Running With the Wind                                                                     Wind Power
For centuries sail boats captured the power of the wind to move people and their things over great distances all at zero cost and with zero emissions.  However, when it came to speed, reliability and ease of operation the newer steam and oil powered craft quickly and permanently ended the age of sail.
Or perhaps it just took a breather….
  The Second Comeback
  Sails, wings and other devices that can capture wind power and convert it to free, clean, usable energy are making a second showing recently.  Even the much-maligned windmill farms of thirty years ago are gaining renewed respect.
  Wind is fickle, blowing when and where it will.  But so long as the sun burns and the world turns one thing is certain: there will be wind at some time from some direction.  The trick when it comes to harnessing the power of the wind is getting it to where it’s needed, when it’s needed, all in a form that it can be used.
  Steps Along the Way
  Delivering the wind’s energy when it is needed often involves storing the energy for a period of time along the way.  Energy may be stored in a variety of ways ranging from the simple (recharging batteries) to the complex (elevation of the water level in a reservoir located upstream from a hydro-electric plant) to the elegant (separating the atoms found in plain water to produce liquid hydrogen). 
  Delivering stored wind energy where it’s needed and in a form that it can be used is a much more straightforward process.  Obviously, the manner in which the energy will be used pre-determines how the energy should be stored in the first place.  Hydrogen-powered vehicles, (whether equipped with piston engines or fuel-cells) re-fuel by means of taking on the stored wind energy in the form of liquid hydrogen.  Electric-powered vehicles can either recharge their batteries real-time (with the current from directly from wind-powered generators) or on a delayed basis (with the current flowing from, say, a wind-assisted hydro-electric plant).
  Note that delivering the stored wind energy to the vehicle is merely a precursor to its use.  Such delivery does not, in and of itself, constitute the actual use of the stored energy.  Technically that energy will not really be used until it is consumed in the process of powering the vehicle to which it was delivered
  Out There On That Horizon
  Our new re-found ability to convert wind power into forms that can be used with the same ease and reliability of fossil fuels is driving a renewed interest in wind energy.  Some efficiency is lost in converting and storing energy, but the gains clearly outweigh the costs.
  Vehicles specifically designed to utilize free-energy sources such as the wind and sun have been dubbed “Tribrids” in large part to distinguish them from their efficient but often purely fossil-fuel powered predecessors, the hybrids.  Clearly, any vehicle that gets part or all of its power from the ambient environment will be easier on the wallet and easier on the air.  At the rate things are shaping up someday soon we might all be running like the wind, if only to get to work in the morning!