Thermocline Inducer
Leslie, the day supervisor at work, was stuck. She's taking classes at a Community College. Her assignment was to present a new technology, and she just couldn't think of one. She asked my help, so I told her about my Thermocline Inducer.
If you've ever swam in a Maine lake and dove 12 feet or so down you've noticed the water is suddenly much colder. That's a thermocline: in this case it's water too deep for sunlight's warmth. Thermoclines are natural in water deep enough.
Back in the 1990's Russian nuclear-powered submarines suddenly became much quieter than our own. Nuclear reactors are essentially high-tech steam plants, and must be cooled. Our submarines rely on pumps - quieted pumps to be sure - but not perfectly silent. Their soft thumping can be detected by those trained and equipped to hear them.
The Russians stopped using pumps and started using a naturally recirculating cooling system. Picture the reactor at the bottom of a big water tank or pool. The reactor heats the cooling water, which rises to the top of the pool and starts cascading through a series of cooling pipes throughout the length of their submarine, eventually flowing back into the bottom of the cooling tank where it is warmed again to continue the process. We're left listening for the sound of water flowing through water.
The Japanese prefer natural sunlight for health and productivity. Some large Japanese buildings have solar collectors on their roofs connected to fiber optics running throughout the structure providing natural sunlight instead of fluorescent lighting to the occupants within.
The idea of a thermocline inducer is to build large tubes floating vertically in the ocean. The tube should be long enough to puncture a thermocline. Solar collectors set at the top of the tube on the ocean's surface send light via fiber optics to the far end of the tube below the thermocline. Water is heated - slightly - and rises up the tube where turbine blades collect the energy from the rising water. Their should be a filter at the bottom of the tube to protect the turbine blades. The water simply flows out the top of the tube.
The thermocline inducers are limited to sunlight usage only. One application is to float these thermocline inducers on barges moving about kelp fields in littoral regions. Kelp is generally not a food crop, and can be turned into bio-diesel without compromising land resources. The barges, powered by thermocline inducers, can be move from field to field processing kelp into renewable fuel.
Lobster-men, possibly displaced by this process, can find steady employment maintaining and harvesting kelp fields. Work is work.
There are local applications for a thermocline inducer too. Residential communities can set units up much like a backyard pool, and power small clusters of homes and businesses, rendering large utility companies and sprawling power grids obsolete.
A thermocline inducer uses proven, off-the-shelf technology in a new way.
It was fun watching Leslie's jaw drop. It's only one of many possibilities. I didn't tell her my idea was years old, or why it's unlikely to be built.
If you've ever swam in a Maine lake and dove 12 feet or so down you've noticed the water is suddenly much colder. That's a thermocline: in this case it's water too deep for sunlight's warmth. Thermoclines are natural in water deep enough.
Back in the 1990's Russian nuclear-powered submarines suddenly became much quieter than our own. Nuclear reactors are essentially high-tech steam plants, and must be cooled. Our submarines rely on pumps - quieted pumps to be sure - but not perfectly silent. Their soft thumping can be detected by those trained and equipped to hear them.
The Russians stopped using pumps and started using a naturally recirculating cooling system. Picture the reactor at the bottom of a big water tank or pool. The reactor heats the cooling water, which rises to the top of the pool and starts cascading through a series of cooling pipes throughout the length of their submarine, eventually flowing back into the bottom of the cooling tank where it is warmed again to continue the process. We're left listening for the sound of water flowing through water.
The Japanese prefer natural sunlight for health and productivity. Some large Japanese buildings have solar collectors on their roofs connected to fiber optics running throughout the structure providing natural sunlight instead of fluorescent lighting to the occupants within.
The idea of a thermocline inducer is to build large tubes floating vertically in the ocean. The tube should be long enough to puncture a thermocline. Solar collectors set at the top of the tube on the ocean's surface send light via fiber optics to the far end of the tube below the thermocline. Water is heated - slightly - and rises up the tube where turbine blades collect the energy from the rising water. Their should be a filter at the bottom of the tube to protect the turbine blades. The water simply flows out the top of the tube.
The thermocline inducers are limited to sunlight usage only. One application is to float these thermocline inducers on barges moving about kelp fields in littoral regions. Kelp is generally not a food crop, and can be turned into bio-diesel without compromising land resources. The barges, powered by thermocline inducers, can be move from field to field processing kelp into renewable fuel.
Lobster-men, possibly displaced by this process, can find steady employment maintaining and harvesting kelp fields. Work is work.
There are local applications for a thermocline inducer too. Residential communities can set units up much like a backyard pool, and power small clusters of homes and businesses, rendering large utility companies and sprawling power grids obsolete.
A thermocline inducer uses proven, off-the-shelf technology in a new way.
It was fun watching Leslie's jaw drop. It's only one of many possibilities. I didn't tell her my idea was years old, or why it's unlikely to be built.