Abstract: A wind turbine with an array of rotors arranged at various heights. Each rotor is optimized for the height at which it is located. Optimization of each rotor could include selection of rated power, solidity, tip speed, blade twist, blade taper, or rotor diameter. Each rotor can also be operated in a manner that is optimized for the wind speed it experiences. Optimized operation parameters could include blade pitch angle or rotor speed.

Abstract: A wind turbine with an array of rotors arranged at various heights. Each rotor is optimized for the height at which it is located. Optimization of each rotor could include selection of rated power, solidity, tip speed, blade twist, blade taper, or rotor diameter. Each rotor can also be operated in a manner that is optimized for the wind speed it experiences. Optimized operation parameters could include blade pitch angle or rotor speed.

Abstract: Differential mounting for railroad wheels includes an axle with a wheel fitted on one end to rotate with the axle and a second wheel carried adjacent the opposite end of the axle and mounted to rotate relative to the axle. The axle has a raised wheel seat with an axial length approximately the same as the hub of the second wheel which is generally rectangular in cross-section. Fillets define the inboard and outboard ends of the raised wheel seat and a steel sleeve is fitted over the raised wheel seat and includes an annular flange portion shaped to engage the outboard axle fillet. A collar carried within the sleeve engages the inboard fillet. Pressure plates are disposed on the inboard and outboard ends of the sleeve and include opposed stainless steel thrust bearing surfaces contiguous to the annular side faces of the wheel hub which are surfaced with a TEFLON composite, bearing material bonded thereto.

Abstract: A plate-fin panel for a heat exchanger may be either formed as an aluminum extrusion or fabricated from a corrugated metal sheet sandwiched between two flat metal sheets. The extruded aluminum version may be clad with protective sheet metal jackets made of, or coated with, a corrosion resistant Cu-Ni alloy. Individual panel sections can be joined together by tongue and groove engagement to obtain a total desired panel width if available extrusion press or rolling mill capacity is insufficient. The plate-fin panels are assembled into slotted headering plates, and a layer of synthetic plastics potting compound seals dissimilar metal joints against electrolytic corrosion as well as leakage and provides sufficient adhesive strength to reduce or eliminate the need for welding the panels to the headers. Mechanical brush or hydraulic jet apparatus is capable of continuously or intermittently cleaning slime or encrustations from all panel surfaces exposed to seawater.

Abstract: In an ocean thermal energy conversion system utilizing solar energy stored as heat in tropical waters to generate electricity, the evaporating and condensing functions of the heat exchangers are interchanged in order to prevent the accumulation of micro-organisms on their surfaces. The surfaces of the heat exchangers are also mechanically brushed or scraped so as to remove any thin films of microbial slime. In order to remove additional micro-organisms from the surfaces of the heat exchangers, the flow of hot and cold sea water through each of the heat exchangers is interchanged preferably on a daily basis. Thus, micro-organisms from the warm surface waters that attach themselves to one heat exchanger surface will be destroyed by the cold water that flows through that heat exchanger on the next day. On the other hand, the organisms that live in the cold water at great depths cannot survive the next day's warm water environment which is caused by alternating the flow to the two heat exchangers.

Abstract: An integrated system for converting ocean thermal energy to electrical power for use in synthesis of anhydrous ammonia and a mariculture operation for raising a selected species of marine fauna. The mariculture operation is carried out in a lagoon located adjacent to a deep ocean region where the surface water temperature is at least 21.degree. C and the deep nutrient-rich water temperature is no more than about 10.degree. C. A separate working fluid, such as ammonia, operates in a Rankine cycle between the warm and cold seawater temperatures. The deep ocean water is used to condense the working fluid and is then mixed with warm surface water that has been used to evaporate the same working fluid in a closed power cycle. The resulting mixture is directed to the lagoon, where the nutrient-rich component contributes to the growth rate of a selected mariculture species.