2.22.2 Прочтите и переведите текст; выпишите ключевые слова, относящиеся к использованию энергии ветра

1. Wind turbines are now a relatively common sight across Europe, with countries such as Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, UK, Spain and latterly France, all investing in wind farms. Offshore wind development, although far less advanced, is the greatest prize in this field. However, relative costs of offshore compared to onshore are higher.

2. This project is aimed to demonstrate the economic as well as technical viability of offshore wind energy. The former was achieved through the innovative use of a floating jack-up barge which reduced the time and costs of installation. The latter was achieved mainly through the incorporation of new electronic control systems which improved the compatibility with the grid network, and reduced the need

for expensive grid strengthening measures.

3. Five turbines were installed, about 4 km off the coast of Gotland. Each turbine is rated at 500 kW. The average annual output is some 8 GWh/y, from mean wind speeds of 8 m/s. Rock-socketed steel mono-pile foundations, to water depths of 5 to 6.5 m were used to secure the turbines. Total construction time was only 35 days. Monitoring of impacts on local flora and fauna, such as the seal population, is also being carried out.

4. Wind energy developments have, in the past, been concentrated in areas of the world which offer higher than average wind speeds. Often, this means that developments take place in remote and/or sensitive areas. A technology which can increase the economic attractiveness of utilizing sites with lower wind speeds would be invaluable (бесценный). This project will design, manufacture, install, test and measure the impact of two 1 MW turbines which have been specially

adapted for use in low wind speed areas. The aim is to increase power production by up to 22%, compared to a standard turbine, mainly through the technological adaptations which allow for an enhanced rotor diameter, with a swept area of 2,830 m2, and an increase in tower height from 50 to 70 m. The new turbine is installed at a site in Central Sweden.

Примечания

1. onshore – береговой;

2. jack-up – самоопрокидывающийся;

3. compatibility – совместимость

2.22.3 В первом абзаце текста обратите внимание на степени сравнения прилагательных и скажите, какую информацию о ветряных разработках они дают

2.22.4 Прочтите второй абзац текста и расскажите о внебереговых ветряных разработках, используя глаголы to aim, to achieve, to reduce, to improve

2.22.5 Расскажите, что обеспечивает устойчивость конструкций ветряков на побережье о-ва Готланд и о достоинствах данного сооружения

2.22.6 Расскажите о разработках ветряков для районов с низкой скоростью ветра, используйте технические характеристики

2.22.7 Прочтите текст еще раз и расскажите, какую новую для себя информацию вы извлекли, используйте следующие словосочетания: I don’t think…; I am sure that…; There is no reason to deny…; I am in complete agreement…

3. Тексты для дополнительного чтения

3.1 Ocean energy: New life for an old idea

Almost a century after the French physicist D’Arsonval first proposed the idea, the extraction of heat energy from the ocean to generate useful power is moving closer to practical application. A working model of such a generator was built in the 1930-s and recent experiments indicate that the operations could profitably be combined with mariculture to help provide power and food for countries near tropical seas.

Electrical power from oceanic generators could potentially have the lowest cost of any solar-generated electricity. There is a concept of a partly submerged ocean-thermal power plant, making use of temperature differences between warm surface water and cold deep water. Some 45% of the total incoming solar energy falls on tropical seas, which form a heat reservoir whose stored energy is 10,000 times greater than present human demand. The problem that has delayed exploitation of

this vast resource is its lack of concentration – temperature differences between the sea surface and the coldest depths are only about 400 F.

Conventional power plants depend on heating various materials (steam or jet fuel) by hundreds or thousands of degrees. As these expand they drive turbines or pistons and thus convert heat into work. The greater the temperature differential, the more easily heat can be transformed.

Now designers believe they can efficiently convert the small oceanic temperature differences into useful energy by using them to boil and then recondense ammonia. Sea surface temperatures are above the boiling point of ammonia; temperatures at great depths, below. The expanding ammonia gas could then drive a turbine in much the same way boiling water is used to drive a steam turbine. But unlike steam engines, which must be constructed from heavy, cast metal to keep them from bursting, sea-thermal plants could be built from light-weight materials

because of the surrounding inward pressure from the sea. A neutrally buoyant, lightly constructed apparatus could be made from aluminum and suspended at 200 feet depth (where the external pressure is equal to the vapor pressure of ammonia) and the total energy cost of refining the aluminum would be recovered in the first few hours of the plant’s operation.

But several problems must be resolved before sea-thermal energy can be considered economically feasible. Because the operating temperature differential is so small to begin with, heat transfer through the thin walls of an apparatus might be cut to inoperable levels by even a thin veneer of algae growth – a constant problem in ocean-borne equipment.

Corrosion must be a major consideration in the design of any seaworthy machines. Also, several of the technical advances upon which supporters base their optimism have not been proven yet outside the laboratory.

(Science news, Washigton, D.C)

Примечания

1. mariculture – морская культура (все, что связано с жизнедеятельностью моря, океана и т.д.)

2. submerge – затоплять; погружать(ся)

3. ammonia – аммиак

4. because of – из-за, вследствие

5. buoyant – плавучий, способный держаться на поверхности

3.2 The way one city plans to make use of its wastes

A futuristic structure just completed here is described as "the first full-scale pyrolysis solid-waste disposal and resource-recovery system in the world. "

Using the latest technology, this plant is designed to handle 1000 tons of refuse daily, more than half the total collected by the city.

At the moment, it is being tested to work out the "bugs" in its unique design. When in full operation, now expected within six months, trash will roll in by truck at a rate of 50 tons per hour. After shredding, it will be baked at 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit. Gases from this "pyrolisis" will be mixed with air and burned to produce steam expected to meet half the heating, air-conditioning needs of many downtown buildings.

Mineral harvest. Solids remaining after pyrolysis will be culled for usable products. Around 70 tons of iron and steel will be extracted daily with huge magnets. Another 170 tons of "glassy aggregate" will be recovered, to be used primarily for road building.

Remaining will be about 80 tons of carbon char residue, which be buried in a landfill or possibly used as a solid conditioner.

(U.S. News World Report, Washington, D.C.)

Примечания

1. futuristic – футуристический

2. pyrolysis – пиролиз

3. shred – кромсать; резать/рвать на клочки

4. downtown – деловой район города

5. char – что-либо обуглившееся; обжигать, обугливать(ся).

3.3 Tidal energy – a source of power

The production of electricity is a highly effectiv industry. Even apporoximate

estimates show that electricity is so cost saving that the investment in expensive thermal and hudroelectric power station construction is quckly recouped.

The growing consumption of electric power and of power resources in general is happening worldwide. So those natural phenomena wich offer promise as power sources are being looked at more closely.

One of these is oceanic tides, since the change in the ocean water level can be up to 15–16 metres.

The tidal wave produced by the interaction of the forces of gravity in the earth-moon-sun system alters the ocean’s water level. The annual power and energy potential of tides is between two and three million million kWh, greater than the aggregate capacity of all the world’s electric stations. If this potential were converted by tidal electric stations (TES), it would greatly ease the strain on power source we have now and save millions of tons of the fast disappearing traditional fuel.

But the planning and construction of a TES has several formidable hurdles to overcome – how to cope with the intermitten, pulsing nature of tides? How can turbines be effectively used given the low pressure of the tide? It is hard to design and even harder to build a tidal electric station amidst the forbidding ocean elements on the bleak coastal sites.

There was found a way of getting around the periodic character of tidal energy by using a hydro-generating unit operative in high and low tides both as a turbine and a pump, which would enable the stations to generate electricity regardless of the tidal phase.

L.Bernshtein, D.Sc. (Technology), suggested and developed the float thechnology for hydroelectric power stations. His idea is that the tidal elecric station would be built on the coast and then hauled out by tug to the site where it will operate.

This would eliminate the need of a foundation (which is extremely expensive to build, since you have to temporarily isolate and remove the water from sections of the bottom) and of building dams and auxiliary buildings. The float technology for TES construction is also promising and cost-saving because the station does not have to be built in a isolated area and because most of the construction can be done on shore and not at the site.

The first TES were built at practically the same time in the USSR and France in the late 1960s.The Rance station in France used the design suggested by Bernshtein in his 1961 book, and was the first commercial tidal electric station operating on the sun time cycle. But it costs three times more than a conventional hydroelectric power station of the same capacity.

The principal hurdle to vault in building the Kislogubskaya TES (USSR)was to achieve a light but srong structural building design. This was done by using the thin wall elemets in the station’s skeleton, while its float stability ease ensured by ballast sand.

The electricity generated by the Kislogubskaya TES for the Kola powergrid is a drop in the bucket, but the station’s importance as a research facility for the future harnessing of tides in the White and Okhotsk Seas cannot be overestimated. Indeed, when high capacity TES are built, problems like control of corrosion and accumulation of algae and other matter on the submerged structures, the development and application of structural materials resistant to the abrasive influence of ice, etc., will have to be overcome many of the technical problems crucial for the construction of future tidal electric stations and for hydro- engineering in general are being studied here, in the tough conditions of the polar region.

The huge amounts of power generated by tidal electric stations will feed industrial development in the North and the Far East and help remake the conditions of life and even the nature of these forbidding areas of the country.

(V. SOLDATENKOV, Candidate of Science (Technology), Moscow News)

Примечания

1. alter – изменять

2. interaction – взаимодействие

3. amidst = amid – среди, посреди, между

4. ease – легко, свободно

5. hurdle – препятствие

6. vault – прыжок

7. alga, pl. Algae – морская водоросль

3.4 How to harness earth‘s heat

Experts are studying ways to tap geothermal energy – underground heat – to do the work of man.

What is geothermal energy?

It is energy extracted from the natural heat of the planet itself. At great depths, the earth is extremely hot. There are many places, though, where this heat is transferred to within a few thousand feet of the surface, forming geological “ hot spots”.

Where do these hot spots occur?

They are more numerous than once believed. Much of the land in the Western States is underlaid with relatively shallow geothermal sources. In some locations, such as Yellowstone National Park, they create geysers, or hot springs. Satellite observations have detected some hot spots, and scientists studying the chemical composition of well water have discovered others.

What is useful potential of geothermal energy?

Enormous. Some scientists estimate that geothermal energy could supply 10 per cent of the country’s energy needs. A geopressuregeothermal formation underlying the Gulf Coast from Mississippi to Texas is estimated to contain recoverable natural gas about equal to known conventional reserves. Usable deposits of hot water and stream in Oregon are estimated to equal the energy potential of the Alaskan oil fields.

How can this energy be put to work?

It depends upon the geological formation. In some areas, wells can be drilled to tap naturally generated dry steam, which can be used to drive turbine generators. Many deposits of natural hot water are adequate for heating homes or offices. There are also dry hot spots – actually subterranean domes of recently molten rock – that some scientists believe can be used to generate steam. The plan, still only a theory, is to drill two wells into a dome, pump water down into one well and recover steam or heated water from the other well. The geopressure-geothermal type of formation can produce energy in three forms – water pressure, heat or natural gas.

If the potential is so great, why isn’t geothermal energy being

used?

It is, in a limited way. The Geysers Power Plant near Santa Rosa, Calif., has been generating electricity from natural dry steam since 1960. There are geothermal power plants in at least six other countries.

Natural hot water heats hundreds of buildings in Oregon and is used in sauna baths, greenhouses and industrial processes in many places. Six cities in Iceland, including Reykjavik, the capital, have been heated by geothermal energy for years.

Is there any environmental issue?

Yes, but the problems are less complicated than those associated with fossil fuels. Still, they are knotty. Besides steam or hot water, geothermal wells may produce noxious gases, which must be handled carefully.

There is also factor of water disposal. A well designed to drive a 100-megawatt power plant, for example, could produce up to 400,000 barrels of water a day, often highly saline. Most experts believe, however, that the water could be disposed of by reinjection into the ground.

Is geothermal energy economically viable?

Cost is the main obstacle to geothermal development. Except for the use of dry steam, most geothermal sites would require a large research-and-development investment.

(U.S. News & World Report, Washington,D.C.)

Примечания

1. "hot spot" – «горячее пятно/место» (в геологии)

2. well –скважина

3. spring –источник, родник, ключ

4. dome –купол, свод

5. barrel –бочка; баррель (мера жидкости: англ.= 163,65 л, для нефти = 159 л; мера веса = около 89 кг)

3.5 The Ways of Using Renewable Energy in Future

Presenting five of the most imaginative new ideas for alternative energy sources. Each is under intensive current study, mostly with Government funding. "Power tower" to generate electricity from steam using water heated by solar energy. Heliostats – the bank of computer controlled mirrors at the base of tower – focus sun's rays on pipes containing water, located in the cylinder at top of tower. Steam under pressure then drives a turbine generator at base. Now in the preliminary experiment ' stage, an operating tower generating electricity for a city of 5,000 homes may be built by 1980. One of the biggest problems will be developing

heat storing capacity for cloudy days. Four major firms are competing in the study:

Honeywell, McDonnell Douglas, Martin-Madietta and Boeing. Space colonies powered by solar energy, reflected by hinged mirrors along the sides. Designed by Gerard K. O'Neill, the colonies; are about 19 miles long and four miles in iameter.

"Giromill" to generate electricity from wind energy. Vertical windmills offer several advantages over conventional, horizontal axis versions: they are more stable in high winds, do not have to be adjusted for changes in wind direction and may be cheaper to build. Blades are tapered like an airplane wing. A typical Giromill to create 100 kilowatts of electricity in a 15 mile per hour wind (about right to service 40 homes) would have blades 130 feet high, mounted on a rotor with a diameter of 100 feet. In high winds, blades could be released to rotate freely. The McDonnell Douglas Corporation has won a contract to study the design.

Ocean Thermal Energy Plant OTEP ships may help solve the food crisis as well as the energy crisis. By using the energy derived from ocean thermal gradients to make ammonia, at about one-third the present cost, OTEP ships could help compensate for expected fertilizer and natural gas shortfalls a decade hence. Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory is studying the possibilities.

One of the keys to developing new energy technologies is materials research. IBM has developed a new type of light absorbing surface – shown here in electron micrograph – made of vapor-deposited tungsten. Some 96 per cent of the light incident at the appropriate angle is absorbed, and the material can hold its heat at high operating temperatures (more than 900 degrees F.).

(Washington, D.C.)

Примечания

1. preliminary – предварительный

2. imaginative – изобретательный

3. hinge – прикреплять на петлях; висеть; вращаться на петлях

4. axis – ось, pl. axes

5. taper – суживать(ся) к концу; заострять

6. release – освободить, (тех.) расцеплять

7. fertilizer – удобрение

8. shortfall – (разг.) дефицит, недостача

9. tungsten – вольфрам

3.6 Floating insulators

Floating casually on the water, the light-blue Sebra Solar Petals (photo) look like a decorator's offbeat addition to an outdoor swimming pool. Despite then lily-pad appearance, the lightweight disks, have a practical side: they heat pool water using energy from the sun.

Manufactured by Engineering & Research Association, Inc., of Tucson, Ariz., the solar petals make use of a scientific principle commonly referred to as the "greenhouse effect". The sun's rays penetratethe petals, which then trap this heat radiation below the surface.

Tiny air bubbles between the two plastic sheets of the disks help to maintain this heat and raise the temperature of a pool as much as 12 degrees Fahrenheit. The petals also significantly reduce water evaporation, and at night they slow the loss of heat built up during the day. Unlike one-piece pool heating covers, the Sebra Solar Petals can easily be dropped into a pool and removed by one person. They

can also be stored more conveniently and can be temporarily stacked in bright sunlight without danger.

(Newsweek)

Примечания

1. petal – лепесток

2. offbeat – оригинальный, нетрадиционный

3. lily-pad – лист водяной лилии

4. bubble – пузырек воздуха/газа (в жидкости)

3.7 Engineering work

The public has become much more aware, especially in the last decade, of the social and environmental consequences of engineering projects. For much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the publicattitude could be summed up in the phrase “Science is good”, and the part of science that was most visible was the engineering work that made scientific knowledge useful. Countless cars and other mechanical devices are part of our engineered invironment.

Today, however, people are more conscious of the hidden hazards in products and processes. The automobile is a typical example. No one disputs its convenience but many are also aware of the air pollution it causes and the amount of energy it consumes. Engineers are working to solve these problems by designing devices that reduce pollution and improve fuel efficiency.

The engineer, then, does not work in a scientific wacuum but must take into account the social consequences of his or her work.

Примечания

consequences – последствия

to be aware of, to be conscious – сознавать

attitude to – позиция, отношение

visible – видимый, явный

hazards – опасности, вредности

to take into account – обратить внимание

3.8 Automation

We now use the term automation for specific techniques combined to operate automatically in a complete system. These techniques are possible because of electronic devices, most of which have come into use in the last thirty years. They include program, action, sensing of feedback, decision, and control elements as components of a complete system.

The program elements determine what the system does and the step-by-step manner in which it works to produce the desired result. A program is a step-by-step sequence that breaks a task into its individual parts.

The action elements are those which do the actual work. They may carry or convey materials to specific places at specific times or they may perform operations on the materials. The term mechanical handling device is also used for the action elements.

Perhaps the most important part of an automated system is sensing or feedback. Sensing devices automatically check on parts of the manufacturing process such as the thickness of a sheet of steel or paper. This is called feedback because the instruments return or feed back this information to the central system control.

The decision element is used to compare what is going on in the system with what should be going on, it receives information from the sensing devices and makes decisions necessary to maintain the system correctly.

The control element consists of devices to carry out the commands of the decision element. There may be many kinds of devices: valves that open or close, switches that control the flow of electricity, or regulators that change the voltage in various machines: they make the necessary corrections adjustments to keep the system in conformity with its program.

An industrial engineer working with automated systems is part of a team. Many components of the system, such as computers, are electronic devices so electronic devices so electronic engineers and technicians are also involved. Many of the industries in which automation has proved particularly suitable – chemicals, papermaking, metals processing – involve chemical processes, so there may be chemical engineers at work too. An industrial engineer with expertise in all these fields may become a systems engineer for automation projects thereby coordinating the activities of all the members of the team.

Примечания

sensing technology – технология очувствления

feedback – обратная связь

sequence – последовательность

handling device – ручное устройство

manufacturing – производство

adjustment – регулирование, регулировка

conformity – соответствие