Sunday, January 3, 2010

Is It Possible To Have A Wind Turbine At My House?


By Peter Hainz

The only method of knowing if a wind turbine will work at your house is to have a knowledge of what the wind resource is at your location. This isn't a query about if it is ever gusty thereit is maybe gusty during hurricanes, but that is just an observation about the weather. What you want to gain understanding about is the long run average wind speed for your area, or serious climate info, not daily weather.

The amount of electricity that a wind turbine can generate is a function of how much wind you can "collect." If you can consistently collect medium to high winds, you will generate much more electricity than if high winds are a rare occurrence only associated with thunderstorms. So living in an area with a good wind resource is important to the success of your wind system.

And equally important is being able to access that wind resource. If you want to float down a river on a raft, you need to be in a part of the river with strong currents. If you are in a protected cove off to the side and isolated from the river current, you may bob around a bit, but you will not make much headway down the river.

Likewise , for your wind system to really generate power, your wind turbine must be situated in such a place where it can access the flow of the wind. This is the reason why air turbines are installed on towers that rise high over the encircling trees and buildings in an area.

Tall towers are critical to get access to the flow of the wind. Installing your wind system on a tower shorter than the area's tree line, or, worse yet, on top of your roof, is similar to floating in a sheltered cove of a brook : you may often bob a bit but there'll be small forward progress. There's simply tiny energy in low winds that you can convert into serviceable electricity. Are you wanting kinetic yard art or a wind electrical generator?

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