Abstract

Kite Gen is the last evolution of wind energy exploitation. It is a radically new and innovative concept that may be the most practical and sound solution, in the market of renewable sources, to the world's energy needs and problems. These are the expectations of the visionary project developed by Italian engineer Massimo Ippolito, who leads the Kite Gen Stem research and development team. In Sommariva Perno, a hills district in the Italian north western region Piedmont, Ippolito and his partners have built a testing prototype of this groundbreaking robot. His Kite Gen Stem has already produced a relevant amount of energy from the virtually endless and almost universally available energy power: high altitude wind. Ippolito's creature, suitable for any territory, as he underlines, is the result of a think-outsidethe-box process: large wings, driven by a high-tech control system based on avionic sensors, fly at high altitude, harvesting the energy of powerful winds, much faster and constant than those available to traditional wind mills. According to Ippolito, he and his team are a few months away from the state-of-the-art development of this hi-tech wonder, that (hopefully) might change the world.