iWind Power?

Apple may be the world’s valuable company and brand, but to sustainability and corporate social responsibility advocates, the company is often a pariah. But a patent application the company filed last year, first revealed on the Apple Insider blog, shows that some of that cash on which Apple is sitting could be invested in a new clean energy technology.

Filed last year, the application describes a set of rotating blades that converts rotational energy from a wind turbine into heat that is then stored in a vessel containing “low heat capacity fluid.” The system would then selectively transfer the heat as needed from that low heat capacity fluid to a “working fluid” and hence would generate electricity. Heat, not rotational energy, would would be the result of the turbine’s blades rotating; and even more exciting, energy could be used when needed, as when there is little or no wind.