Bahrain's World trade Center is not just one of the million tall buildings on Earth that scrape the sky. It does much more than that. It uses the energy of the wind blowing across it to generate electricity to meet a fraction of its power needs. Commonsense as it sounds, this is the first practical implementation of this concept.

The building is a twin tower structure with 3 stainless steel bridges erected in between to hold a huge wind turbine each. A turbine is the reverse of the fan that we all know so well. It's aerodynamic shape makes it rotate when wind blows across it, moving a set of gears and a dynamo thus generating electricity.

With this structure in place it is expected that about 15% of the building's power needs would be met by this structure, thus saving few thousand USDs of power cost per annum. That's not really all. Read on.....

-This is clean energy using a renewable power source (wind) and not contributing to the depletion of fossil fuel reserves.
-It also does not add to air pollution.

It may have a huge initial construction cost associated, but with such structures getting more patronage, costs will drop in future.Better designs would not only help cover a larger fraction of the host building's power needs, but may also go on to supply electricity to neighboring buildings that can not leverage wind energy. There is a better one planned for Dubai already.

The concept of a mega structure with ability to harness a free energy source to meet its power needs is a great one. I wonder why it took us so long to get it nto action. Was it lack of vision, lack of funds,lack of technology or was it a mere lack of concern for the environment?

This is a great step in reducing pressure on our planet's natural resources.We need such ideas to be supported and implemented in India too. Unfortunalety, mega builders like DLF find it more appealing to support IPL, than to think on these lines.

Note: I borrowed some details from "Mega Structures" series on Nat Geo and the following website: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/03/bahrain_install.php<
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You might find this youtube video interesting as well.