看到弗吉尼亚大学设计出的一种新型风车，很具有美学冲击力。这种小型的风车适合低风速下能量的转换，和传统风车的显著区别在于转轮垂直于支撑杆而不是平行付着。转动轴承需要使用磁性材料来降低摩擦损耗。有一点大家关心的是虽然小型风车成本会降下来一些，也不需要立很高的塔柱，但是单位功率的成本是不是符合市场需求？

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Charlottesville firm, U.Va., work on new turbine design

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CHARLOTTESVILLE -- A Charlottesville company and researchers at the University of Virginia are developing a new turbine to harness wind power for electricity.

The prototype wind turbine -- dubbed the Blade Runner 5000 -- is designed to be smaller, cheaper and more efficient than traditional wind turbines.

The most noticeable difference is that the turbine's blades rotate on a vertical axis, rather than the typical horizontal axis.

"The idea is that this could power a farm or maybe half a dozen homes," said Paul Allaire, a professor of mechanical engineering at U.Va. and chief of the university's newly formed Jefferson Wind Energy Institute.

The institute is working with Charlottesville-based Central Virginia Wind Energy & Manufacturing to build a 9-foot-tall prototype turbine, which was recently tested in a wind tunnel in U.Va.'s Aerospace Research Laboratory.

The final version is expected to stand 150 feet tall, measure 15 feet in diameter and cost an estimated $150,000.

It will be no more obtrusive than the average cell phone tower, said Jason Ivey of Central Virginia Wind Energy & Manufacturing.

Ivey is seeking venture capital and grants to move the project forward. If all goes as planned, he said, the turbines will be up and running by the first quarter of 2011.

Ivey said he intends to tap Virginia companies as much as possible to handle manufacturing and assembling the turbines.

"We want these turbines to be made by Virginians in the state of Virginia," he said.

Traditional large-scale wind turbines typically generate 3 megawatts of electricity, cost roughly $3 million each and are designed for wind speeds of about 30 mph.

The Blade Runner, however, is designed to generate 50 kilowatts of power and is meant to harness the more moderate winds of places such as Virginia.

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