I’m not sure where this is going, but the first thing I thought of was this old sci-fi movie “Them“:
Via Eurekalert: Evolutionary lessons for wind farm efficiency
Evolution is providing the inspiration for University of Adelaide computer science research to find the best placement of turbines to increase wind farm productivity.
Senior Lecturer Dr Frank Neumann, from the School of Computer Science, is using a “selection of the fittest” step-by-step approach called “evolutionary algorithms” to optimise wind turbine placement. This takes into account wake effects, the minimum amount of land needed, wind factors and the complex aerodynamics of wind turbines.
“Renewable energy is playing an increasing role in the supply of energy worldwide and will help mitigate climate change,” says Dr Neumann. “To further increase the productivity of wind farms, we need to exploit methods that help to optimise their performance.”
Dr Neumann says the question of exactly where wind turbines should be placed to gain maximum efficiency is highly complex. “An evolutionary algorithm is a mathematical process where potential solutions keep being improved a step at a time until the optimum is reached,” he says.
“You can think of it like parents producing a number of offspring, each with differing characteristics,” he says. “As with evolution, each population or ‘set of solutions’ from a new generation should get better. These solutions can be evaluated in parallel to speed up the computation.”
Other biology-inspired algorithms to solve complex problems are based on ant colonies.
“Ant colony optimisation” uses the principle of ants finding the shortest way to a source of food from their nest.
“You can observe them in nature, they do it very efficiently communicating between each other using pheromone trails,” says Dr Neumann. “After a certain amount of time, they will have found the best route to the food – problem solved. We can also solve human problems using the same principles through computer algorithms.”
Dr Neumann has come to the University of Adelaide this year from Germany where he worked at the Max Planck Institute. He is working on wind turbine placement optimisation in collaboration with researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“Current approaches to solving this placement optimisation can only deal with a small number of turbines,” Dr Neumann says. “We have demonstrated an accurate and efficient algorithm for as many as 1000 turbines.”
The researchers are now looking to fine-tune the algorithms even further using different models of wake effect and complex aerodynamic factors.
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Tom T –
Why are you so ant-i wind power?
JamesS says:
May 4, 2011 at 9:24 am
“Optimizing the locations of the deck chairs on the Titanic.”…”…using pheromone trails…”
It could work!
Over on Climate etc. there is a lively discussion about ‘Black Swans’ and Dragon Kings.
The concept of “black swan” comes from Nassim Nicholas Taleb…The term “black swan” comes from the mistaken assumption that all swans are white. In this context a “black swan” is a metaphor for something that cannot exist.
Didier Sornette has given a rather precise definition for what he calls a dragon-king:
Dragon Kings are defined quite closely as being the variability associated with chaotic bifurcation.
My comment:
One has to wonder what these scientists smoked in their student days.
Wind power must be the most ‘funny’est means of generating electricity.
Because of efficiency losses, the value of the energy taken from the wind will always be less than the value of the energy left in the wind. The tort visited upon those downwind from windmill operators cannot be cured.
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It will no doubt give some improvement within its limited scope, but it’s still just gilding a turd.
Why don’t they apply that algorithm to compare nukes to wind power?
From a purely theoretical point of view, I find this fascinating. I would love to work on this type of problem (though what I am working on right now is kinda cool 🙂 ).
From a practical real world point of view, I am sure this is silly. A lot of work to eek out a minor increase in the cost effectiveness of a system that will never be as cost effective as a coal-fire or NG plant.
I’m keeping an open mind about wind farms, actually. Individual small turbines (like the small one that the City of Aurora, IL built around the corner from my home, to power one set of traffic lights) are pretty stupid. However, properly placed, large-scale farms may not be that objectionable.
I recently toured the Meadow Lake wind farm in Indiana with a bunch of electrical engineers, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meadow_Lake_Wind_Farm
I was quite impressed with the level of control the operators have over the turbines, which are remotely operated from a center in Texas using SCADA (if they did anything with water, I’d sue for patent infringement). Turbine blades are feathered to optimized energy output and match this output with demand. Also, the farmland beneath the turbines was nearly all usable, and they didn’t look nearly as ugly as other installations I’ve seen. I didn’t see any dead birds/bats, not that there weren’t any.
However…in IN, wind energy is least when the power is needed most (dog-days of summer), there is no storage mechanism for excess production, and the farm operator is fined if they provide electricity into the grid when it is not needed, so turbines will sit in “off” mode on some windy days since the power is not needed. A waste of assets.
At least we don’t have to import wind from the Persian Gulf or Venezuela! There are many problems to overcome with this technology, but I was impressed with their approach and wouldn’t mind seeing further refinement of the technology. We will need every extra electron that we can muster, and wind energy is but one small piece of the puzzle. It may not replace nuclear/coal/gas, but there is a fit for this stuff in some instances.
more like he is optimizing his seat on the Eco Gravy Train and trying to keep the gig going until he qualifies for a cushy taxpayer funded pension.
“While wind-driven electrical generation is not-ready-for-prime-time,”
Wind power was mostly abandoned as soon as anything better came along, for good reason. Generating electricity from a widmill is no different thwn pumping water or running a mill, just a different mechanical process.
“they can augment the electrical reserve.”
No, they can’t, because they are not on demand sources. In fact they require reserve power be built just to back them up. The gas generators that are required to augment the windmills are the reserve.
This reminds me somewhat of the final years of steam locomotive development (whether coal- or oil-fired). There was always another “unexplored avenue” round the corner which would radically change the fundamental inefficiency – pre-heated water, condensers, economisers, uni-flow cylinders, turbine drives, etc – they each amounted to almost nothing, thermal efficiency rarely exceeding 12%, and then only intermittently. They were all dead-end avenues and the net result was that burning oil internally in smaller cylinders, or using coal-by-wire from power stations, delayed real improvements in efficiency by a decade or so (depending on which country you’re in). At least the loco designers didn’t use public funds derived from fraudulent taxation to contrive those delays.
Then there is this ant story.
Global warming leads to the spread of giant ants.
http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/early/2011/05/03/rspb.2011.0729.full.pdf+html
Vuk etc. says:
“… In this context a “black swan” is a metaphor for something that cannot exist…”
Tell that to Cygnus Atratus.
(yes, I know that Taleb pointed that out in his book, but it’s still pretty cool)
Now I know what I need to finally get my perpetual motion machine to work! All that is missing is the right magic algorithm. Why didn’t I think of that?
“Dr Neumann has come to the University of Adelaide this year from Germany where he worked at the Max Planck Institute.”
So the Germans have managed to export another of their Max Planck Institute nutters.
Poor Aussies. They’d have been better taking someone who is good at cricket.
Pedestrian concerns like cost and leasing don’t enter into this? I’m pretty sure that no one wants to ‘learn’ with their money…..they would rather get it right from the outset.
Now …….learning from someone ELSE’S money might be a little easier….
That is great but it is still being used to spend billions on a fraud. Science should be put to better use and so should hard earned tax dollars and so should representation by politicians.
““Genetic programming” has been around for 20 years. Hardly novel. The results of using it on this problem are tied to the accuracy of their models of what the “genes” in the “organism” will produce. ”
EXaCTLY RIGHT.
This is very powerful technique where you can optimize complex multivariate problems that have multiple “correct” but “less perfect” solutions that would trap normal optimization algorithms. (There are add-ins to Excel that will allow you run it on your desktop. It’s very cool. I’ve used the technique on Financial math and production problems and been impressed.)
BUT it’s only as good as your modeling knowledge and control of your “universe”, and since I’m constantly seeing stories about turbines failing because of “unexpected” turbulence from -ground, other turbines, the atmosphere, etc… and all the other problem “issues” with wind turbines, I have to admit to a high degree of skepticism that the results of this are any better than human’s experience and good eye.
Assuming you even want want one those economically disastrous money pits at all, which is a really big IF. Optimizing to minimize the massive disaster that they are seems a lot more trouble than NOT DOING IT AT ALL and avoiding the problem altogether.
This reminds me of the hydrogen based dirigible crowd saying we can make it much safer than the Hindenburg! And everyone answering “WHO CARES?” we don’t need it at all. (Or at least where it’s needed there are other MUCH SAFER solutions.)
““To further increase the productivity of wind farms, we need to exploit methods that help to optimise their performance.”
I’m not sure that any very complicated algorithm is needed to optimise BigWind’s performance in the only thing that they are good for.
The obvious solution is to check out the level of subsidy available. I’d be surprised if Australia could compete with the UK in that respect and at least SOME of their politicians have woken up and smelt the BS.
My guess is that British subsidies are amongst the most generous (=most ludicrous) in the world.
“Thousands of engineers can design bridges, calculate strains and stresses, and draw up specifications for machines, but the great engineer is the man who can tell whether the bridge should be built at all, where it should be built, and when.” – Eugene G. Grace
My grandmother had an expression for such exercises in futility: “lining up the deck chairs on the Titanic.”
evolution or regression
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13269302
“A giant ant growing over 5cm (2in) long crossed the Arctic during hot periods in the Earth’s history”
It’s not “Them”, it’s “Them!”
ShrNfr says:
May 4, 2011 at 10:04 am
““Genetic programming” has been around for 20 years. Hardly novel. The results of using it on this problem are tied to the accuracy of their models of what the “genes” in the “organism” will produce. Given the track record of models of wind turbines, I am not hopeful that they will produce anything more than just another research grant request.”
He’s using a Genetic Algorithm, not Genetic Programming – Genetic Programming means that you evolve a program (this is usually very hard); a specialized Genetic Algorithm (in this case one that places wind turbines) is easier to do. And it’s a standard optimization technique. Every now and then a Wired or Technology Review writer gets all excited about it but it’s run of the mill these days.
The fitness function probably just runs simulations of the wake effects of the turbines. And it will result in a marginal improvement of the turbine placement. To run the supercomputer that runs the GA they probably only need the output of 5,000 turbines plus one coal fired power station for the moments the wind doesn’t blow…