Makani Power

Makani Power
Subsidiary
Industry Wind Energy
Founded 2006
Key people
 Saul Griffith, Corwin Hardham, Donald Montague, Damon Vander Lind
Owner Alphabet Inc.
Number of employees
 20+
Parent X
Website x.company/makani

Makani Power is an Alameda, California-based company that developed airborne wind turbines with the support of Google X and the U.S. Department of Energy office of ARPA-E. Makani is a leader in the development of airborne wind power extraction systems.[1] Makani was founded in 2006 by Saul Griffith, Don Montague, and Corwin Hardham.[2] It received funding as part of Google.org's Renewable Energy cheaper than Coal (RE<C) initiative.[3] "Makani" is Hawaiian for "wind."[4] One of the founders, Corwin Hardham, died in 2012 at age 38.[5] On May 23, 2013, Makani Power was acquired by Google and was folded into Google X.[6]

Working principle

In order to meet its goal of producing low-cost renewable energy, the Makani kite-energy system uses autonomous tethered wings which fly in a circular path and generate electricity via wind turbines mounted upon the main wing, a method already in public domain; expert Miles Loyd in 1980 stated that for large scale purposes flying the generators was expected to be disfavored because of the need to fly the mass of the generators;[7] many of Makani Power competitors have generators kept on the ground, like KiteGen, Italy.[8] The electricity is transmitted to the ground via an electrical cable within the kite's tether.[9] Several patent applications have been made; some have been granted.

Development milestones

In December 2016, Makani operated for the first time a 600 kW prototype with 28 meter wing span.[10][11]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Kirsner, Scott. "A generator that's lighter than air — and relatively light on the wallet".
  2. ↑ "Company History". makanipower.com.
  3. ↑ "Investing in a cleaner energy revolution". Google.org.
  4. ↑ Wagner, Eric (7 December 2012). "High-altitude Wind Power". Conservation. University of Washington. Retrieved 13 April 2014.
  5. ↑ "Makani Power's Corwin Hardham Dies; Service Scheduled". Archived from the original on 22 February 2014.
  6. ↑ "Google acquires kite-power generator". BBC News. 23 May 2013.
  7. ↑ Miles Loyd, 1980: http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~highwind/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Loyd1980.pdf
  8. ↑ AWES Museum http://www.energykitesystems.net/AWESMuseum/index.html || KiteGen http://kitegen.com/
  9. ↑ Harper, Ben (21 March 2011). "Start-ups are devising kites to turn wind power into a cheap source of power". The Washington Post. Retrieved 27 July 2011.
  10. ↑ "Makani's first commercial-scale energy kite". YouTube. Retrieved 27 May 2018.
  11. ↑ Felker, Fort (5 October 2017). Progress and Challenges in Airborne Wind Energy. Airborne Wind Energy Conference 2017. Freiburg, Germany: University of Freiburg.
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