The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently announced funding of a proposal submitted by Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and Empire Magnetics Inc. Over the next two years, $1.3 million of a total of $36 Million appropriated by the US Congress for International Proliferation Prevention will be dedicated to the design and prototyping of new windmill technology. The program, officially named LBNL-T2-0203-RU Low Maintenance Wind Power System, is an outgrowth of collaboration between scientists and engineers at Lawrence Berkeley Labs, The Makeyev Design Bureau of the State Rocket Center in Miass Russia, and Empire Magnetics Inc.

As the cold war winds down and terrorism becomes a greater threat, the US Government has decided that unemployed weapons designers and supporting research scientists present a threat to civilization. With the specific intent of providing peaceful and gainful employment for these scientists, the DOE labs have been tasked with finding ways to generate new business ventures for them. Quite logically the US science community has turned to US industry to find partners for these ventures.

These small (3-70 kW) wind power systems use a novel Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) design. VAWT offers a number of advantages over conventional Horizontal Axis Wind Turbine (HAWT), such as lower maintenance costs and increased durability and reliability. VAWT systems are also more economically viable in remote locations than 100+ kW HAWT systems. Empire Magnetics will be engineering the alternators for these windmills.

According to a report by the American Wind Energy Association (www.awea.org), over the last five years growth of the wind power market averaged 30% annually, with 2001 sales topping $7 Billion, and a total of 6500 megawatts added to the grid worldwide in 2001 alone. The multi-billion dollar wind power industry is the world's fastest growing energy source and is growing in popularity in an effort to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and to generate cost-effective electricity in remote locations. These windmills are being proposed as power sources in the effort to help rebuild Afghanistan.

Empire Magnetics Inc. has been providing specialized equipment to the national labs for many years. As a result the company was in a position to pull together several programs to put together a plan which, according to the USIC (http://www.usic.net/) review committee was, "The best proposal submitted this year." This plan has teams of Russian missile, aircraft, submarine and other disciplines working to create advanced windmill designs. The expertise in aerodynamics, mechanical structures and other related areas directly transfer to this peaceful and environmentally friendly purpose. Empire Magnetics Inc. will use its expertise in motor technology to design and build improved alternator technology to be used with these windmills. At LBNL, Daryl Oshatz (daryl_oshatz@lbl.gov) is the project manager, while Glen Dahlbacca PhD. manages the overall LBNL IPP program.

Empire Magnetics is a leading supplier of specialty motor products, motion control systems and support services to a variety of North American and international manufacturers.