BS: slashdot should be ashamed (Score 2, Interesting)

Wind power is very well understood. The power in the wind is (1/2)*p*A*v^3. Where p is air density in units (kg/m^3), A is the swept area in units (m^2) and v is the velocity of the wind in units (m/s). This is intuitive from a physics perspective if the energy of a moving object is (1/2)*m*v^2 then p*A*v is mass. Albert Betz proved that the maximum efficiency of a wind generating device is 59%. Many small wind turbines can achieve an efficiency of over 30%. From the article it says "his device [is] 10 to 30 times as efficient as the best microturbines" That would put the efficiency of the device at at least 300%. Not only is that higher than the betz limit it is higher than the energy available. A quick example. Lets use an air density of 1 and a swept area of 1 (for a rotary turbine this would be a blade radius of .56m), a wind velocity of 10mph (4.47 m/s) and an efficiency of 30%. This will make 13.4 watts of power. That would be enough to power several small led light.