Quietrevolution wind turbine

A qr5 turbine at Bristol Beacon, Bristol
Quietrevolution wind turbine at the London Olympic Stadium

Quietrevolution (often stylized with lower-case "q": quietrevolution) is a brand of vertical-axis wind turbines owned since 2014 by Darrieus Ltd previously VWT Power Ltd in the United Kingdom.

Quietrevolution's helical designs are related to the Gorlov turbine, which evolved from the Darrieus wind turbine. Quietrevolution's qr5 model won several awards, including Building magazine's 2006 Sustainable Innovation Award.[1] However, the qr5 did not perform well enough to ensure the original company's success, and it went into administration in 2014.[2][3] The company and its intellectual property were taken over later in 2014 by Darrieus Limited previously VWT Power Limited, which now offers an improved qr6 model.[4]

Both models consist of three vertical airfoil blades, each having a helical twist of 120 degrees. This feature spreads the torque evenly over the entire revolution, thus preventing the destructive pulsations of the straight-bladed giromill (Darrieus turbine). The wind pushes each blade around on both the windward and leeward sides of the turbine.

The qr5 turbine, rated for 6.5 kW, measures 3.1 metres (10 feet) in diameter[5] and 5.5 metres (18 feet) high.[6] The qr6 is similar: 3.1 m wide and 6 metres (20 feet) tall and is rated 7.5 kW.[7]

Seven qr5 turbines were erected in 2012 at the Olympic Park in London[8] in a failed attempt to generate on site 20% of the park's post-games energy requirements however there was insufficient wind resource.[9] The turbines' usefulness was questioned: they were possibly net consumers of energy.[10]

A public relations setback for the qr5 and original company was the poor performance of the turbine installed at Welsh government offices in Aberystwyth. The company blamed poor siting[11][12] for the £48,000 turbine's generation of a monthly average of £5.28 worth of electricity (33 kWh) in 2012.

  1. ^ 2006-11-24T00:00:00+00:00. "Sustainable innovation award". Building. Retrieved 2022-08-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ Paul Gipe (7 May 2014). "Quiet Revolution Goes Quiet: Maker of QR5 VAWT Files for Bankruptcy". Wind Works. Paul Gipe. Retrieved 2 August 2019.
  3. ^ "Appointment of Liquidators". The London Gazette. The London Gazette. Archived from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 2 August 2019.
  4. ^ "Vertical Axis Wind Turbines the qr6 helical VAWT". www.quietrevolution.com. Retrieved 2022-08-14.
  5. ^ "VWT Power qr5 - 6,50 kW - Wind turbine". en.wind-turbine-models.com. Retrieved 2022-08-14.
  6. ^ Tjiu, Willy; Marnoto, Tjukup; Mat, Sohif; Ruslan, Mohd Hafidz; Sopian, Kamaruzzaman (2015). "Darrieus vertical axis wind turbine for power generation I: Assessment of Darrieus VAWT configurations". Renewable Energy. 75: 50–67. doi:10.1016/j.renene.2014.09.038 – via Elsevier Science Direct.
  7. ^ "QR6 Vertical Axis Wind Turbine" (PDF). Quietrevolution.
  8. ^ Murray, James (2012-07-31). "Olympic Park erects wind turbines". the Guardian. Retrieved 2022-08-14.
  9. ^ 2012-02-10T00:00:00+00:00. "Focus on wind turbine blamed for Olympic renewables failure". Building. Retrieved 2022-08-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  10. ^ "Power-hungry Olympic wind park a triumph of spin over substance | Games Monitor". www.gamesmonitor.org.uk. Retrieved 2022-08-14.
  11. ^ "£48k turbine which made just £5 of power a month to be removed". BBC News. 2014-07-10. Retrieved 2022-08-14.
  12. ^ Paul Martin (7 November 2013). "Welsh government's £48k wind turbine creates £5 of power a month". BBC News online. A wind turbine that cost the Welsh government £48,000 to buy has been generating an average of just £5 worth of electricity per month.