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Atmospheric Vortex Engine

By

د م�حمد اع�ى م�حمد س�عي� ال�سي�ادر ن� ن�# ح�مد ح�سي� ال�مصري� ا'

Level 500

2011 ,2012IntroductionRenewable energy is energy generated from naturalresources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, andgeothermal heat, which are renewable (naturallyreplenished). In 2006, about 18% of global final energyconsumption came from renewables, with 13% coming fromtraditional biomass, such as wood-burning.Hydroelectricity was the next largest renewable source,providing 3% of global energy consumption and 15% ofglobal electricity generation.

Wind power is growing at the rate of 30 percent annually,with a worldwide installed capacity of 121,000 megawatts(MW) in 2008, and is widely used in European countriesand the United States. The annual manufacturing output ofthe photovoltaics industry reached 6,900 MW in 2008, andphotovoltaic (PV) power stations are popular in Germanyand Spain Solar thermal power stations operate in the USAand Spain, and the largest of these is the 354 MW SEGSpower plant in the Mojave Desert. The world's largestgeothermal power installation is The Geysers inCalifornia, with a rated capacity of 750 MW. Brazil hasone of the largest renewable energy programs in theworld, involving production of ethanol fuel from sugarcane, and ethanol now provides 18 percent of thecountry's automotive fuel. Ethanol fuel is also widelyavailable in the USA.

While most renewable energy projects and production islarge-scale, renewable technologies are also suited tosmall off-grid applications, sometimes in rural and

remote areas, where energy is often crucial in humandevelopment. Kenya has the world's highest householdsolar ownership rate with roughly 30,000 small (20–100watt) solar power systems sold per year.

Increased global demand for earth's fossil fuel resourcesin conjunction with dwindling oil and natural gasreserves is beginning to cause concerns for meeting ourlong-term energy needs. Options for replacing fossilfuels are limited. As a result of these growing concerns,there has been strong new interest in solar, wind energyand other renewable energy sources.

Traditional solar and wind energy are low intensityvariable energy sources. The land area required to meetthe energy needs of a country with a high populationdensity using only solar or wind energy would be asignificant part of the country. Meeting the presentenergy needs of a country such as Germany would requirethat over 10% of the land area be covered with solarcollectors or wind turbines. Use of such a large landarea for solar collectors or wind turbines is simply nota practical solution.

The solar chimney is another method which has been provencapable of generating electrical energy from the sun. Thesolar chimney consists of a very tall chimney surroundedby solar collectors. The collectors heat the air near theground and funnel the air into the base of the chimney. Aturbine in the base of the chimney generates electricityas the buoyant air rises in the chimney. The Manzanaressolar chimney built in Spain in the 1980's operated forseven years with a peak output of 50 kW.

The solar chimney is an interesting solar energyalternative, but it also requires solar collectors plus avery tall chimney. The efficiency of a solar chimney isproportional to its height with the overall efficiencyunlikely to exceed 2%. Increasing the height of thechimney could increase the efficiency, but there arepractical construction limitations which restrict themaximum height of chimney that could ever be built. Thecollector area would be as large or larger than in more

traditional solar technology. Enviromission is currentlyin the process of designing a large 200 MW solar chimneyto be built in Australia.

A basic understanding of atmospheric science is requiredin order to explain the principle of operation. Theatmosphere is warmed from by solar radiation whichstrikes the ground. Air heated at ground level by solarradiation becomes buoyant. Heated air is transportedupward by natural convection to the level at which theheat is radiated heat back into space as infraredradiation. Mechanical energy is produced when heat iscarried upward by convection because the work ofexpansion of a heated gas is greater than the heatrequired to compress the same gas back to its originalpressure after it has been cooled.

The mechanical energy produced in a large hurricane canexceed the energy produced by humans in a whole year. Theenergy produced in an average size tornado is equivalentto the energy produced in a large thermal power plant.The solar chimney demonstrates that it is possible tocapture the energy produced during atmospheric upwardheat convection.

What is a solar chimney / solar tower?

A solar chimney (also known as a solar tower) is a solarthermal power plant wherein heated air rises in a tallchimney.  The inflowing air is heated in a greenhousewith an open rim surrounding the base of the chimneyand a turbine at the base of the chimney turns agenerator to produce electrical power.

The theoretical concept of

AVE:

The figure above compares some of the Earth's storedenergy resources. Starting from the left, the singleyellow square represents the energy content our remainingcrude oil reserves which were formed over the past 100million years, 7.3 x 10 21 J.

The center image represents the total energy present inthe latent heat of water vapor in the bottom kilometer ofthe atmosphere, 13 x 1021 J, approximately double theamount of energy stored in our remaining oil reserves.

On the far right hand side, the heat content of warmtropical ocean waters, 130 x 1021J (assuming a 100 m deeplayer and 3°C), approximately 20 times greater than theenergy stored in our remaining oil reserves!

Finally, the figure illustrates that IF we could somehowfind a way to release the enormous amount of energystored in the latent heat of water vapor and the storedheat content in tropical ocean waters and completelydeplete them, they would be completely replenished by solarenergy from the sun in just 10 days and 100 days,respectively!

If even a very small fraction of the total energy storedin the latent heat of water vapor or from the heat oftropical ocean waters could be captured and convertedinto mechanical energy, we would be able to meet a largeportion of our present and future energy needs.  Theatmospheric vortex engine can perform this energytransformation process...

Mechanical energy is produced when heat is carried upwardby convection in the atmosphere. A process for producingan artificial vortex and concentrating mechanical energywhere it can be captured is proposed. The existence ofdust devils proves that low intensity solar radiation canproduce concentrated mechanical energy. It should bepossible to control a naturally occurring process.Controlling where mechanical energy is produced in theatmosphere offers the possibility of harnessing solarenergy without having to use solar collectors.

The Atmospheric Vortex Engine (AVE) is a process forcapturing the energy produced when heat is carried upwardby convection in the atmosphere. The process is protectedby patent applications and could become a major source ofelectrical energy. The unit cost of electrical energyproduced with an AVE could be half the cost of the nextmost economical alternative.

A vortex engine consists of a cylindrical wall open atthe top and with tangential air entries around the base.Heating the air within the wall using a temporary heat

source such as steam starts the vortex. The heat requiredto sustain the vortex once established can be the naturalheat content of warm humid air or can be provided incooling towers located outside of the cylindrical walland upstream of the deflectors. The continuous heatsource for the peripheral heat exchanger can be wasteindustrial heat or warm seawater. Restricting the flow ofair upstream of the deflectors regulates the intensity ofthe vortex. The vortex can be stopped by restricting theairflow to deflectors with direct orientation and byopening the airflow to deflectors with reverseorientation. The electrical energy is produced in turbo-expanders located upstream of the tangential air inlets.The pressure at the base of the vortex is less thanambient pressure because of the density of the rising airis less than the density of ambient air at the samelevel. The outlet pressure of the turbo-expanders is sub-atmospheric because they exhaust into the vortex.

The Atmospheric Vortex Engine has the same thermodynamicbasis as the solar chimney.  The physical tube of thesolar chimney is replaced by centrifugal force in thevortex and the atmospheric boundary layer acts as thesolar collector.  The AVE needs neither the collector northe high chimney. The efficiency of the solar chimney isproportional to its height which is limited by practicalconsiderations, but a vortex can extend much higher thana physical chimney. The cylindrical wall could have adiameter of 200 m and a height of 100 m; the vortex couldbe 50 m in diameter at its base and extend up to thetropopause. Each AVE could generate 50 to 500 MW ofelectrical power.

Latest technology of AVE:

The purpose of the Atmospheric Vortex Engine (AVE) is toproduce clean carbon free electrical energy. The AVE usesa controlled vortex to harness the huge amount of energyproduced when heat is transported upward by convection inthe atmosphere.

Mechanical energy is produced when water descends or whenwarm air rises. The Vortex Engine captures the energyproduced when warm air rises by creating a river ofrising air. The AVE produces an air vortex which acts asa vertical conduit.

The vortex is produced by admitting warm or humid airtangentially into a circular arena. Tangential entriescause the warm moist air to spin as it rises forming an“anchored vortex”. The vortex engine has the same basisas the proven solar chimney except the physical tube ofthe solar chimney is replaced with centrifugal force inthe vortex.

The heat source can be solar energy or waste industrialheat. The solar heat can come from warm sea water orsimply from warm humid air. There is no need for a solarcollector; the solar collector is the earth’s surface inits natural unaltered state.

The pressure at the base of a chimney is less than thesurrounding pressure because of the buoyancy of the warmrising air. The reduced pressure at the base of thevortex is used to drive turbines. The turbines arelocated in the air inlets which are all around theperimeter of the station. 

Centrifugal force in the vortex prevents the rising airfrom being diluted by cooler ambient air and therebylosing its buoyancy. The vortex acts like a chimney – itis well known that warm air rises higher with a chimneythan without one.

The vortex engine harnesses the energy of the processresponsible for dust devils and tornadoes. An AVEproduces a controlled vortex whose base remains firmlyanchored in the center of a circular structure. Thevortex cannot break away from the base station and itsintensity is always under complete control by varying theopening of the air inlet dampers.

AVE Designs:

1-5m Diameter Dual Octagonal Model

2- Atmospheric Vortex Engine - Pony Station

3-Polygonal Atmospheric Vortex Engine with Integrated Cooling Cells

3-Circular Atmospheric Vortex Engine with Individual Cooling Cells

Personal opinion:I think the AVE is Scientific breakthrough in the fieldof renewable energy because its initial cost isrelatively small and its gain power is Relatively largecompared with solar chimney because it doesn’t use solarcollectors or high chimney and it can applied in anyplace in the world that water and sun exist in there .

But I think AVE has some disadvantages like its volumewhere it needs a big area to set on it.

AVE usage:AVE is anew way of thinking in the renewable energy felidso it doesn’t use actually in the power production world.

But there are model build in USA by ENG/ Louis M.Michaud, and there are various experimental prototype AVEmodels have been constructed.

I think it can be used in Egypt in the western desertbecause AVE needs a large area and we can used theGroundwater to collect heat from the sun.

AVE can produce half of the produced electric power from" Soupra ELKIMA " power station where it produce 1260 MWand AVE produce 500MW so it can cover the need ofelectric power for city like GIZA .

Reference:1. Atmospheric Vortex Engine Technical description,

Louis .M. Michaud, July 2007.

2. Atmospheric Vortex Engine, Energy Manger Magazine, October 2009, Vol. 02.

3. Presentation about the AVE, Don Cooper, Western Australia.

4. http://vortexengine.ca/index.shtml