The neat inflatable wind turbine we looked at earlier this week solves a materials/cost problem, but it doesn't solve the eyesore problem that keeps some communities opposed to wind farms. So here comes yet another wind-harnessing solution, this time from a Japanese company called Zena: The Wind Tower.

It's a design for a 50-meter tall structure that collects wind from every which direction, compressing it within its structure and channeling it into a wind tunnel that runs down the core. It is supposedly more cost-efficient than putting up a wind farm and it's arguably more sightly, as it just looks like another building, albeit a tall one.

It'd be cool if the building was managed by a lone guy with an office inside the structure, but I'm guessing he'd need a manageable hairstyle and rather a lot of paperweights.