Cloud seeding and free energy?

Bit of a strange story on the BBCtoday, about a proposal to build ships that will fire sea-water into the atmosphere to increase cloud cover and therefore the amount of solar radiation reflected back to space. A method to counteract greenhouse warming?

OK, plausible. But get this:

Instead of sails, these vessels use a much more efficient technique to power the yacht - Flettner rotors.

These spinning vertical cylinders mounted on the deck, are named after their inventor Anton Flettner. They also house the spraying system which sprays sea water droplets from the top of the rotors.

The power required for spraying, communications and so on, comes from electricity generated by turbines dragged along by the vessels.

The ship would have to be going fucking fast to generate enough power to jet water thousands of feet into the air. Or wouldn’t it? Surely there would be more efficient ways of collecting the energy required? If not, then why are people building wind farms with rotors instead of using some variation on this technology?

It all looks a bit dubious.

Comments?

Pretty dubious. I wouldn’t mind one of those flettner rotors on my roof providing lights, pumping water and maybe some other stuff. Also not sure about putting seawater in clouds. Wouldn’t it be possible for it to rain seawater where you don’t want it then?

Pretty massive idea. I like massive ideas, but I’m no scientist.

Check this out: Turby

[quote=“canucktyuktuk”]Pretty dubious. I wouldn’t mind one of those flettner rotors on my roof providing lights, pumping water and maybe some other stuff. Also not sure about putting seawater in clouds. Wouldn’t it be possible for it to rain seawater where you don’t want it then?

Pretty massive idea. I like massive ideas, but I’m no scientist.[/quote]

I just looked again. The flettner rotor utilises a motor to turn itself, and generates force in a straight line. It doesn’t spin, so it can pull something along but can’t turn a generator.

Perhaps you could put it on the roof of a car to help it go faster? Or mount a small one on your crash helmet?

That turby thing look cool.