The world's first floating wind farm, Hywind Scotland, has officially begun generating electricity. Operated by international energy company Statoil in partnership with clean energy company Masdar, the 300-megawatt wind farm located 15 miles from Scotland's eastern coast will ultimately power 20,000 houses and connect to a battery storage solution currently in development. "Hywind can be used for water depths up to 800 meters [2625 feet], thus opening up areas that so far have been inaccessible for offshore wind," said Statoil executive vice president of the new energy solutions Irene Rummelhoff in a press release. "The learnings from Hywind Scotland will pave the way for new global market opportunities for floating offshore wind energy. Through their government's support to develop the Hywind Scotland project, the UK and Scotland are now at the forefront of the development of this exciting new technology.” [Statoil]
A group of researchers from ETH Zurich has designed and built a 25-foot-tall prototype of an ultra-thin, lightweight, and double-curved concrete roof that is set to be used in a residential construction project next year. With an average thickness of just under 2 inches, the structure varies between 1.2 inches thick on the edges to 4.7 inchesthick at the roof's structural supports. [ARCHITECT]
Researchers at MIT are using the 180-square-mile European nation of Andorra as a "living lab" for urban innovations. So far one team has developed a 3D augmented reality platform called CityScope Andorra that simulates urban interventions such as autonomous vehicles to assess potential impact, civic engagement, and decision making. [MIT News]
Despite hurricane-related delivery setbacks, the Swiss team won the the Department of Energy–sponsored 2017 Solar Decathlon with its communal flex space, NeighborHub. [Builder]
On Tuesday, San Francisco–based component building systems company Project Frog announced a collaboration with global software developer Autodesk to create a yet-unnamed cloud-based platform that connects the architectural design process with the manufacturing industry. The partnership was made possible through an Autodesk Forge Fund investment. [ARCHITECT]
A team of researchers from California Institute of Technology and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, in Germany, have developed a new model for solar cells inspired by butterfly wings. The group found that the insect wings' microstructure includes scales pockmarked with holes that both make the butterflies lighter and scatter the sun's light to help them absorb more heat. After replicating this form, the scientists found their new solar cells could absorb twice as much light as traditional cells. [Phys.org]
