turn off three yeah you can turn it off right AR here yes underwater tidal turbines may be the wave of the future in providing power to homes and businesses in New York City as part of a pilot program verdant power a renewable energy company just installed two new turbines off of Roosevelt Island which makes a total of six currently in the East River so what we have here are tidal energy turbines that look very much like wind turbines but they're designed to work with the tidal current and they're designed to work in both directions the
basic power is based on the size of the rotor and the speed of the current so for this East channel of the East River we have a 16 ft diameter rotor and because the current flows at about 2 m/s we have a 35 KW generator in each turbine when the current picks up the rotors move about 34 RPMs slow revolutions but enough to provide some power to two nearby businesses now what we have here is a tidal array now there words more than one turbine in the water uh we have produced so far 50 megawatt
hours of electricity grid connected electricity to two customers which Taylor says makes them the first grid connected array of tidle turbines the beauty of tidal power is much like it's much like wind currents you have very strong energy and tile currents now the beauty of tidal power is it's very predictable and reliable so with these systems in the water one can look at their clock and a tital chart and know exactly when Power is coming on and and going off the tides of the East River Rush In And Out turning the turbines and generating electricity
about 30% of the day the wind industry never really took off until all Technologies converged on three bladed axial flow or horizontal axis Upstream rotors what we have here is a three-bladed axial flow Downstream rotor other words the rotor is at the end of the turbine the the nose cone of the turbine has this fin that allows the turbine to orient itself to the current like a Weather Vein the two most recently installed turbines will allow verdant power to complete operational test and environmental monitoring over the next few months and once they receive a commercial
pilot license from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission they plan on expanding this project to a total of 30 water turbines in the East River for Discovery news I'm Casey D Gardner
