How the World’s Biggest Plane Would Supersize Wind Energy


独角兽初创公司Radia计划运用航空航天科学来克服风电产业最大的障碍之一。该公司要制造一架巨型货运飞机。


WindRunner飞机的效果图。Radia设计的这架飞机能把大型风力涡轮机叶片直接运送到风力发电场。

一位航空航天工程师认为自己知道如何改造可再生能源，办法是：制造世界上最大的飞机。 6park.com
An aerospace engineer thinks he knows how to transform renewable energy: by building the world’s largest plane. 6park.com
    
麻省理工(MIT)培养的火箭科学家、曾为牛津大学罗德学者的马克·伦斯特罗姆(Mark Lundstrom)与一个工程团队花费了七年多时间设计一架巨大的货运飞机：WindRunner。如果项目完成，WindRunner将成为长度和载货量最大的飞机。 6park.com
Mark Lundstrom, an MIT-trained rocket scientist and Rhodes scholar, has spent more than seven years with an engineering team designing the WindRunner, a gargantuan cargo plane. If completed, it will be the largest plane by length and cargo volume.
   6park.com
这架飞机的用途是运载长度与足球场相当的风力发电机叶片。这种叶片是世界上最长的叶片之一，由于陆上运输的限制，目前只能用于海上项目。如果能够把最大的发电机安装到广阔的陆地上，则有望改变风电产业的面貌。在美国，新的陆上项目已经放缓，海上项目的价格也出现大幅波动。 6park.com
The plane’s purpose is to carry wind turbine blades the length of football fields. The blades, among the world’s longest, are currently used only for offshore projects because of transportation limitations onshore. Opening vast swaths of land to the largest turbines could transform wind energy, which has seen a slowdown in new U.S. onshore projects and price turmoil for offshore projects. 6park.com
    
到时候，我们会看到叶尖较目前平均水平高出约300英尺（约合91米）的陆上风力发电设施，这一高度大约相当于在美国国会大厦顶上再架上华盛顿纪念碑。这种项目将产生相当于现有陆上设施两倍的电能，而且有可能在更多的地方安装。 6park.com
The result would be land-based wind power installations with a blade tip reaching about 300 feet higher than the current average, roughly as tall as the U.S. Capitol with the Washington Monument stacked on top. Such projects would produce about double the energy current onshore installations do and be possible in more places, too. 6park.com
     
伦斯特罗姆的初创公司——总部位于科罗拉多州博尔德的Radia多年来一直没有对外公布设计方案。现在，该公司表示，WindRunner的设计、制造和认证估计需要八年时间，目前进度已经完成了一半以上。 6park.com
Lundstrom’s startup, Boulder, Colo.-based Radia, has kept the design private for years. Now, it says the WindRunner is more than halfway through the eight years it estimates it will take to design, build and certify the aircraft. 6park.com
    
伦斯特罗姆于2016年创立Radia。当时他在资料中读到，运输笨重的叶片是能源行业在物流方面最棘手的任务之一，于是，他想设法把航空航天与能源转型结合起来。 6park.com
Lundstrom founded Radia in 2016 as he looked for ways to marry aerospace with the energy transition when he read that delivering unwieldy blades is among the trickiest logistics jobs in the energy business. 6park.com
    
“那一刻，你清楚地知道，这个行业在向你招手，”伦斯特罗姆说。 6park.com
“That was a very clear moment when the industry speaks to you,” Lundstrom said.


如果项目完成，WindRunner将成为长度和载货量最大的飞机。

海上风电叶片如今很难在陆地上使用，是因为它们无法通过火车或卡车来运输。这些叶片太大、太宽，在大多数路口无法转弯，也无法在桥梁和交通信号灯的下方穿行。在海上运输这些叶片需要专用船只。 6park.com
Today’s offshore-sized wind blades can’t be used easily on land because they can’t move by rail or truck. They are too big to turn most corners and too wide to make it under bridges and traffic lights. Transporting them offshore requires specialized vessels.  6park.com
   
金融数据提供商PitchBook的数据显示，Radia已融资1.04亿美元，估值达10亿美元。该公司的员工和顾问包括波音公司(Boeing)、联邦航空管理局(Federal Aviation Administration)以及一些公用事业和可再生能源开发商的现任和前任高管。投资者包括石油巨头康菲石油公司(ConocoPhillips)以及Caruso Ventures、Capital Factory和Good Growth Capital等风险投资公司。 6park.com
Radia has raised $104 million and is valued at $1 billion, according to PitchBook. Employees and advisers include current and former executives at Boeing, the Federal Aviation Administration, utilities and renewable energy developers. Backers include oil giant ConocoPhillips and venture firms Caruso Ventures, Capital Factory and Good Growth Capital. 6park.com
    
美国前能源部长欧内斯特·莫尼兹(Ernest Moniz)是Radia的顾问委员会成员，他说，公用事业公司正在大幅提高需求预测。由于美国许多地区在推进交通和供热的电气化，加上制造业和人工智能数据中心的蓬勃发展，用电量正在激增。 6park.com
Former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, a member of Radia’s advisory board, said utilities are increasing their demand forecasts by huge factors. Electricity usage is surging because of the electrification of transportation and heating across much of the U.S., plus booms in manufacturing and in data centers for artificial intelligence. 6park.com
    
“他们还需要清洁电力，”莫尼兹说。 6park.com
“They also want clean electricity,” Moniz said. 6park.com
   
伦斯特罗姆计划为风能项目开发商运送叶片，还打算在某些情况下自行开发早期风电项目，但不打算拥有或运营这些风电场。 6park.com
Lundstrom plans to deliver blades for wind project developers and, in some instances, develop early stage projects on its own, though it doesn’t plan to own or operate the sites.  6park.com
   
WindRunner装有齐肩高的轮胎，能够在长6,000英尺（约合1829米）的经整备土质跑道上降落，每个项目都需要建造跑道。伦斯特罗姆说，项目要实现盈利，需要安装约25台他所设想的超大型陆上风力发电机。 6park.com
The WindRunner includes shoulder-height tires and has the ability to land on a packed-dirt 6,000-foot runway, which would need to be built for each project. Lundstrom says projects would include about 25 of the supersize onshore turbines he envisions to be profitable. 6park.com
   
Radia的第一个客户是一家大型独立发电商，该公司在内华达州购买了一个1吉瓦的项目。 6park.com
Radia’s first customer is a large independent power producer that has bought a 1-gigawatt project in Nevada.


金融数据提供商PitchBook的数据显示，Radia已融资1.04亿美元，估值达10亿美元。

在风电领域，可以说是越大越好。较大的叶片可以捕捉更多的风，而较高的塔架可以将叶片放置在风更连续的地方。这样一来，一天里的发电时间会增加，发电量也随之增加，即使在平均风速较低的地区，也可以产生更多电量。 6park.com
Bigger is better in wind. Larger blades can harvest more wind, while taller towers place blades where winds are more consistent. It adds up to more electricity over more hours of the day, even in areas with lower average wind speeds. 6park.com
   
Radia估计，与目前的陆上风力发电机相比，更大的发电机可将能源成本最多降低35%，并将发电连贯性提高20%。 6park.com
Radia estimates the larger turbines could reduce the cost of energy by up to 35% and increase the consistency of power generation by 20% compared with today’s onshore turbines. 6park.com
    
2022年，风力发电约占美国大规模发电量的10%。在美国中部地区，尤其是艾奥瓦州、伊利诺伊州、德克萨斯州、俄克拉荷马州和堪萨斯州，风电是一大主要电力来源。 6park.com
Wind provided around 10% of large-scale electricity generation in the U.S. in 2022. It is a major source of electricity generation in the middle of the country, especially in Iowa, Illinois, Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.  6park.com
   
普林斯顿大学(Princeton University)教授杰西·詹金斯(Jesse Jenkins)作为顾问，为Radia进行了一项研究。他说，在更高的塔架上安装更大的叶片，将使风能在各地更具竞争力，并使风能开发在美国更多地区更具可行性。但较大的塔架会被更多人看到，这可能会引起社区的反对。“最大的问号是社会的容许和社会的接受度，”詹金说。 6park.com
Larger blades attached to taller towers would make wind more competitive everywhere while making more of the U.S. viable for wind development, said Jesse Jenkins, a professor at Princeton University who did a study for Radia as a consultant. But the larger towers would be visible to more people, which could stir community opposition. “The biggest question mark is the social license and social acceptability,” Jenkins said. 6park.com
 
据美国清洁电力协会(American Clean Power Association)称，去年是近十年来新风电设施建设速度最慢的一年，因为项目面临政策不确定性和选址障碍等问题。制造商生产的尺寸最大的产品也面临可靠性问题，这主要是由质量控制问题导致的。 6park.com
Last year was the slowest for new wind installations in a decade as projects faced issues such as policy uncertainty and siting barriers, according to the American Clean Power Association. Manufacturers have faced reliability problems with their largest products, mostly stemming from quality-control issues. 6park.com
   
伦斯特罗姆说，WindRunner将使用监管机构熟悉的现有技术和组件，这些技术和组件可通过现有的航空供应链获得。该公司将利用飞机制造商来制造这款飞机。 6park.com
The WindRunner would use existing technologies and components familiar to regulators, available through the existing aerospace supply chain, Lundstrom said. The company would use aircraft manufacturers to build the plane. 6park.com
   
波音公司前工程总监、Radia的飞机开发副总裁雷切尔·凯利(Rachel Kelley)说，飞机设计的目标是“不做新东西”。 6park.com
Rachel Kelley, former director of engineering at Boeing and Radia’s vice president of aircraft development, said the goal of the plane design was, “Do nothing new.”  6park.com
    
凯利表示，如果说制造一架新型飞机听起来很极端，那么运送大型叶片的其他手段更是不切实际。飞艇无法在大风天气降落。直升机的成本比货运飞机高，而且悬吊着专门用来捕风的叶片飞行可能复杂而危险。如果完全绕开物流问题，在现场建造移动生产设施，则需要足球场那么大的临时设施。 6park.com
If building a new airplane sounds extreme, Kelley says other measures to move big blades are impractical. Blimps can’t land in windy conditions. Helicopters are more costly than airplanes, and flying with a dangling blade designed to catch wind would prove complex and dangerous. Skipping the logistics issue altogether and building mobile manufacturing on site would require temporary structures as big as football fields. 6park.com
   
这种飞机一次可以装载一个大型海上风电叶片，也可以装载多达四个较短的叶片。伦斯特罗姆还认为，这种飞机还有其他用途，比如运送军用或石油天然气行业的大型设备。 6park.com
The plane would be able to fit one large, offshore-sized blade at a time, or it could carry as many as four shorter blades. Lundstrom also thinks it has other uses for moving large equipment for the military or oil-and-gas industry.