Green Daily

Wondering what New York City will look like when Mayor Bloomberg gets his way and puts wind turbines on every available surface? While you're probably envisioning a city skyline punctuated with giant windmills, British turbine start-up Quiet Revolution has a different idea for urban wind development. They raised $12.49M this year to start production on their innovative, and of course quiet, vertical-axis turbines.

So far, Quiet Revolution's claim to fame has been its three-blade helix design, which allows its turbines to produce 20% - 40% more energy than a traditional turbine of equal size. The 'qr5' is the company's current flagship model. At 5 meters tall and 3 meters wide, this 'small-scale' turbine is an ideal size for urban locales. The only drawback is the price: $43,500 for the tubine, plus installation, controls, and the mast -- not exactly ideal for the homeowner. The qr5 is designed with schools, commercial, and municipal buildings in mind.

QR is working on a smaller 2.5 meter model which will be a scaled down duplicate of the qr5's low-maintenance, high-efficiency design. Hopefully, the 'qr2.5' will be priced with homeowners' budgets in mind.

[via Earth2Tech]