Stick it to mountain climbers by capping mountain tops with lakes to generate power. A man made volcano-like crater at the top, filled with rain. Windmills could be put at the edges of the crater if there's enough wind to warrant it. Higher altitude/higher wind speed.
-- goomba, Jun 27 2004

Pumped Storage http://www.darvill....altenerg/pumped.htm
[DrCurry, Oct 21 2004]

Electric Mountain http://www.rps.psu.edu/cause03/four.html
Baked, even has wind turbines in the background [suctionpad, Oct 21 2004]

Why didn't you climb the mountain? Because there's a power station at the top.
-- goomba, Jun 28 2004


Mountains are very nice how they currently are, thank you.
-- evilmathgenius, Jun 28 2004


Baked, possibly Widely Baked. Absent the windmills, this is commonly done to augment local power grids. One scheme I saw involved using off-peak power to pump water up the mountain to fill the lake, which then served as a reserve battery against peak demands.
-- DrCurry, Jun 28 2004


My "reserve battery" would maximize gravity as the energy stored hence leading to more efficient use of land. No more raping of fragile tarn ecosystems. No more senseless mountain climbing casualties.
-- goomba, Jun 28 2004


It seems they'd fill with ice, being so cold and such. That being the case, it wouldn't be any different than what's already up there.
-- Freefall, Jun 28 2004


Some of the extra power produced from the added elevation could be used for melting the snow in the higher and/or less Equatorial mountains. Lower and/or more Equatorial mountains wouldn't have this problem.
-- goomba, Jun 28 2004


Do I get a second vote to fishbone [goomba]'s annotations?

Hydroelectric power, both from naturally occurring sources such as lakes, rivers etc., and from man-made reservoirs is widely baked. This goes for "reserve battery" peak-shaving systems as well as baseload energy generation. Windmills and wind turbines are also widely baked, including on high ground. There is nothing particularly new in placing them close to each other.

Incidentally it will take 334MJ of energy to melt 1 ton of water ice, while a 1km drop will release only 10MJ of potential energy.
-- suctionpad, Jun 29 2004


Poor !...... Thats all I can say......
-- PainOCommonSense, Jun 29 2004


This is not a baked concept. There are no mountains whose tops have been blown off to be replaced by a man-made lake.
-- goomba, Jun 29 2004


Baked or not, the fish have spoken, I believe.
-- DrCurry, Jun 29 2004


Beg to differ [goomba]. See [link].
-- suctionpad, Jun 29 2004


Dinowrig was mentioned in the first link. Thanks just the same.
-- goomba, Jul 02 2004


Back in the 1960's, my grandfather worked on a project in New Zealand wherein a tunnel was bored up from the base of a mountain, in to the lake at the top with a hydroelectric at the base to generate electricity from the water drained from the lake. As I recall, the water discharged in to or near a place called "Deep Cove". The system was capable of pumping water back up to the lake (Manapouri, I think).

I don't get the windmill part. And I don't get the "stick it to mountain climbers" part either. Are you saying that there will no longer be a top of the mountain to climb to?
-- half, Jul 02 2004


Yes [half]. The peak will have been removed, the result resembling a volcano. The mountain, having been obviously summited in the past, will lose it's allure to would be height heros.
-- goomba, Jul 02 2004


It is far simpler (and already common) to create "forebay" reservoirs below the main dam, where water fills up by day, driving hydro generators when power demand is high. At night, the water is pumped out of the forebay back up to the main reservoir, when power demands are low. Examples in California: San Luis, Oroville, Trinity / Shasta.
-- NickB, Nov 29 2004



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