Why Flower Turbines, “Most Fundable Company,” Will Fail

Apparently, Pepperdine University’s business school, Graziadio, has named its 2020 Most Fundable Company® winner, Flower Turbines, calling it “an innovative wind turbine that has revolutionized the industry.”

I use the word “apparently” because concepts in small wind like this, of which there have been many dozens, have failed uniformly, every single one.

There are good reasons for this, but they fall into three categories:

• Small output = small value = low price = low cost materials = cheap and flimsy, which doesn’t work for things that have to spin 24/7 on a bearing for a period of many years.

• Small output doesn’t compete at all well against large.  That’s because power is proportionate to the swept area, and swept area is proportionate to the square of the radius.  Thus doubling the radius quadruples the power output.

• Small wind is generally sited in modest elevations, which means poor wind conditions, a situation which is made even worse because of trees and buildings.

They’re looking for investors.  OMG.