Tech & Biz

Bill Gates Patents a Device Aimed at Halting Hurricanes

by Barbara McPherson | July 18, 2009 at 03:23 pm

259 views | 30 Recommendations | 7 comments

Bill Gates, investor in a company called Searete, has filed patent applications aimed at halting hurricanes. The founder of Microsoft is an investor in a parent company Intellectual Ventures and is listed as one of the inventors of the new technology.

Five patent applications for technology that aims to control the weather bear the signature of a man who knows how to think big: Microsoft founder Bill Gates. The applications made public by the U.S. Patent Office last week describe floating devices that could reduce the strength of hurricanes by drawing warm water from the ocean’s surface and channeling it down to the depths through a long tube. A second tube would reverse the process and bring deep, cold water up to the surface.

This sounds pretty much like science fiction but with Bill Gates name attached to the patent applications some credence must be given to the plans. The spokesperson for the company explained that the technology may be needed in the future if global warming triggers more extreme weather.

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Amy Judd

at 15:54 on July 18th, 2009

I pretty much think you shouldn't mess with nature.

Spydermonkey

at 17:25 on July 18th, 2009

The tubes form a thermal pump exchanging water on the surface with deep sea water.

I have to agree with amyjudd, we don't understand all of the effects putting in 100 or 1000 or more of these pumps in the gulf. Will it harm sea life like srimp? What about the salinity difference at depth? what will it disrupt?

djermano

at 22:16 on July 18th, 2009

I think Bill Gates has too much time on his hands. How about supporting ideas that reverse Global Warming? I will tell you why it is because the ideas out there for them are not made by him. This guy will not invest in someone elses idea...they keep the money in their coffers, their ideas will pay, but not to someone else. Bill Gates is the typical American that has brought disaster to the world....and these clowns continue on their destructive path...... He likes to pat himself on the back to show how philantrophic he is by his generousity.... Well frankly Bill you are a penny short, and a dime behind. He needs support and help from his pal Warren Buffet.....two of the same, two of the poorest examples of wealth and trickster, magicians in the world. Better for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than a Bill Gate...

Rev. Jermano

anarkissed

at 23:28 on July 18th, 2009

So by stirring the gulf he proposes to cool the surface and reduce hurricanes. In the short term we might get away with it, but in the long term it will kill deep sea life and make the overall water temperature higher, resulting eventually in far worse hurricanes. What's needed is a way to cut down on the heat that flows off the land via air currents and water flow. When you view time lapse infrared satellite images of the continent you can visibly see the heat flowing from the river outflows and across the coastlines into the water from the major population centers. It's quite dramatic and definite. When you then track hurricanes against these heat flows it becomes apparent that the hurricanes turn towards and track into the sources of the heat. Turn off the heat, you will turn off the storms. At least you'll reduce them to manageable levels.