If you're at all like me, this is what you do with the sunny summer weekends in San Francisco: you build experimental kite-powered hydrofoils capable of more than 30 knots. And you realize that there is incredible power in the wind, and it can do amazing things. And one day, a vessel not unlike this will probably break the world speed record.
Ukoliko ste imalo slični meni, ovo je ono što radite za sunčanog ljetnog vikenda u San Franciscu: proizvodite eksperimentalne hidrokrilce pogonjene zmajem sposobne za više od 30 čvorova. Tada shvatite kako postoji nevjerojatna snaga u vjetru, koja može činiti zadivljujuće stvari Jednog dana, letjelica slična ovoj će vjerojatno probiti svjetski brzinski rekord.
But kites aren't just toys like this. Kites: I'm going to give you a brief history, and tell you about the magnificent future of every child's favorite plaything. So, kites are more than a thousand years old, and the Chinese used them for military applications, and even for lifting men. So they knew at that stage they could carry large weights. I'm not sure why there is a hole in this particular man.
No, zmajevi nisu samo igračke poput ovog. Zmajevi. Upoznat ću vas ukratko s njihovom povijesti, i ispričati vam o izvanrednoj budućnosti najdraže igračke svakog djeteta. Znači, zmajevi su stari više od tisuću godina, a Kinezi su ih koristili u vojne svrhe, i čak za podizanje čovjeka. Znali su u ono doba da oni mogu podizati velike terete. Nisam siguran zašto je rupa u ovom dotičnom čovjeku.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
In 1827, a fellow called George Pocock actually pioneered the use of kites for towing buggies in races against horse carriages across the English countryside. Then of course, at the dawn of aviation, all of the great inventors of the time -- like Hargreaves, like Langley, even Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, who was flying this kite -- were doing so in the pursuit of aviation.
1827., čovjek zvan Goerge Pocock ustvari je razvio korištenje zmajeva za vuću kočija u utrkama protiv konjskih kočija kroz engleski krajolik. Tada naravno, u zoru avijacije, svi veliki izumitelji tog doba -- kao Hargreaves, kao Langley, čak Alexandar Graham Bell, izumitelj telefona, koji je letio ovog zmaja -- su radili to baveći se avijacijom.
Then these two fellows came along, and they were flying kites to develop the control systems that would ultimately enable powered human flight. So this is of course Orville and Wilbur Wright, and the Wright Flyer. And their experiments with kites led to this momentous occasion, where we powered up and took off for the first-ever 12-second human flight. And that was fantastic for the future of commercial aviation.
Tada su došla ova dva gospodina, a oni su letjeli zmajeve kako bi razvili kontrolni sustav koji je u konačnici omogućio let ljudi. Ovo su naravno Orville i Wilbur Wright i Wright Flyer. A njihovi pokusi sa zmajevima su doveli do tog značajnog događaja, gdje smo pogonjeni mehaničkom snagom poletjeli do prvih 12 sekundi ljudskog leta ikad. To je bilo fantastično za budućnost komercijalnih letova.
But unfortunately, it relegated kites once again to be considered children's toys. That was until the 1970s, where we had the last energy crisis. And a fabulous man called Miles Loyd who lives on the outskirts of San Francisco, wrote this seminal paper that was completely ignored in the Journal of Energy about how to use basically an airplane on a piece of string to generate enormous amounts of electricity. The real key observation he made is that a free-flying wing can sweep through more sky and generate more power in a unit of time than a fixed-wing turbine.
Ali nažalost, to je degradiralo zmajeve i učinilo da budu ponovo doživljavani dječjim igračkama. Tako je bilo do 1970-ih, kada smo imali zadnju energetsku krizu. A nevjerojatan čovjek po imenom Miles Loyd koji živi na rubu San Francisca, je napisao poticajni rad koji je bio potpuno zanemaren, u Journal of Energy, o tome kako načelno upotrijebiti avion na uzici za generiranje ogromne količine elektriciteta. Njegovo ključno opažanje bilo je da slobodno-leteče krilo može zahvatiti više vjetra i generirati više energije po jedinici vremena, nego turbine s fiksnim krilom.
So turbines grew. And they can now span up to three hundred feet at the hub height, but they can't really go a lot higher, and more height is where the more wind is, and more power -- as much as twice as much.
No turbine su rasle. I sada dosežu do 90 metara visine pri glavčini, ali ne mogu ići mnogo više, a na većim visinama ima više vjetra, i više snage -- čak i do dvostruko više.
So cut to now. We still have an energy crisis, and now we have a climate crisis as well. You know, so humans generate about 12 trillion watts, or 12 terawatts, from fossil fuels. And Al Gore has spoken to why we need to hit one of these targets, and in reality what that means is in the next 30 to 40 years, we have to make 10 trillion watts or more of new clean energy somehow. Wind is the second-largest renewable resource after solar: 3600 terawatts, more than enough to supply humanity 200 times over. The majority of it is in the higher altitudes, above 300 feet, where we don't have a technology as yet to get there.
Vratimo se nazad. Još uvijek imamo energetsku krizu, a sada k tome još i klimatsku krizu. Znate, čovječanstvo generira oko 12 bilijuna vata, ili 12 teravata, iz fosilnih goriva. I Al Gore je govorio zašto trebamo dosegnuti jednu od ovih meta, a u stvarnosti to znači da u slijedećih 30-40 godina moramo proizvesti novih 10 bilijuna ili više vata čiste energije, nekako. Vjetar je drugi najveći obnovljivi izvor energije poslije sunčeve: 3600 teravata. 200 puta više nego što je dovoljno za opskrbu čovječanstva. Većina je na višim visinama, iznad 90 metara, za što još nemamo tehnologiju koja bi nas do tamo dovela.
So this is the dawn of the new age of kites. This is our test site on Maui, flying across the sky. I'm now going to show you the first autonomous generation of power by every child's favorite plaything. As you can tell, you need to be a robot to fly this thing for thousands of hours. It makes you a little nauseous. And here we're actually generating about 10 kilowatts -- so, enough to power probably five United States households -- with a kite not much larger than this piano. And the real significant thing here is we're developing the control systems, as did the Wright brothers, that would enable sustained, long-duration flight. And it doesn't hurt to do it in a location like this either.
Dakle, ovo je zora novog doba za zmajeve. Ovo je naše pokusno područje na Mauiu, iz zračne perspektive. Sada ću vam pokazati prvi autonomni generator energije pomoću najdraže dječje igračke. Kao što možete vidjeti, morate biti robot kako bi upravljali ovime tisućama sati. Pomalo izaziva mučninu. Ovdje zapravo proizvodimo oko 10 kilovata -- znači, dovoljno za opskrbu energijom oko 5 kučanstava u SAD-u -- sa zmajem ne mnogo većim od ovog klavira. A stvarno značajna stvar ovdje je da mi razvijamo kontrolni sustav, kao što su i braća Wright, koji bi omogućio održiv, dugotrajni let. I nije na odmet to raditi na lokaciji poput ove.
So this is the equivalent for a kite flier of peeing in the snow -- that's tracing your name in the sky.
Za letača zmaja, ovo je ekvivalent pišanja u snijegu. To jest ispisivanja svog imena na nebu.
And this is where we're actually going. So we're beyond the 12-second steps. And we're working towards megawatt-scale machines that fly at 2000 feet and generate tons of clean electricity.
A ovo je kamo mi trenutačno idemo. Dakle prešli smo 12 sekundni prag. I radimo na megavatnim spravama koje bi letjele na 700 metara i generirale na tone čistog elektriciteta.
So you ask, how big are those machines? Well, this paper plane would be maybe a -- oop! That would be enough to power your cell phone. Your Cessna would be 230 killowatts. If you'd loan me your Gulfstream, I'll rip its wings off and generate you a megawatt. If you give me a 747, I'll make six megawatts, which is more than the largest wind turbines today. And the Spruce Goose would be a 15-megawatt wing.
Pitate, koliko su velike te sprave? Pa, ovaj avion od papira bi možda -- ups! On bi bio dovoljan da vam napuni mobitel. Vaša Cessna bi bila 230 kilovata. Ako bi mi posuditi vaš Gulfstream, skinuo bi krila sa njega i generirao megavat. Ako bi dali 747, napravio bi 6 megavata, što je više nego najveća vjetro-turbina danas. A Spruce Goose bi bilo krilo od 15 megavata.
So that is audacious, you say. I agree. But audacious is what has happened many times before in history. This is a refrigerator factory, churning out airplanes for World War II. Prior to World War II, they were making 1000 planes a year. By 1945, they were making 100,000. With this factory and 100,000 planes a year, we could make all of America's electricity in about 10 years.
To je smiono, kažete. Slažem se. No smiono se zbivalo već mnogo puta u povijesti. Ovo je tvornica frižidera, koja je proizvodila avione za drugi svjetski rat. Prije drugog svjetskog rata, proizvodilo se 1.000 aviona na godinu. Do 1945., proizvodilo se 100.000. S tom tvornicom i 100.000 aviona godišnje, za približno 10 godina bi mogli proizvoditi sav elektricitet koji Amerika treba.
So really this is a story about the audacious plans of young people with these dreams. There are many of us. I am lucky enough to work with 30 of them. And I think we need to support all of the dreams of the kids out there doing these crazy things. Thank you. (Applause)
U biti, ovo je priča o smionim planovima mladih ljudi s ovim snovima. Mnogo nas je. Sretan sam što radim s njih 30. I smatram kako moramo poduprijeti sve takve snove djece koja rade te lude stvari. Hvala vam (Pljesak)