Photo: Rabih Shasha | Unsplash
Wind turbines need resilience in the face of natural disasters like hurricanes. But building stiff blades is expensive. Recently, researchers were inspired by the structure of palm trees, which surprisingly withstand such storms with ease. Making blades facing away from the wind allows them to be lightweight and flexible. This also makes them more sustainable than stiff blades. Additionally, their flexibility allows the blades to bend with strong winds and therefore not break. "Wind turbine blades are typically designed to last at least 20 years, and we want our novel concept blades to achieve similarly long lifetimes," Researcher Lucy Pao says.
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