Your Questions About Wind Power For Homes

adminsta answers:

In the context of the home, you usually cannot generate power at stable enough voltage and frequency for reliable use.

So what they do is to generate DC (Direct Current) power, and then this is fed into an inverter, which converts it to AC at your supply voltage and frequency. The inverter is an electronic unit. Sometimes, there can be a battery banka as well, so that when everyone else is blanked out, you stll have power.

You will have to have some connection made to the house wiring, so this needs to be done by a registered electrician.

By the way, in principle, the same applies to solar energy panels.

adminsta answers:

As the other answer states there are kits out there.

As for how. The wind turbine ( blades ) turn a generator producing DC current. This is used to charge a group of batteries. An inverter converts the DC current into AC for household needs. Only in very rare circumstances will this alone provide for all of your energy needs. Mostly it is used as a backup for a generator system in remote areas.

adminsta answers:

Yes. However, you need to do your research.

The wind belt mentioned in this thread is foolishness for the same reason that vertical axis generators are foolishness. The energy is coming from the wind, and is proportional to the cube of the velocity. This means that something with a small surface area like a wind belt cannot extract much energy because the collection area is minuscule and the wind will rapid destroy the belt. It also means that you need the turbine high above the trees where the breeze is better. If you double the wind speed, you can get eight times more power.

The most efficient design is the type of turbine with a simple airplane style propeller that faces the wind. Even these have a theoretical limit — the Betz limit — which limits the efficiency to 59%. All other designs are worse.

So for village life, you need the following. A low tech, axial flux generator like the ones at www.otherpower.com. These have several important features.
A) They can be maintained in rural communities
b) They can be built in small communities with basic welding equipment and some ingenuity. Steel pipe, bolts, wheel bearings, wood, fiberglass resin, copper wire etc. Are available even in the poorest of countries.
C) They do not depend in perpetual motion or defying the laws of physics to meet their claims.
D) They automatically protect themselves in high winds with a simple mechanical mechanism.

If the spaces are really small and you can’t use a tower, perhaps a few homeowners could get together and share a tower. Between them all, there will be room for the tower guy wires.

adminsta answers:

Check out GovBenefits.gov http://www.govbenefits.gov for a listing of all government assistance programs you are entitled to based on your description

For grants go to http://www.grants.gov

adminsta answers:

A typical wind power system comprises of a tower and five blades to churn out wind energy. The length of the wind tower varies depending on the location of your house. You may need a longer tower if you are in low-wind zone; you can work with a shorter tower if you live by the beach. Using a wind generator, this wind energy can be converted into useful electrical energy to be employed at home for running various electrical appliances. You can even store the power generated for later use, making wind generators more efficient than convention power systems.

adminsta answers:

Good grief…the answers you have recieved thus far!

My husband works on the commercial wind turbines. Our power company also offers purchasing of the wind power, at an extra $4 per month charge. Something I find rather humorous, since my husband is actually employed to work on the wind turbines.

You will of course still have power if the wind is not blowing, or the wind farm is down for some sort of repair. You electric company will continue to provide you power, it will just come from another source. To think that the power company would leave you without power is just plain silly.

The modern commercial wind turbines DO NOT KILL BIRDS, as some people would have you believe. To put it simply, the blades are larger than they use to be (and more efficient) and spin at a much slower rate. The birds are well able to judge the speed of the wind turbines. Wind farms actually provide amazing wildlife habitat. Instead of becoming covered with sprawling housing developments, the land remains in tact, and the wildlife QUICKLY adapts to the turbines. I am quiet an avid lover of wildlife. I would be most distressed to see birds of prey, or migrating geese and swans killed by the turbines. This simply doe NOT happen.

If you are able to easily afford the extra money for the wind energy, then I would say go ahead. However, I would ask that your electric company provide an accounting of exactly how that money is being spent. If it is a stretch for your budget, or you are having financial problems, then forgo the extra money.

Supporting the wind turbines is wonderful. They provide wildlife habitat. They are a completely renewable recource, the very towers themselves, are highly recyclable when they have reached the end of their lifespan.

The wind turbines help suport people in rural areas with good paying jobs that are usually hard to come by. In turn this also helps support local businesses. Examples of that would be the local gentleman they employe at my husbands site to maintain the gravel roads, and to so snow removal. They paid him over $100K last year. The local fencing comapany they empoyed to put up strong gates to keep people off the landowners private land where the turbines sit (I forgot how much but it was expensive). The local radio rental company they are always renting radios from when crews come in for different projects. Usually $300 a month to the radio rental company.

The list goes on and on. Supporting the green energy of the wind turbines really is a win-win situation.

~Garnet
Homesteading/Farming over 20 years

adminsta answers:

I have sola heating installed
works very well and was alot cheaper than piping gas to my house when we built the house
been running for the last 10 years never gone wrong so has cost us nothing oh yea it also heats my water