The Cleveland Indians have installed a wind turbine at their ballpark. The reason: to help Cleveland hit more home runs!
The newly patented turbine on Progressive Field’s rim could make urban wind farms a reality and help relieve Cleveland’s economic woes. But, WWN has learned that real purpose of the wind turbines is to great strong headwinds against opposing batters and to help the Indians hit more homeruns.
“If we use the wind turbines as they are designed, the Indians should win all their homes games this season,” said an Indians representative. “It’s going to be impossible for batters to hit a ball when their facing 60 mph winds coming at them.”
“When we’re at bat, we can give our players a 60-70mph wind to help propel the balls over the fence, and when the opposing teams are at bat, we’ll just turn the wind machine around and… they won’t stand a chance.”
Mounted on a steel base on the ballpark’s southeastern rim, the helical wind turbine is 40 feet tall, 18 feet wide, and it weighs 3,000 pounds. The helix is constructed from 80 vacuum-formed, hard plastic pieces affixed to an aluminum frame. Four off-the-shelf wind turbines rest within the grooves of the corkscrew.
“The easiest way to explain it is this: there are two wind turbines hanging on both sides of the spiral,” said the corkscrew’s creator, Cleveland State University mechanical engineering professor Dr. Majid Rashidi. “When air passes by the spiral, it gently deflects the wind towards the turbines to power them.”
Is it against MLB rules to use wind against opposing teams? “There’s nothing in the rulebooks against it,” said an Indian insider. “It’s sort of like an act of God, except we’re causing the act of God. Other teams can get into wind too if they want. But when they come here, they’re gonna run into some strong headwinds!”
The array will generate an estimated 40,000 kilowatt-hours a year—roughly four US houses-worth—during its year-long test run. If successful, the design could prove useful in urban and confined environments where conventional long-blade turbines simply can’t work.
The Department of Energy and Major League Baseball footed the $2.1 million prototyping bill. The Indians organization wants to use it to defeat opponents, but they all want to educate a new generation of baseball fans about sustainable energy.
“This is a great opportunity to teach fans about the importance of clean energy technologies,” said Hank Mullins, the Indians’ assistant director of Ballpark Operations. “And to win some *%$ing games! Finally, the Indians will be back in the World Series.”
reporting by Andrew Tarantola of Gizmodo.
Here’s the “official” explanation of the Cleveland Corkscrew.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=aNEIz9IQ6uU&w=480&l=385]
