New Vivace Energy Technology Harnesses Vortex Hydro-Energy

There’s a natural phenomenon that occurs in large bodies of water that engineers have been battling for years. It’s called VIV (vortex induced vibrations), and it’s what allows schools of fish to swim so fast. It’s strong enough to have destroyed the Narrows Bridge in Washington State in 1940 and the Ferrybridge power station cooling towers in England in 1965. So, researchers began to wonder whether they could harness this power to produce energy – and ‘Vivace’ energy technology was born.

From Inhabitat:

Rather than suppressing VIV, Vivace actually creates and then harvests energy from VIV, and it does it all using slow water currents, a previously untapped source of sustainable energy.

Most of the water that covers 70% of our planet flows at less than 3 knots – too slowly to harvest its power using current technology. Wave and tidal turbines require an average of 5 or 6 knots to operate efficiently, as does the timeless watermill. But Vivace, the technology being developed by Dr. Michael M. Bernitsas at the University of Michigan, is designed to operate at currents of less than 2 knots, opening up a world of possible applications from river power and dam replacement to perpetually powered ocean sensors, uninterruptible power for vulnerable coastal facilities, and the supply of electricity to offshore facilities.

Though the current setup doesn’t resemble a school of fish, Dr. Bernitsas says it will eventually. Right now, it looks like a ladder with sliding rungs. Those rungs actually oscillate up and down on springs when the ‘ladder’ is placed in a slow-moving current, creating mechanical energy which is then converted to electricity. The cost, estimated to be about 5.5 kilowatts per hour, is competitive with other forms of renewable energy technology.

This is pretty fascinating stuff. According to the Vortex Hydro Energy website, vortex-induced vibrations were first observed 500 years ago by Leonardo DaVinci in the form of “Aeolian Tones.” Vivace takes the ‘problem’ of VIV and turns it into a clean, sustainable way to power our communities. It will be really interesting to watch new technologies like this evolve.

Link [Inhabitat] + [Vortex Hydro Energy]

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