S.T.E.V.E.N.

Sustainable Technology and Energy for Vital Economic Needs
414 Triphammer Road, Ithaca, NY 14850 USA.
Email: stevenfoundation@yahoo.com.
Website: www.virtualithaca.com/francis/stevenhomepage.html

NEWSLETTER 2002

Dear friend,

   This year’s newsletter covers our work during 2002 locally with wind power and other forms of alternative energy, and also outreach efforts into the field, especially with our contact in Africa, Gordon Wagner.  Francis Vanek has continued his appointment as director of the Foundation for another year, through July 31, 2003.  We hope you will enjoy reading about our work, and we welcome any questions or comments you may have.

In peace,
The S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation

Table of Contents:

Wind Energy: General Considerations

 In the course of the last year the work of the foundation has focused primarily on the subject – new to us – of wind energy. There are several reasons for this. First of all, the S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation thus far has been working on various aspects of solar energy and has done very little on wind. Second, in the area where we work [upstate  New York] wind seems to be the more abundant form of renewable energy as compared to solar.  Third and perhaps most significant, when it comes to the more valuable and necessary form of energy, that is, mechanical and electric, wind represents a natural transformation from the sun’s heat into mechanical power, and thus promises a more efficient form of obtaining power from renewable solar energy.
 In our seeking new forms of wind energy we have again adhered to the S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation philosophy and objectives; that is, providing energy resources most accessible to low income and very low income families, such as those in developing countries or the poorest areas of our country. But of course, if our work can be useful for others it should also be provided, perhaps through not for profit media which could benefit those most needy.
 Our technical capabilities do not lend themselves to developing improvements or new technologies in the technological area. Rather, pursuing out aims, it appears to us that advances are possible in improving the economic cost – efficiency of gathering energy from wind. We may not be able to make technological improvements of the order of ten or twenty per cent, but we can conceive of improvements of hundreds of per cent on the economic front.  And this at least in three different areas: 1. lowering the costs of necessary materials; 2. increasing the proportion of self-help and sweat equity in total cost, and 3.simplification of design, such as reducing or eliminating the need for high support towers for the wind turbine.
 Our work is still in preliminary stages, but already we can report on three types of development in the subsequent three sections, as well as the subject of legal aspects of  connecting wind energy to the electric grid in NY State, discussed in a subsequent section.
 

Anemometer

 Quite obviously before one starts producing electric or other energy using wind power, one must ascertain that there is a sufficient amount of wind to warrant such an attempt. It is necessary to measure in some way the average wind velocity in the area where the wind turbine is to be installed.  Since we are interested to produce technologies accessible to low income households, this may constitute a serious stumbling block. For example, the REAL GOODS catalogue offers an anemometer, the device that measures and records wind flows over time.  Thus, if the a priori probability of finding adequate wind resources is one third, the expected subjective cost to the households will be around one thousand dollars – a sum quite prohibitive to a low-income household.
 As we have noted, one way of coping with this problem is to construct low cost turbines, end such ones that can start operating at as low a wind speed as possible.  But we feel that we have found, and can suggest, anemometers on the order of one-tenth of the costs indicated above, perhaps as low as twenty dollars.  This we do by combining [quite enjoyable] self-effort by the user, requiring simple tools and materials. The essential component of our anemometer is a small computer used by cyclists to measure their riding performance costing [on sale] as little as ten dollars, or twice that amount in any bicycle store. The rest is a little epoxy glue, some other bike components worth pennies, two ping pong balls and some 20 inches of ½ inch angle aluminum. Also needed is a calibration of the anemometer converting miles of riding per hour to wind speed miles per hour.  But we can provide anyone interested with more exact instructions including the corresponding characteristics of the calibration [a voluntary tax-deductible contribution to S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation would be hoped for].
 

Preliminary Windmill Explorations

 Given our objectives and philosophy, we were seeking a low cost turbine that would function with relatively low wind velocities. The first component was the securing of a robust ball bearing device which would permit rotation of the blades of the turbine. As often in the past in our work, we turned to the bicycle wheel, at least for small turbines/windmills up to say 5 feet diameter.
 Such turbines were explored with three types of wind-blades: aluminum tin, wood planks using boards or plywood, and sails comparable to those used on sailboats. All three worked reasonably well, but in the end several reasons made us reject these solutions.
  The problem for all three was the relative weakness of the ball bearing hub of the bicycle wheel. The axle experiences too much strain in the long run if it has to carry not only the wheel but also the blades attached to it.  The sail-inspired blades are promising when one wants to deal with lower wind velocities, but this advantage turns into a critical disadvantage when stronger velocities are encountered. It is true that, as in sailing, one can [even automatically] relax the tension and incline of the “jibs” but if the turbine is unattended, this becomes quite clumsy and risks destruction of the windmill.  The metal blades solution has a significant advantage in that it permits a variable pitch of the blades changing with the distance from the center of rotation [which is very efficient and used in many commercial and expensive windmills].
 All these smaller turbines based on bike wheels also made us face the problem of finding a low-cost gearing from the relatively low speed of the turbine to the high rpm’s of most low cost alternators, generators or dynamos. The simple technology [mostly based on belts and pulleys] has so much inherent friction that the low velocity and energy of the turbine can be entirely lost, except at high wind velocities.
Thus, all considered, these preliminary explorations were all rejected and we turned to our better solution of a modern Dutch-type [Van Ek] windmill, described in the next section..
 

The Current Windmill Design (In Progress)

 Like the anemometer, our preferred design, reminiscent of the Dutch windmills, is primarily efficient in that it reduces the costs of the turbine by the order of ten to one or more. We do not dare yet to speak of cost efficiencies per watt produced, but of efficiencies of turbines of some 20 foot or 7 meter diameter. Such turbines procured commercially, according sources such as the Home Power or Real Goods, can cost, all included, plus-minus ten thousand dollars. Ours, of the same dimensions, when produced by the user from simple parts and materials, can cost on the order of three hundred dollars.  We have produced a prototype which was tested mechanically with everything including an auto alternator generating 12 volt power, shown in the diagram.

Diagram of windmill (21k)

 We do not have yet more precise readings on the power output of the windmill corresponding to various wind speeds, nor were we able to test it in its proper environment. The photos were taken in our backyard, which is entirely surrounded by trees or houses and not permitting much free airflow.
 We describe our preferred solution in summary terms because we feel that our work and testing of the design are not final:

1] The first element of simplification and cost reduction is that, like the windmills of Holland, ours is not elevated on a high tower; but simply the rotor is placed at the top of a steel pipe planted solidly into the ground [some four feet deep].  The mill must be placed in an area where there is enough space for the wind to develop its speed and direction, such as agricultural fields, meadows, mountains or on or near extended water surfaces.
2] The post can also be made of something like a telephone pole with a pipe at the top. This actually from our experimentation may be the better solution.
3]  The free rotation with the wind is secured by a two inch steel pipe inserted snugly into a two and one half inch pipe, well lubricated.
4] The four blades of the windmill are formed by inserting two-inch foam insulation between a metal pipe and a two-by-one inch wood using threaded rods piercing  all three components to form a one-by- ten [or eight] foot [light but very sturdy] wing (the completed rotor is shown on its side on the next page.)
5] A one or more inch steel rod is inserted into two ball bearings fixed onto a steel plate resting [using a flange or a weld] on top of the two-inch pivoting pipe noted above. At one end of the rod is fixated [by welding or otherwise] a rotating steel plate: at the other end we fix a large power-output wheel [can be most conveniently a sturdy bike wheel]. The four blades or wings of the mill are fixed at the extremity of the metal pipe, using two u-bolts for each, to the rotating plate supported by the rod in ball bearings.
6] The safety and protection against possible very high winds is provided by fine-tuning the tightness of the eight u-bolts which permit the wings “collapsing” to a position parallel to the windflow.
7] The other two contributions of our design consist in a system of steel cable riggings, which [A] form a pyramid above the center of rotation holding the extremities of the four steel pipes, and [B] connect the four extremities of the four wings.

Photo of windmill rotor (50k)

Work on grid intertied wind power in New York State

   Francis recently installed a photovoltaic (PV) system on his new house in the Ecovillage at Ithaca (see www.ecovillage.ithaca.ny.us) that is "intertied" with the electric grid, and this gave us the inspiration to work on advocating the permitting of intertied wind power systems in New York state.   For those who are unfamiliar, PV systems convert sunlight into electricity, and an intertied system allows excess energy from a home power system (i.e. in excess of what is being used in the house) to flow into the electric grid, so that you don't need batteries for storage.  Conversely, when the home power system is not meeting all the electric demand in the house, power from the grid is used to make up the difference.  These systems are mainly applicable to houses that are already on the grid: for those in remote locations, the high cost of bringing an electric line into the house often make battery storage a more attractive option.
   Currently in New York State the only type of home power intertie that is available is for PV.  At the same time, the amount of insolation (energy available from sunlight) is low relative to many other parts of the country, and many locations around the state are fairly windy.  Of the 30 states in the US that currently allow intertied systems, all but 2 include wind power generation as one of the possible sources for home power.
   According to the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), the state is interested in promoting small-scale wind power with a view toward allowing interties at some unspecified date in the future.  We are interested in having the legislation for interties put in place as quickly as possible, so our work will include contacts with state officials who are responsible for renewable energy policy, as well as working to have a bill introduced in the legislature through our local representative.  We think that the experience of other states will be very helpful in convincing New York that the interties are both feasible and desirable, so we will contact other states as well.  It is a good time to work on this issue in New York; in his recent victory speech after the last election, Governor George Pataki specifically mentioned the importance of renewable energy for both the environment and the economy.
    Readers in other US states may be interested in exploring the possibility of grid-tied home power in their regions.  If so, you may wish to look at the list of states that allow intertied systems powered by wind as well as other sources, made available from the American Wind Energy Association at http://www.awea.org/policy/netmeter.html.
 

A Steam Engine for Africa

 A former graduate student of ours, Dr. Gordon Wagner, has been engaged in developmental activities now for some thirty years.  S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation’s first major solar technology mission was organized with Dr. Wagner in Nairobi, Kenya back in the 1980’s.   Those attempts at contributing steam power to the developing countries did not meet with much success, for both technological and extraneous reasons.
 Now we are exploring a more concrete project, again with Dr. Wagner and again in east Africa – and this gives us new hope. Wagner’s current project yielding significant results is the organization of women’s cooperatives to produce shea oil from local tree nuts, thus giving employment to many and developing markets for a well-known and valuable commodity. (Shea butter or “lulu” is an ingredient used in quality soaps and cosmetics; it is also edible.)  The production involves grinding and crushing of nuts, which can be done manually with great effort, or using equipment based on diesel engines which are very expensive for local people.
 To deal with this energy problem, we at S.T.E.V.E.N. Foundation have further simplified our basic “penguin design” steam engine to make it producible from a few off-the-shelf plumbing parts and a few recycled components such as truck shock absorbers.  We supplied the designs to some technicians working with Wagner in east Africa, hoping to have soon a prototype used in the oil production. The project seems to be promising, since in the region of application there is apparently a good deal of biomass including the remnants of the oil nuts, which can be used in generating steam.  In addition to our technical assistance we have also earmarked one thousand dollars – of which five hundred was sent already – for the project, including an educational component which would teach young students how to produce the simple steam engine.
 

Solar Oven

   Cooking, and drying, with our solar ovens proved to be fun this summer as it has been for many years.  “Summer” in solar oven terms means from spring when the sun begins to be warm and high, straight through to early autumn, just about the equinox.  Essentially, a couple of hours of strong sun, even with cloudy intervals, will do the trick.
   For cooking/baking our favorite is still preparing rice in the oven.  We find it nicer than rice cooked on the kitchen stove.  Takes about an hour, with a couple of re-focuses of the oven—but think of all the things you can do in the meantime!  In fact we’ve been known to go off, never re-focusing the oven, and come back to delightfully cooked rice when the sun is strong enough.  And it never burns!  Of course many other cooking and baking preparations are well made in the oven, just about anything calling for low to moderate heat.  It’s excellent for simmering and thickening a pot of sauce, for instance.
   The other application we explored more fully this season was the oven for drying.  Tomatoes were abundant, more than people wanted to cook or can.  Small tomatoes, cherry or small plum size, dried nicely in the oven which was warmed but not focused to cook them.  The process required a couple of days: we confess that for the intervening night we put the trays of tomatoes into the kitchen oven which is mildly warmed by a pilot light.  Absent this convenience, they probably would have needed a day longer.  For this drying application our large bakery-size oven, without any side reflectors, also proved very useful.
   Early fall brought a crop of mushrooms which turned out to be edible.  Thinly sliced, they also dried nicely in the solar oven—in fact, even more quickly than the tomatoes.  We look forward to cooking with our dried tomatoes and mushrooms through the winter.  And we remind that the manual to construct a solar oven is available for the asking.
 

Testing of superbike

   During the winter of 2002 we carried out cold-weather testing of the all-wheel-drive "Superbike" (example superbikes are shown in the photograph), which Francis used intermittently for his afternoon commute from work to home, a distance of about 8 miles (13 km).  Between January and April, he carried out a total of 19 rides, for a total of 150 miles (240 km) of cumulative distance, at temperatures which ranged between 20 and 35 degrees F (-7 to +2 deg C) for much of this time period.  The test confirmed that the superbike is indeed beneficial for cold weather riding, as the arm motion was helpful in keeping upper body warmth.  Average speed for the trip was around 11 miles per hour (17.6 km/h), which is comparable to the travel time for the same itinerary on a conventional bike.  Therefore, in this situation, the benefit of the superbike was for arm activity and upper body warmth rather than extra speed.

Photograph of superbikes (48k)
 

Presentations and demonstrations undertaken by the Foundation

   In May of 2000, Francis and Steven Vanek gave a presentation on S.T.E.V.E.N. solar cookers to the Hubert Humphrey Fellows program in the College of Agriculture at Cornell University.  This program brings government officials and other specialists from developing countries to the US for a one-year program aimed at disseminating skills relevant to agricultural development and related fields.
   The talk was co-presented with Touriah Dafrallah, a Humphrey Fellow from Morocco, who gave the first part of the talk on a Moroccan government program that seeks to reduce deforestation by providing solar cooking as an alternative to wood burning.  Francis and Steven then displayed an oven and gave a slide presentation from work in Haiti and Ecuador.  A lively discussion of issues raised by attempts to introduce solar cooking, especially in the context of cultural cooking habits, followed.  One concrete insight we gained is that the testing of solar ovens with a view toward achieving the best possible taste for a wide variety of foods (breads, grains, casseroles, etc) would be very helpful.  As a result of this talk, the Foundation made a number of contacts among the fellows from Africa and Asia, as they have now returned to their native countries.
  In April of 2002 we also participated in the annual Earth Day fair held at the Dewitt Park in downtown Ithaca.  We brought in and erected the demonstration solar collector and steam engine.  The cloudy weather on the day gave us a good opportunity to demonstrate the “dual fuel” capability of the demonstration system, as we used the woodburning boiler to generate steam and power the engine.
 

Editorial: “Reaching out with appropriate and alternative technology”

   One part of being in the business of promoting sustainable technology is that we are in regular contact with data on the overall performance of various countries in terms of their progress toward sustainability.  At the aggregate level, progress has been slow.  New technologies introduced in the advanced countries are beginning to have some impact, and people’s practices are gradually changing, but there has not as yet been a dramatic change of direction in terms of the numbers.  Furthermore, many industrializing countries are adopting energy- and impact-intensive practices, which does not help the global picture, regardless of what the US and other rich countries do.
   This view from a distance does not capture the small but growing number of individuals who make fundamental changes in their own lives to dramatically change how they impact the planet.  We may not have seen a 30-40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from the US as a whole, but these people have achieved targets like these on a personal level.  We are also impressed how diverse the group of people is that makes such a change.  It is not limited to engineers who specialize in energy efficiency like myself: there are examples among doctors and lawyers, agriculturalists, tradespeople, and so on.
   We see in this core group of people a real source of hope for transforming the world.  The general population may look at the size of the environmental problem and their own role, and feel that they cannot make a difference.  But when they see another seemingly “ordinary” person making these changes – switching to bike or transit, investing in insulation, using wind or solar power – they may become inspired.
   So to conclude, we urge the readers to be extroverted (!) about your commitment to appropriate and alternative technology (we suspect that many of you already are).  Each person that you can “bring on board” this movement multiplies the total impact of your own individual efforts.  Please help to spread the word.
 

For More Information:


For manuals, copies of our STEVEN prospectus, or to make a tax-deductible contribution, please email us at either stevenfoundation@yahoo.com or jv19@cornell.edu.

Or write to: STEVEN Foundation, 414 Triphammer Rd, Ithaca, NY 14850, USA