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michael jantzen

michael jantzen

Santa Fe, NM, US

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The Solar Wind Power Plant

The Solar Wind Power Plant

The Solar Wind Power Plant is a public art installation that makes electricity from the sun and from the wind, and stores it for use by the community in which it is built. The Solar Wind Power Plant also collects rainwater and stores it for the local community.

A large solar panel mounted near one edge of a concrete slab base, converts sunlight into electricity. The electricity is stored in four spherical shaped yellow batteries.

Three silver colored vertical axis wind turbines mounted on the top of a white colored support frame, make electricity from the wind, and also store the electricity in the yellow batteries.

Three blue colored tanks with funnels mounted on their tops, collect and store rainwater. The water tanks and the batteries have access portal, through which the electricity and the water can be extracted for use by the local community.

The entire Solar Wind Power Plant is made of painted steel, attached to a large concrete base. The ideal location for this public art installation would be in a public park, where the water and electricity would be used to help maintain it.

The design of the Solar Wind Power Plant was inspired by more conventional power plants where electricity is made from conventional fossil fuels.

This power plant intends to inspire the people who visit it to become more aware of the positive benefits to all of humanity through the use of alternative sources of energy like the sun and the wind, as well as the positive benefits to be derived through the conservation of water.

As a public art installation, the aesthetics of the Solar Wind Power Plant were formed around a desire to celebrate the use of alternative energy. This was done through the creation of a place filled with intrigue, where the functional and non-functional elements leave questions in the minds of the visitors about how the whole thing might really work.

 
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Status: Unbuilt