Every independent comment I've been able to find about this suggests it is either an intentional or unintentional scam, as well as my own intuition as a physicist (if in very different areas). The...
Every independent comment I've been able to find about this suggests it is either an intentional or unintentional scam, as well as my own intuition as a physicist (if in very different areas).
The company appears to be run by an MBA with no engineering or technical experience, but who appears to be actually trying to do all the work himself; the only engineer involved, as far as I can tell, is an advisor, and the website makes me skeptical as to the extent of their actual involvement, considering they note that their 'plan is to start with a comprehensive analysis done by our technical adviser'. Comments on reddit threads created by the head of the company, here or here, for example, are strongly critical and point to them having little understanding of fundamental aspects of the device or wind power in general, and suggest that the device as advertised would be fundamentally incapable of generating the amount of power claimed under reasonable conditions. There have apparently been graphs published, which I have not seen, that don't even have correct units.
The claims made in the marketing video, while extremely nonspecific, seem entirely unsupportable. The 'accelerating air' argument is quite misleading: you fundamentally cannot extract more energy from the wind than is present in air flow through the cross-sectional area you're exploiting, regardless of design, and the angles involved here seem, at least at a glance, as though they would be very inefficient in redirecting the air flow. While suggesting that they will ship next year, their FAQ suggests that that they have just started working with actual engineers, after raising capital.
Is there anything that suggests this is not simply either a scam, or someone with no expertise or knowledge in a field thinking they have discovered something groundbreaking when a basic analysis would demonstrate that they haven't? It's rather astonishing that they (and this is very much a singular they, as far as I can tell) have managed to raise that much.
Every independent comment I've been able to find about this suggests it is either an intentional or unintentional scam, as well as my own intuition as a physicist (if in very different areas).
The company appears to be run by an MBA with no engineering or technical experience, but who appears to be actually trying to do all the work himself; the only engineer involved, as far as I can tell, is an advisor, and the website makes me skeptical as to the extent of their actual involvement, considering they note that their 'plan is to start with a comprehensive analysis done by our technical adviser'. Comments on reddit threads created by the head of the company, here or here, for example, are strongly critical and point to them having little understanding of fundamental aspects of the device or wind power in general, and suggest that the device as advertised would be fundamentally incapable of generating the amount of power claimed under reasonable conditions. There have apparently been graphs published, which I have not seen, that don't even have correct units.
The claims made in the marketing video, while extremely nonspecific, seem entirely unsupportable. The 'accelerating air' argument is quite misleading: you fundamentally cannot extract more energy from the wind than is present in air flow through the cross-sectional area you're exploiting, regardless of design, and the angles involved here seem, at least at a glance, as though they would be very inefficient in redirecting the air flow. While suggesting that they will ship next year, their FAQ suggests that that they have just started working with actual engineers, after raising capital.
Is there anything that suggests this is not simply either a scam, or someone with no expertise or knowledge in a field thinking they have discovered something groundbreaking when a basic analysis would demonstrate that they haven't? It's rather astonishing that they (and this is very much a singular they, as far as I can tell) have managed to raise that much.