Pros
- Great source of energy
- Saves fossil fuels
- Little noise
- Modern wind turbines are far less harmful to wildlife
- Saves money
- Creates jobs
- Natural Resource
- Doesn’t emit harmful emissions
- Clean energy
- “Green”
- Can be used day or night
- Receive significant federal subsidies
- Used for pumping water, grinding grain, sawing, and pushing a sailboat
Cons
- Costs a lot of money
- Needs a large amount of wind
- Takes lots of space
- Kills birds
- Drag of blades
- Few people know much about wind energy
- Turbines are huge
- Vulnerable to weather
- No power plant is reliable 100% of the time
Design
- Short in the blades
- Flat towards middle
- Small number of blades
- Lighter materials
- Thin blades
- Angle of blades
- Smooth surface
- Blades are smaller at end for less drag
- 50-90 meters tall
- 3 blades
- Efficient blades
- Want less drag
- 2 basic designs- vertical – egg beater or horizontal axis
- Backed up by a generator
- Small tip
- Tower is made of steel
- Blades are made of fiberglass with polyester or wood epoxy
Other
- Shorten blades
- Changing the pitch
- Less blades
- Lighter materials
- Smooth surfaces
- Wildlife problems
Energy Effect
- Power many houses
- Saves many needed resources
- Lowers energy cost
- No air or water pollution
- No greenhouse gases
- 1 turbine could supply 1400 houses in 1 hour
- 100% reliable
- Wind energy is converted form of solar energy
- Fed into electric power lines and delivered to customers
- 1 megawatt of wind
- Transforms kinetic energy of the wind into mechanical or electrical energy harnessed for practical use
- Wind energy requires production tax credit (ptc) to achieve economics
- Wind energy is unpredictable
- Wind energy is more expensive than conventional energy
Equipment Problems
- Creates drag if not made right
- Time consuming to make blades
- Build up of junk on the blades
- If something breaks someone would have to go up high to fix it
- Long time to fix them
- Very expensive
- More power than electricity
