Selfsufficientish.com

Has anyone been using a wind generator?

Any observations, hints and pointers to the best suppliers would be VERY welcome.

I know I can approach CAT but I would also like to chat with any devotees here.

I do mean external wind, btw, not self generated

G'DAy Malcolm,

Yeah, I get complaints about the self generated, especially after a good feed of Indian .

I built a small wind generator based on a bicycle wheel and roller style bike generator (well, alternator really ), but its contribution to my system was minimal. I have accumulated some information over the years on "build your own" as most of the commercial ones are outside my budget! .

I recently found a local supplier of wind generators for reasonable cost, but when I approached the council (I live in a suburban area and wind generators are bit hard to hide!) their fees and inspections doubled the cost! Bugger !

Anyway if you want info on self build wind generators let me know! Judy of the woods also has experience in this area and can help lots!

Nev

Many thanks! I'd love to read what info you have - and I'll contact Judy.

From what i have heard, wind generators cost more in energy to construct than they make in their lifetimes. Additionally they are loud.

My 2c or is it 2p in england :P

From what i have heard, wind generators cost more in energy to construct than they make in their lifetimes. Additionally they are loud.

I guess this is what I am trying to find out - but as there are lots of different designs and levels of sophistication - plus uses - and considerations of energy loss over long distribution networks ... it is well worth investigating.

Wind has been used for pumps and mills for donkeys years. In the absence of wind it was either water or poor donkeys that provided the power.

In terms of an overall energy balance, I am still dealing with the issue of me buying a car and that flight I took to the USA last year. Big guilt trip!

PS - talking of noise levels - I am shocked by how noisy cars have become as their tyres are developed for better road holding and people drive faster - the noise pollution is ridiculous! In towns you have to shout to talk to your companion as you walk down the street. Shocking

Renewable devices in Scotland do a roof mounted Wind turbine. Dont really know how good it is but check the sites below.

http://www.renewabledevices.com/

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/05 ... ind_tu.php

Salviador wrote:From what i have heard, wind generators cost more in energy to construct than they make in their lifetimes

I did some back-of-an-envelope calculations on this once. Over a twenty year lifespan, even at only one third usable output time (two-thirds downtime due to lack of wind) that's about 60,000 hours of generation. If my maths is correct, a modest 1000kW generator working at half power will output over 10^14 joules of energy in that time - a little over a day's output from a nuclear powerstation. In terms of the nation's energy consumption it's small, but think of the amount of industry, housholds, railways, etc. that a nuclear powerstation does supply. I don't think manufacturing any part of a wind turbine is particularly energy intensive; in terms of making a hi-tech windmill I'd say this amount of energy was huge.

I don't relish the prospect of wind turbines marching across the countryside, but I won't easily buy the notion that they produce less energy that it takes to make the damn things.

Haddock wrote:Renewable devices in Scotland do a roof mounted Wind turbine.

This is exactly what I think we should be doing. Anybody feel like doing the sums? I estimate that within half a mile of me there must be a thousand houses suitable for a small rooftop turbine, and probably ten times that in the whole town. What %age of households would need to put one of these on their roofs to compare with the output of a wind farm? There is easy technology to patch these into the houshold power supply; there would be financial savings for the householder, the need for more powerstations and windfarms would be reduced. Consider how many housholds have now spent 500 quid on a satelite dish and associated ephemera; with the right incentives (grants), maybe they would be willing to get a turbine too.

But as Nev has said elsethread, there is little incentive for governments to get involved in this sort of thing, because there is no tax payback, and the big energy businesses would lose out, so if enough people got a turbine, they might have to have words about it.

Thanks for the link for the wind turbine, very intersting. As I live in Scotland I'm going to get my O/H to have a look at the site, it does state that householders in scotland could get help from the government to bring the price down to under 1,000 pound. With the way fuel prices are rising I think nows the time to look at alternatives.