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The 108 m (356 ft) long Radia Windrunner is designed to transport cargo too large for roads to short, ready runways over rough terrain. That would dwarf the majestic 84 m (275 ft) long Antonov An-225 Mrya. Unfortunately, it no longer exists.
With the exception of the Large Hadron Collider, no machine in history has had a single part larger than today’s giant wind turbines. For example, some offshore turbines are built with blades over 140 m (459 ft) long. One of the reasons you can’t reach this scale on dry land is that it’s nearly impossible to move a blade of this size on a road.
The corners are too tight. The bridge is too low. Even a blade half that size is a logistical nightmare. As you can see in the video below, the process can be quite scary to watch. There should be no big gusts of wind that day!
A truck carrying giant wind turbine blades navigates a treacherous mountain road
But with wind power, size really matters, and the swept area of the turbine is a key factor in how much energy can be recovered. The tip of the blade sweeps over a wider area than the section closest to the hub, so each additional length increases the area of imbalance. If onshore wind power could start using blades roughly the same size as those used offshore, more wind energy could be harvested at lower cost.
The idea of Radia Windrunner is therefore a transportation solution that can be designed around the entire turbine manufacturing operation, and indeed a solution that wind farms need to factor into their planning from day one. This is because it is completely focused on moving absolutely gigantic turbine blades.
we are radia
If it were six feet longer, the Windrunner would stretch the entire length of an NFL football field, and with a wingspan of 80 meters (261 feet), it would also be almost three-quarters as wide. At 24 m (79 ft) tall, it’s no taller than the Airbus A380, but its flip-top front raises the cabin directly above the fuselage, allowing the 108 m (354 ft) long plane to carry cargo. can be carried. It can be up to 105 m (344 ft) long and 7.3 m (24 ft) in diameter.
It has a maximum payload of a whopping 72,575 kg (160,000 lbs), a maximum range of approximately 2,000 km (1,200 miles), and a cargo hold of approximately 8,200 cubic meters (272,000 cubic feet), more than seven times more than its predecessor. The mighty Antonov will be able to provide. It will be quite large.
Radia
The idea is to install a runway as close as possible to the blade manufacturing facility and another one very close to the wind farm. The blades are loaded directly onto the plane from the factory floor and similarly lifted by crane almost straight from the back of the plane for installation.
To facilitate this type of action, the Windrunner is designed to take off and land on a relatively short 1,800 m (6,000 ft) runway. To put this into perspective, typical much smaller airliners typically use strips that are 30-110% longer than that.
Additionally, Radia doesn’t even count on a proper paved runway. Anticipating that many wind farms are built on open, flat land, Windrunner is a “semi-prepared runway,” a simple area cleared of rocks, brush, trees, and other obstacles. It is designed to operate in , like a military plane landing during an operation.
Radia
by wall street journal, Windrunner is also much more than just a set of renderings – Radia has apparently raised US$104 million for this purpose, and the company hopes to help onshore wind developers unlock larger turbines. We estimate that doing so could reduce clean energy costs by the same amount. This makes wind farms viable in a wider range of locations. The company apparently believes Windrunner will be manufactured, tested and certified within about four years.
It’s certainly a noteworthy project, and if it takes flight, it could open up all sorts of opportunities for clean energy developers. We look forward to the evolution of this monster machine!
Source: Radia
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