SPECIAL NOTE: Nov 16, 2010 PolarStar (formerly IceCode) was chosen from among 3800 entries as one of five innovation award winners of the ‘GE ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid’
52 Patents 116 Pending ...Worldwide
Contact: Cliff Lyon 801.274.0882
A team of physicists and engineers at Dartmouth College led by Dr. Victor Petrenko have unlocked the secrets of ice and perfected a number of ways to make ice work for us instead of against us.
Dr. Victor F. Petrenko Director, Ice Physics Research Lab Thayer School of Engineering Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH USA 54 patents, 116 pending worldwide
M.S., Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology Ph.D., U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, Moscow 1974 D.Sc., Physics and Mathematics, U.S.S.R. Academy of Science, Chernogolovka 1983 Publishing: Physics of Ice Physics of Semiconductors Over 150 scientific publications (See video interview)
Photo Courtesy of Gary Braasch. All Rights Reserved
www.polar-star.us
At POLARSTAR, we have deciphered the secrets, decoded the details ICECODE and changed man’s interface with ice forever.
A team of physicists and engineers at Dartmouth College led by Dr. Victor Petrenko have unlocked the secrets of ice and perfected a number of ways to make ice work for us instead of against us.
click to play video More videos here
We Cracked It
PETD technology breaks the ice bond almost instantaneously, inexpensively and with dramatically less energy than current technology.
Where can we break ice? ● ● ● ● ● ●
Ice makers Power lines Windshields Wings and wind blades Bridges, buildings and ships Refrigerators and air-conditioning ...and more
Premise Power Grid
POLARSTAR VRC technology melts ice from power transmission lines without service interruption. There is no other known solution.
Today, the US power grid is over-capacity causing massive loss of heat energy. VRC means higher capacity lines can be employed improving transmission efficiency by up to 25% for over 50% of the grid worldwide.
(VRC Technical Paper) (Patent) Full VRC presentation
Premise Wind blades
PETD-enabled wind blades eliminate wind turbine down-time due to icing Click for video
World wide, lost power production due to wind blade icing averages 10% in cold climates.
SPECIAL NOTE: On November 16, 2010 PolarStar was named one of five innovation award winners of the ‘GE ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid.’
PETD-I
Pulse Electro-Thermal Deicing (PETD) (technical paper) PETD concentrates a “smart,” precise, high power pulse to the ice/substrate interface for between .01 - 4 seconds to heat a minimal layer of interfacial ice to just above the melting point causing the ice to slide off a resulting thin water film. Watch demonstration video
SPECIAL NOTE: On Nov 16, 2010 PolarStar was named one of five innovation award winners of the ‘GE ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid.’ For PETD technology.
"An ice surface has a high electric charge. Ice doesn't simply cake onto surfaces, it bonds in three ways: via the hydrogen atoms themselves, via an electrostatic bond caused by the current and via comparatively weak van der Waals forces. There is no surface coating which can suspend those three forces. That is why the search for ice-phobic coatings has failed. POLARCSTAR PETD melts just a few microns of the ice interface and gravity does the rest." - Dr. Victor Petrenko
Wind Turbines I
POLARSTAR Wind Blade De-icing Technology Full power production in the most severe icing conditions. Allows for wind farms in high wind locations heretofore disqualified due to icing. ● ● ● ● ●
Instant de-icing & anti-Icing Low power requirements Lightning strike protection Flexible control electronics Patented worldwide
SPECIAL NOTE: On Nov 16, 2010 PolarStar was named one of five innovation award winners of the ‘GE ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid.’ For PETD technology.
Wind Blades Winter
Once wind turbine blades begin to accumulate ice, like airplane wings, they lose lift and slow down until finally, to avoid damage, they must be shut down until the ice melts. Global Population and Winter Conditions in Select Regions
Region U.S. Canada Western Europe Eastern Europe Northern Europe Japan Russia China South Korea
Total Population (M)
% Affected by Winter Conditions
307
63%
34 188
100% 100%
293 98
100% 100%
127 150
58% 86%
1,350 48
75% 100%
Note: Population data is taken from 2009 U.N. statistics. Note: Population percentages affected by winter conditions are estimated.
Blades Retro Fit Diagram
Proprietary Mathcad/COMSOL software tools are used to design and model tile size, shape placement and pulse delivery.
Intelligent multiple tile design: ○ Provides incremental de-icing pulse delivery system balanced with power availability. ○ Allows for blade flex and perfect conformance to airfoil shape. ○ Matches coefficients of thermal expansion of tile and blade materials to minimize thermally induced stress. Adhesion: The preferred laminate has excellent adhesive quality. Fasteners may be used.
Wind Blades Retro Fit
Proprietary PETD Tiles Material: The optimal tile material is a thin composite laminate (.25 to .5mm thick) Application: 3 to 5 ft2 tiles are laid in a series along the leading edge of the air foil. A bank of ultra capacitors Maxwell or Nesscap provide power to the tiles. Life expectancy: Where the maximum imaginable heating cycles is 10,000 per year, the life expectancy the PETD material components is at least 50 years.
Wind Blades Detail
Low Power Consumption A 1-2 second 50kW/m2 pulse (average) is required per heating cycle. Under the most serious icing conditions, a heating cycle every 10 minutes uses in average power density of 83W/m2 to 167W/m2. 167W/m2 x 150m2 = 25kW Example: The target area of a 50m blades is about 150m2. Under heavy icing conditions such a turbine would use an average of less than 25kW.
Blades Retro Fit Diagram System Overview For most existing sites, only the outer third of the blade requires ice protection tiles.
Integrated Design Variables Wind blades can be POLARSTAR-Enabled in manufacturing
Integrated Design Variables:
Ocean: Blade length, speed and distance to ocean surface (spray). Land: Altitude (air density) and moisture Meteorological parameters: (NASA's LEWICE Ice modeling software for predicting icing conditions in aerospace works well for wind turbines)
In over a decade of research, development and extensive testing of PETD technology in aerospace the Petrenko research team has created a powerful set of software tools to model PETD. These tools provide the ability to design PETD applications quickly and with a high degree of confidence, for hundreds of different materials, blade shapes and environmental conditions.
Other Attempts Blade De-Icing
Why Other Solutions Don't Work Thermal Heating panels/tape ● Too slow. Heat dissipates into ice and blade ● Incomplete de-icing ● Patches fall off due to thermal expansion, material incompatibility ● Excessive power consumption Hot Air Blade Heating ● Requires plant shut down ● Incomplete de-icing ● Too slow. Heat dissipates into ice and blade ● Excessive power consumption Ice-phobic coatings ● Years of testing has not yielded success ● Icing occurred even on coated surfaces ● Materials degradation, coating becomes porous
Last Slide of 7 (short presentation)
Click for full presentation (PPT slide deck)
Contact: Cliff Lyon 801.274.0882