Inhabitat » ‘WING’ PERSONAL PORTABLE WINDMILL

September 10, 2007

‘WING’ PERSONAL PORTABLE WINDMILL

by Ali Kriscenski

Wing Personal Windmill, Wing Portable Windmill, Wing Personal Wind Turbine, Wing Portable Mini Wind Turbine, Ines Vlahović and Mladen Orešić of Croatia, Index Awards, Design to Improve Life, Wind Power, Mini Personal Windmill, Mini personal wind turbine, renewable energy, wind energy, wind gadget, wind device

Wind power is one of the most promising sources of renewable energy, yet most often its presence is felt only on the industrial scale, in large wind farms connected to the power grid. How great would it be for individuals to be able to power their devices through their own personal, portable windmill? Thats the concept behind the ‘Wing’ Personal Windmill. The name alone has an air of freedom and mobility, and that’s exactly what this lightweight personal windmill creates. Portable, easily folded and carried by a single individual, Wing produces enough electricity to satisfy the primary needs of the mobile individual; powering cell phones, laptops, and lamps.

Designed by Ines Vlahović and Mladen Orešić of Croatia, the original impetus for Wing was to provide energy in remote locations (camping, at the beach, in remote rural areas, etc), but the success of the prototype makes it easy to use Wing as a secondary source of electricity in the home as well. Wing is suitable as a secondary power source in any settled situation, and earned one of the highly-coveted INDEX Awards of 2007: Design to Improve Life.

We’ve covered personal “Micro Wind turbines” before, but the ‘WING’ design is nothing like the large, static “Quiet Revolution” for the home, nor the tiny, plastic Motorwind Micro Turbine for use in dense urban areas. ‘Wing’ is designed for portability and personal electronic use, and thats why this design is so truly innovative.

The designers, Ines Vlahović and Mladen Orešić of Croatia, intended for Wing to mimic an umbrella in its form. The result has two useful implications: convenience and connection to the elements. Inclement weather? Unfold umbrella. Urgent email? Unfold Wing. The packable design is complete with a sling-back canvas carrying case.

In its prototype phase, Wing was recently honored with a 2007 INDEX award for its potential to improve everyday life without disturbing the environment. A winner in the Home category, Wing considers modern life as a nomadic, independent experience with high-tech communication possibilities.

+ WING PERSONAL WINDMILL

+ INDEX Awards

+ MICRO WIND TURBINES

+ QUIET REVOLUTION HOME WIND TURBINE

28 Responses to “‘WING’ PERSONAL PORTABLE WINDMILL”

Orrin Says:

September 10th, 2007 at 7:15 am

How many people would actually carry that thing around when we won’t even carry around a solar cell 1/10th that size? Impractical.

chris Says:

September 10th, 2007 at 1:36 pm

I think it’s great. I plan to take this w/ me to tailgating for football games and camping at music festivals like wakarusa and bonnaroo. Often the only electricity we need during those events is enough to charge cell phones or play a small radio. This would save us from having to use the car.

chas Says:

September 10th, 2007 at 4:15 pm

Although I am skeptical of many of the products I see, I actually think this is great!!!!!!!!!
I am a person that is really into flying stunt kites. when I go out I’ll set up a wind sock kite & use that as a way to guage wind speed & direction.
it would be cool to set up this thing instead of the wind sock & actually get useful energy out of it.

Rex Says:

September 10th, 2007 at 8:12 pm

I love how the second picture shows it standing up. It looks really nice to look at at that point of view. I think that cafes or places that have outdoor eating and that are located near the beach should definitely have this. It could provide some sort of shade if it were slightly larger and at the same time people can charge their stuff.

Rik Martin Says:

September 11th, 2007 at 5:04 am

please can i have one?
let us not forget all those rotating washing lines in all our back gardens the unsung heroes of wind power
let us combine the wing with washing and empower ourselves with dry pants at the same time

Richie Says:

September 11th, 2007 at 10:24 am

Just like electric vacuum tube powered guitar amps we never intended to be overdriven & distorted as a modus operandi by their designers… they were, and Rock & Roll was never the same. The greatest value of this ‘Wing Personal Windmill’ design concept might be in it’s allowing homeowners to create very INEXPENSIVE windmill like wind power arrays for individual homes. Maybe 10 of these suckers will be ganged together by homeowners that balk at the $25,000 English Pounds cost of a single ‘Quiet Revolution’ wind turbine would kick ass !?!? I’ll bet that 10 of these ‘wing personal wind generators’ wouldn’t cost very much at all.

Use different colored fabrics and place each wing unit at different heights… and its ‘Art’ ! An outdoor sculpture installation that generates power ! This might also be useful as public power generating sculpture installations in small parks and other urban / suburban spaces as well ?

chas Says:

September 11th, 2007 at 12:49 pm

I love the idea of hooking a generator up to a rotating cloths dryer. that’s so cool. not only would you be saving energy by drying your cloths on the line but you would be generating power at the same time. the cloths would act as the sail so the more you put on the line the more sail area you have & the more energy you could generate.
what a cool idea!!!!
gonna have to work on that one…..

Nick Simpson Says:

September 11th, 2007 at 3:26 pm

How much electricity does this produce? That would be the make-or-break for this invention. If it creates a good amount for the price you pay, great, but taking into account it’s lightweight appearance I can’t image it being a big producer,

stephen Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 12:31 pm

I second what Nick says. This article is pretty useless without some kind of figures. “Sufficient” power? Who’s to say what that is? This looks like an amazing invention, but without knowing how much power it can generate, or at least an estimate, it feels pretty pointless…at this point, all I can picture is that it’s going to allow me to run a flashlight or so. But, I’d love to be proven wrong with numbers.

Sean Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 12:45 pm

I agree with Rex. Install these instead of umbrellas over outdoor seating. If one can charge a laptop, then a dozen can help reduce a restaurant’s power bill (or provide a benefit to customers). It looks like these could be mass-produced for almost the same price as one of those umbrellas. The only real problem might be how distracting/annoying the constant spinning is, and you won’t know until you try sitting under one (or perhaps in the middle of a group of tables with them all spinning). ;-)

Orrin, you wouldn’t carry it around everywhere. As long as the pole isn’t too long (it looks like it is, but that issue could be resolved), you could keep it in your car trunk. It’s not that hard to sling it over your shoulder when setting up at the beach, a picnic, or somewhere else you want it. It’s thin enough that if it fits properly, it should take up almost no space in the trunk.

Scott Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 1:19 pm

How much????

Peter Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 1:20 pm

A solar cell would out-produce this during the daytime hours, and it’s much smaller and doesn’t depend on wind, which may or may not be blowing. The WORST thing for battery charging is non-consistent power, so be wary of sparse wind conditions. At night, with a good steady wind, this thing would be pretty cool to use.

grenden Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 1:24 pm

I was hoping to see something smaller and sturdier, for instance, to be used while driving your car–stick it out the window or sunroof and let it spin and charge a battery while you’re speeding along at 75mph. If I’m going to be using energy to get somewhere, I may as well try to get back what I can along the way.

Chris V. Says:

September 12th, 2007 at 2:25 pm

Do you have the specifications for this model, how much power does it generate and how it is converted to electricity?

Bob Alou Says:

September 13th, 2007 at 12:06 pm

grenden, wouldn’t it be more efficient to charge from the car’s electric system or a solar charger on the dash or rear deck?

The aerodynamics of this thing on a car would have to make a dent in the fuel economy, so I can’t see its being useful in that context. It might make a nice supplement to solar for nights and cloudy days, though.

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September 14th, 2007 at 5:31 am

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September 19th, 2007 at 2:13 am

[…] Wing Personal Portable Windmill […]

Jae Says:

September 20th, 2007 at 5:36 pm

This is a great idea! Being a dreamer, I can see this being used when parasurfing, while riding a bike, or as a sculptural urban centerpiece, The ideas are endless! Back to reality, as others have stated, it would be nice to know what kind of energy can be harnessed and how it can be used w/o creating lots of drag (when using w/ sport activities).

Turbina eólica portátil - Glúon /blog Says:

September 21st, 2007 at 3:58 pm

[…] Via Inhabitat […]

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October 3rd, 2007 at 4:32 pm

[…] for camping, road trips, or in developing rural areas with no access to an electricity grid.”read more | digg […]