Comments on: Understanding Renewable Energy Systems http://www.alternativee.org/renewable-energy/understanding-renewable-energy-systems/ User driven website for sharing news and information about alternative and renewable energy Sun, 07 Aug 2011 04:23:02 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1 By: Technical Books http://www.alternativee.org/renewable-energy/understanding-renewable-energy-systems/comment-page-1/#comment-3936 Technical Books Sun, 28 Feb 2010 20:59:50 +0000 #comment-3936 Unfortunately, this book doesn't live up to the promise of its title. It reads very much like a catalog of statements, with little motivation or explanation given. Consider, for example, the following paragraph: "The ends of the windings of a slipring rotor are only connected internally on one side. The beginnings of the windings are connected via sliprings and graphite brushes to the outside of the machine. There, they can be short-circuited over rotor resistances. This can improve the behaviour of the asynchronous machine during start-up." The foregoing statements may all well be true, but how much does someone who isn't already familiar with slipring rotors learn from them? <br /> <br />Another problem is one of physics. One reads that in the Bohr hydrogen atom the Coulomb and centrifugal force on the electron are balanced, whereas in fact the unbalanced Coulomb force provides the centripetal force required to keep the accelerating electron in its orbit. The Bohr postulate is renamed the Planck theorem, the electron's energy is represented as purely kinetic (no electrostatic potential energy is given), and the atom's energy is given as positive rather than negative, decreasing (rather than increasing) with increasing n. This in the space of a few paragraphs. <br /> <br />Not every page suffers from these problems, of course, but for the engineering student truly interested in "Understanding Renewable Energy Systems," Gilbert Masters' "Renewable and Efficient Electric Power Systems" is a better investment. Rating: 3 / 5 Unfortunately, this book doesn’t live up to the promise of its title. It reads very much like a catalog of statements, with little motivation or explanation given. Consider, for example, the following paragraph: “The ends of the windings of a slipring rotor are only connected internally on one side. The beginnings of the windings are connected via sliprings and graphite brushes to the outside of the machine. There, they can be short-circuited over rotor resistances. This can improve the behaviour of the asynchronous machine during start-up.” The foregoing statements may all well be true, but how much does someone who isn’t already familiar with slipring rotors learn from them?

Another problem is one of physics. One reads that in the Bohr hydrogen atom the Coulomb and centrifugal force on the electron are balanced, whereas in fact the unbalanced Coulomb force provides the centripetal force required to keep the accelerating electron in its orbit. The Bohr postulate is renamed the Planck theorem, the electron’s energy is represented as purely kinetic (no electrostatic potential energy is given), and the atom’s energy is given as positive rather than negative, decreasing (rather than increasing) with increasing n. This in the space of a few paragraphs.

Not every page suffers from these problems, of course, but for the engineering student truly interested in “Understanding Renewable Energy Systems,” Gilbert Masters’ “Renewable and Efficient Electric Power Systems” is a better investment.
Rating: 3 / 5

]]> By: Alessandro Mosti http://www.alternativee.org/renewable-energy/understanding-renewable-energy-systems/comment-page-1/#comment-3935 Alessandro Mosti Sun, 28 Feb 2010 18:56:39 +0000 #comment-3935 This book gives you a complete overview of all the renewable energies. <br />If you are looking for answers with explanations, this book might be a good option: it is detailed enough, without being too much. The language is always simple, as all technichal books should be. <br />Could be a good book for basic courses on Renewable Energies for engineers. I use it as a reference book. Rating: 4 / 5 This book gives you a complete overview of all the renewable energies.

If you are looking for answers with explanations, this book might be a good option: it is detailed enough, without being too much. The language is always simple, as all technichal books should be.

Could be a good book for basic courses on Renewable Energies for engineers. I use it as a reference book.
Rating: 4 / 5

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