Google has announced that it will begin taking its large-scale wind turbines airborne next month, according to the International Business Times. Astro Teller, the head of Google X, announced the news to a crowd at South by Southwest (SXSW) during a keynote address that capped off the Interactive portion of the major tech festival. Google X, a project of Google that is dedicated to making major technological advancements, is calling the massive kite-like turbines Project Makani. Up until now, Google has only tested smaller scale, 28-feet long models, but now the company will test a full-scale model.
Flying wind turbines might sound like another outlandish Google project, but Teller told SXSW attendees that “There’s an enormous benefit to going up higher.” The wind turbines could “generate 50 percent more energy by accessing stronger winds at higher altitudes, while eliminating 90 percent of the materials used in conventional wind turbines,” according to Project Makani’s website.
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