. 

The biggest problem with renewable energy sources is that they are intermittent. We do not have constant supply of sunlight, wind, etc. So, Parameshwar said that we actually end up installing 4 times equipment required to actually generate the basic energy that we consume. 

I am absolutely fascinated with all these technologies. Perhaps the static nature of the buildings disturbs me now...but i think we can creatively engage with exciting technologies which not only help us in addressing the question of sustainability, but also of creating exciting forms in architecture.