Wind-powered cars and boats anyone?

The application of wind energy for the generation of electricity is a relatively new phenomenon of the last 100 years or so. By far the most dominant human application of wind energy has been transport throughout our history - predominantly sail-powered boats over the last few millenia. Could transport applications of wind power be coming back?

UK-based Greenbird are working on a wind-powered car, that recently clocked up 60mph (27m/s) during a preliminary speed trial in the Australian desert. Although the vehicle is aimed at breaking speed records, the concept is an interesting one, using a carbon-fibre sail to provide thrust.

On the high seas, German-based skysails are developing a kite-like system to assist cargo ships in reducing their fuel consumption by an estimated 30%. Essentially harnessing the power of the wind to pull them along when favourable, assisting their conventional drive system. Even better, it can be used on the current fleet not requiring a radical change in the current ystem.

For transport applications, using wind energy directly rather than converting to electricty and then back to kinetic is definitely a more efficient approach however the practicalities remain to be demonstrated. This could be a great step forwards for reducing CO2 emissions, with transport accounting for around 20% of the total, ship-transport being around a quarter of this. It will take some radical thinking to get past our reliance on cheap and readily available fossil fuels, this could form a piece of the puzzle.