The apparatus includes a wind turbine system for the collection of wind energy and the conversion thereof through staged-compression into highly compressed gas. The highly compressed gas is routed to a central tank, and then expanded into a plurality of concentric ring tanks, each storing gas at successively lower pressures. The cooling resulting from this expansion is utilized to cool hot compressed gas from an intermediate line of gas compressors, increasing the efficiency of the following compressors. This absorption of heat also improves the efficiency of the gas turbines driving electrical generators. The gas compressor in each wind turbine is located near ground level, and driven by a vertical shaft passing through the wind turbine support tower. One embodiment has conventional radially extending blades, and another embodiment has ducted blades to withstand higher winds. Both ground mounted and deep water adaptions for the wind turbines are disclosed.

The invention relates to a device for converting kinetic energy of a flowing water into kinetic energy of a rotatable rotor shaft, wherein the device is adapted to be effective in a first flow direction and a second flow direction substantially opposite to the first, wherein the device comprises two rotor blades each connected to a blade shaft coupled to the rotor shaft for transfer of a torque relative to the rotor shaft, wherein the blades are each rigidly connected to their blade shaft, the blade shafts are mounted for rotation about their own axis relative to the rotor shaft, the blade shafts are coupled to each other for rotation in the same rotation direction and the rotor blades each have an asymmetrical cross-section. There is hereby always flow against the asymmetrical rotor blades from the same direction relative to the blade during the energy conversion process, so that the profile of the rotor blades can be optimized for this flow direction.