Windwheel concept combines tourist attraction with “silent turbine”
Gizmag, February 25, 2015
The Dutch have long used windmills to harness wind energy. A new concept proposed for city of Rotterdam, however, is surely one of the most elaborate windmills ever conceived. The Dutch Windwheel is a huge circular wind energy converter that houses apartments, a hotel and a giant coaster ride.
The concept is designed to be part energy icon, part tourist attraction and part residential building. It is a 174-m (571-ft) structure comprising two huge rings that appear to lean against each other. “We wanted to combine a big attraction for Rotterdam with a state-of-the-art sustainable concept,” explains Lennart Graaff of the Dutch Windwheel Corporation, to Gizmag.
The larger outer ring houses 40 pods on rails that move around the ring and provide those who visit with views of Rotterdam and its port. The smaller inner ring, meanwhile, houses 72 apartments, a 160-room hotel across seven floors and a panoramic restaurant and viewing gallery. Perhaps most remarkable feature of of all, however, is a huge “bladeless turbine” that spans the center smaller ring.