Wayne German is a most forward-leaning visionary in AWE. I have been fortunate to be a friend & coworker in AWE for some years now. His latest musings concern the potential to make huge molds out of the Antarctic ice cap. If anyone is willing to undertake his NDA, he'll go into detail, but for years now i have played a guessing game with Wayne's brilliant imaginative leaps, from bare clues.
 
 One can use Antarctic windpower to heat water & melt out vast forms in the ice pack, but what could possibly be formed in such molds? How would it be removed? Likely Wayne is thinking of his blow-molded membrane-wing concept at hundreds-of-meters scale. Wayne has long envisioned cheap high-quality aviation wings made from bundles of thin-film tubes blown into airfoil molds. Such cheap structure might scale beyond any other.
 
 Imagine a long parade of vast wings flying out of Antarctica someday to meet global needs. The scientific community has already determined the Antarctic research sector will be the first wind/hydrogen economy, as it is currently addicted to diesel. Many other uses of deep ice could occur- vast cities, hydrogen storage, etc.. With the "spoil" water from the molds large surface structures could be built, such as giant ram-air ducts for wind turbines. Geo-engineering the conservation of icecaps & glaciers might be possible by recycling melt-water that would otherwise be lost to global warming. Planetary alebedo could be maximised by painting dark surfaces with ice in winter.
 
 I can't wait for Wayne to make all his concepts public someday. Lets hope Wayne is able to attend AWEC2010. He was an eccentric star of HAWPCON09 with ideas like hypersonic tethered wings & a heart-felt plea for non-militarized AWE.
 
 
FairIP/CoopIP                       ~Dave Santos             , 2010        M1902

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