Wind turbines for home energy?

[-]

Bierculles@reddit

Even with enough wind, wind turbines need a lot of maintenance, have a lot of mechanical parts that can and will fail eventually and repairs might straight up not be possible with the tools available to you. Solar pannels are a way safer bet, they easliy last for 20 years with minimal maintenance and repairing should be way easier for anything short of a large rock hitting the pannels.

[-]

Mala_Suerte1@reddit

From my research, to really make it worthwhile, you have to have a fairly tall tower. As in 50' to 100' to get high enough to have steady winds. Very few places have enough steady winds to justify the price.

[-]

SubstantialAbility17@reddit

Wind turbines are somewhat of a nothing burger unless you live on the coast or on top of a mountain.

[-]

Givlytig@reddit

I live in a desert valley, haven't been able to go outside in a week because of a relentless wind (sand) storm and all I keep thinking about is all that free wasted energy I could captureif I had a turbine system. Especially at night while my lazy ass solar panels are sleeping. Turbine could be working 24/7 💪

Honestly my main concern is I'd smash that thing to a million pieces if I even as much as injured one of my beloved bird friends, especially hummingbirds, they have nests and feed and fly all around our yard. I've seen some "upright" designs that don't use conventional blades and are at least look "bird-friendly", but I don't know enough about them. I'd have to have a damn near foolproof setup to prevent killing birds before I'd go through with it.

[-]

Leopold_Porkstacker@reddit

Blowing sand will cause a lot of wear.

[-]

SubstantialAbility17@reddit

I had one on my boat. Too much noise for the trouble. If you have the space, I would add extra solar.

[-]

Givlytig@reddit

Noise isn't a concern in my case, and I really do like the idea of it working at night and to offset solar during the occasional cloudy spells we hit. We don't get a ton of stretches like that, but man when those panels are only working at partial output I get nervous. I know more panels can help with that, but I also do just want to try a different source for once.

[-]

Soft-Ad-8821@reddit

Go solar Wind is high maintenance with moving parts that wear out and noisy if it’s on your house

[-]

gizmozed@reddit

I got seriously interested in wind a few years ago. I won't belabor the point, it didn't take a ton of investigation to find that the affordable versions of wind generators, say under $3K or so, are seriously unreliable and won't last long, especially if you have strong sustained winds (ironically just what you need to get any real power from them).

Solar has it's downsides but reliability isn't one of them. Repairing a turbine unit is painful as it is generally mounted up in the air. I'm happy with my small off-grid solar system.

[-]

wolfwell69@reddit

May not want it on a roof either as the forces on the roof structure would destroy the roof.

[-]

Live_Huckleberry2507@reddit

Yeah, I could see the constant vibrations degrading it much faster than usual.

[-]

thundersnow211@reddit

This is what I heard as well.

[-]

newagedefiance@reddit

I'm a Journeyman Electrician and Renewable Energy Technician so I can help.

When comparing all the different renewable energy systems micro wind (wind turbines for your home) has the lowest Return On Investment (ROI).

Someone mentioned in the previous responses that manufacturers will claim a turbine can put out out 300 or 400w of electricity but this is only true when the turbine is spinning at a high rate of speed (high winds). It will start producing electricity at a lower wind speed (this is known as the cut in speed) but only a few watts during low speeds.

Also location is key, is there alot of wind where you live? Are there lots of trees and buildings that will reduce the wind compared to being out in the open (think farm field).

Wind tends to blow more at night than during the day due to heat being released from the ground during the night. So you will need a battery bank to store the power to be used when needed.

Solar is a much better because the sun always rises and ene in overcast conditions you can generate power. Also wind requires maintenance (greating bearings, changing slip rings and brushes) where solar requires almost none (keeping them clear of snow and clean).

If a possible solar arrays will be blocked by trees consider clearing them out or pruning them. You can use the wood for other things. If not then maybe look into a generator.

I hope this helps, also feel free to ask if you have more questions.

[-]

humidsputh@reddit

Kind of tangential, but related to your topic. A ranch I have access to has retired all their windmills on wells and gone to solar panels. (29° 40' N latitude).

They overall get more water, and don't have to jack around with climbing on windmills to fix things.

[-]

Speck72@reddit

The alternative energy company near us stocks Kestrel and Primus. We've looked at it and might go that route as an additional trickle into a battery system.

Whatever your energy flow in, are you also looking at a storage capacity for them? The 600w Kestrel is a cool little unit but only outputs 600w. Great for recharging batteries over a full day, and enough to run a fridge in the moment but you'll definitely want to store that power somewhere so you can run your larger loads.

[-]

Ryan_e3p@reddit

For most people, I don't see it as worth it.

Here is a copy/paste (several times over) of write I wrote about this:

Wind generation at low altitudes is very hit or miss (emphasis on the miss). Here's a copy/paste from a comment I made previously:

So, I actually looked into getting some low-power (300W) wind turbines, if for nothing else than just to play around with or augment solar, maybe keep the motorcycle battery trickle-charged during the winter. Turns out that they need a really strong wind to get any measurably useful power.

Manufacturers will often list "start-up wind speed" in meters per second, which is just playing with numbers and units to confuse customers (similar to how hard drive manufacturers sell hard drives measured in size using the metric system, not by the binary system that computers actually use (like, a hard drive will claim to hold 1GB, while in reality, it contains .93 GB worth of actual space). That startup speed means nothing though, when the reality is that the blades will often need 5x or more wind speed to get the output they claim. So, for a 400W turbine to claim a startup speed of 4.5MPH, it would likely only put out maybe 20W (if that) worth of power at that speed, and need 35MPH to get the full 400W. Maybe not an issue on the open plains, but in areas near trees, forests, or hills that can act as wind barriers, not many places will have constant 35MPH winds so low to the ground where mounting them on a house or garage will provide sufficient output.

You would need to put the wind generators high up enough to get beyond the ground-buffeting effect that slows down wind at lower altitudes, which extends up to about 100-200' tall (depending on your geographic location).

[-]

dank_tre@reddit

Thanks for this writeup. I’ve used this sev tines irl for people thinking they’re going to use wind.

[-]

salmon1a@reddit

A friend of mine has one installed at his residence that supplies much of his electrical needs. He is perched on a hill and has a 100 foot tower supported by guy wires. There is some noise from the unit but it is tolerable. I think he said the payback in around 20 years which he is close to achieving.

[-]

jkubus94@reddit

I've built a few vertical ones and they don't produce nearly enough to make them worth while to me. Mind you the axial flux motor I built was about 6 inches wide and 3 inches deep and could produce maybe 1.5w of power on super windy days.

[-]

pathf1nder00@reddit

You can't buy the kind of wind generator to be cost effective. Those patents were bought out and killed. Honeywell had a great unit that would cut in at 4mph windspeed and start generating, which greatly improves generational cost offset. It was blade tip generation as opposed to hub generation, was light weight (comparatively) and was intended just for this purpose....but, government subsidized oil and gas bought out the copy right, captured and killed it.

[-]

jadelink88@reddit

Roof mounting isn't the usual move, it's pole in ground stuff. You want it as high as you can.

In most urban areas it's very marginal, if you were in the country, you can fly it higher, and may be truly off grid, and therefore want to bother it, as it can be a real bailout in those cloudy windy weather streaks, if your area has them. That difference can be worth it, especially if you do home rigged up systems, (propeller and a truck alternator.), which are very cheap and can be made out of 'junk'.

[-]

Any-Application-8586@reddit

Tried it, a vehicle alternator uses more power to energize the field windings than I could get out of it, and I clock an average wind speed of 26 mph. They’re wildly wasteful. Permanent magnets over electromagnets always.

[-]

Fatherkevind@reddit

Get a gas generator instead.

[-]

Any-Application-8586@reddit

Exactly. Gas generator and an appropriately sized solar system. Talked myself out of a wind turbine for a long time with how little I use my generator. Currently putting in a wind turbine because the wind makes me mad and it may as well do some work for me.

[-]

Any-Application-8586@reddit

I live off grid. Collected wind data for 2.5 years, came up with an average wind speed of 26.6 mph. It gets windy enough here that there are days I don’t work outside because it’s too windy. Bought a turbine, building a tower. 2400 watt turbine with a 6’4” diameter rotor. I’ve been successfully talking myself out of buying one for a while now by saying that I could buy 10 years worth of fuel for the generator for what I’m going to spend on a turbine. Finally sat down and did the math, and if I’m able to collect/use 100% of what my turbine should make in a year, I’ll get the same amount of power as I get out of my solar (6,600 watts) in the first two weeks of December (my lowest producing month).

Money would have been better spent on batteries. But this turbine is gonna look sick af in my yard. 30’ tower and I’m gonna paint it like a WWII era fighter down to the nose art (this is the only way I won’t hate myself for wasting so much money). Hopefully the math is wrong and it makes a whole lot more power than I’m expecting.

[-]

Individual_Run8841@reddit

I suggest to have a look at the small wind turbines often used on saling boats, they might be feasible and also the small relatively quiet vertical ones…

[-]

Eazy12345678@reddit

i think solar is the way to go better price to performance

u dont see wind turbines cause they dont perfrom well for most locations

[-]

Unlikely-Ad3659@reddit

Yes, fitted a few for customers over the years.

Don"t bother. Unreliable, inefficient and they vibrate.

Get solar. Buy a bigger battery.

[-]

-zero-below-@reddit

I’ve looked into wind at times in the past, and it sounds sooo enticing, but when looking at all the elements, even poor solar is often better in terms of cost, infrastructure, output, etc.

[-]

Wayson@reddit

I would be worried about maintenance and efficiency. Too little wind and you get no power generation but too much wind and it may get damaged or break entirely. Solar on the other hand you can just add more panels.

[-]

ResponsibleBank1387@reddit

Be worth checking into. Some the newer style vertical reportedly generate decent power without a lots of noise.

[-]

livestrong2109@reddit

Totally not worth it and I live on the plaines.

[-]

1one14@reddit

I looked into it for my place, and they said, "Do not mount it to the structure as the vibrations would drive us crazy. They also said we did not want windy conditions but a location with constant wind. We do have a hilltop that would work, but by the time we figured out the cost, it was just cheaper to add more solar.

[-]

Adorable_Dust3799@reddit

I plan on getting one to put on the tool shed to charge a couple of small emergency batteries, but incentives aren't there and without that it's cost prohibitive to go big.

[-]

ResolutionMaterial81@reddit

Yes I have experience with micro-wind turbines, even rebuilt them (mainly for knowledge as I have the same model) while offshore.

Might want to look at the Sandia Labs Wind Energy Charts for maximum & average wind energy in your area. Personally, I wouldn't mount one unless you have Class IV winds.

House mounting has certain drawbacks, such as vibration & feathering during high winds. You also need to ensure the micro-turbine is mounted high enough to be above any turbulence upwind AND downwind.

[-]

ResolutionMaterial81@reddit

[-]

drowninginidiots@reddit

Most people don’t actually live in spots that get enough wind often enough to make them practical. Usually you have to live right on the coast, or on top of a hill. You then will generally mount them on a tall pole. They can cause quite a bit of vibration and be surprisingly noisy. Really small ones, like you might see on a sailboat, that would be more practical, produce very little power. Maybe enough to trickle charge a couple 12v batteries.

[-]

boomerangchampion@reddit

Noise is a real issue on these that people don't think about. They're not like the great big turbines you see serenely swooshing around on the breeze, small ones are going fast like a giant desk fan bolted to the structure of your house.

Workable on an outbuilding or a pole at the edge of your property maybe. Not directly above your bedroom.

[-]

stream_inspector@reddit

They installed the big massive ones near us on a ridge about 12 or 15 years ago (widened roads, special trains etc due to the size). Recently took them down. They were already falling apart and my guess is they barely made it to the pay off point if at all.

[-]

ARGirlLOL@reddit

Im still on solar’s side for electricity generation but why do you want onsite electricity generation? For a week long outage? I’d just buy more panels/batteries and trim your consumption. For the end of society? I’d rather have geothermal heating/cooling, a wood burning stove and rechargeable lights+candles than a wind turbine.

[-]