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Tech

Quebec's 'Riverlutionary' Turbine Video Is Hilarious

A Quebec company is trying to raise money for their portable turbine with a ridiculous Kickstarter video.
Image: Screenshot from the "Riverlutionary" video

Not only is the Canadian province of Quebec one of the largest producers of hydroelectric power (and maple syrup) in the world, but the many lakes, streams and rivers producing the power have become a cultural institution.

Since its creation in the 1940s, the state-owned corporation Hydro-Québec, which administers the many power stations providing electricity to the province and a bit beyond, has been an anchor of the regional economy and a trailblazing engineering showpiece for renewable, clean energy.

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Love for hydroelectric power is also probably part of the reason some water-crazed Quebecers from the little-known Montreal company Idénergie were inspired to design a smaller, portable river turbine, which they hope will bring easily accessible electricity to impoverished people all over the world by offering a cheap energy alternative.

And if its plan to power up the lives of the millions worldwide who go without electricity wasn't already audacious enough, the company produced one of the most insane Kickstarter videos I've ever seen, complete with corny jokes and an awkward Francophone host occasionally dancing.

Amidst a bumping synth beat, Idénergie CEO Pierre Blanchet explains how his "riverlutionary" system will start a "riverlution." According to him, it could change the energy game by powering homes using the non-stop flow of rivers as an energy source. "Since the river runs 24 hours a day, our solution provides a reliable and consistent source of energy," said the company release on the Kickstarter site.

Unlike solar and wind-powered energy producers, Blanchet points out (in between a very lame moonwalk and rolling wrist move), that the constant flowing of water in rivers stops for no one. Which is why their small-scale Darrieus aluminum turbine can be installed in any running river to produce hydroelectricity. In other words, Blanchet and his team are applying a very old design for hydropower and shrinking it into a cheaper, small scale alternative energy source.

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Looking a little bit like a hamster wheel with three open spinning blades on either end, the system latches onto flowing river water to activate a spinning motion that is harnessed by the turbine. The device transfers the energy by an attached chord to batteries.

"Our river turbine is equipped with the first green generator," reads the company breakdown of the turbine. "A true innovation that procures a fully waterproof compartment to protect critical electronic components of the generating unit. We also developed 10 versions of our generator in order to be efficient at low water velocity and power the electrical appliances of a residence."

In comparison to gargantuan centralized dams, which are invasive in water systems and can offset certain fauna, this turbine is presented as a less invasive, smaller alternative. That said, during the sequences where Blanchet is underwater near the spinning blades of the turbine, all I thought of was what would happen if he caught his fingers in the turbine. Or if fish swam directly into the path of the grinding blades (at least in the video there didn't seem to be any fish grates preventing organisms from being swallowed up).

Safety precautions aside, the company touts other positives of its turbine like, "no visual pollution" since it's buried underwater, and easy portability and installs using only simple allen keys. Apparently, assembly only takes a few people.

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While the company leads off the project with plans to supply power to people living without electricity, it's worth noting that in the video, Blanchet points out how homes in Quebec could also be powered by the device.

This isn't a brand new concept: hydroelectric power used to be as simple as a wheel under a creek or beneath small dams cranking out power. But for people to actively use this device, it would probably have to reduce hydro bills or be capable of completely replacing the need for central power generation.

In its plea for Kickstarter backers, Idénergie says it would like to build and send them turbines to "populations in need." Besides lighting, the company said "our river turbine can help support local agriculture by facilitating irrigation of fields, it can allow the use of plug-in insecticides to help reduce the spread of malaria or allow the use of water purification systems to improve access to clean drinking water."

This isn't the first Kickstarter to champion both portable hydroelectric devices and their potential to feed cheap electricity to people in developing countries, either. Last December, there was a similar (and unsuccessful) Kickstarter campaign for the "Hydrobee" another portable hydropower device.

The Hydrobee was designed to power mobile devices, attachable through a USB outlet, and the device aimed to bring portable electricity to 700 million mobile phone users in countries with poor access to electricity infrastructure. Users could simply throw their Hydrobee into the water, wait for it to power up, pull it in, then attach it to their phone for charging.

In the end, Idénergie hasn't designed a particularly novel concept, but it's taken tried-and-tested hydroelectric technologies and formatted them into a smaller scale. That being said, it's an ambitious turbine design that might work in places like Quebec or other parts of Canada where running water is easily accessible and home owners might be looking for cheaper power.

In Saharan Africa, or other places with fewer river systems, rapidly flowing water isn't always so easy to come by. And without that flowing water in close proximity, the Idénergie turbine seems limited in its geographic scope, even if it does work in low velocities.