# Realistic use of renewable power



## homesteadpastor (Jan 27, 2014)

I, like many people, have given much thought to getting involved with renewable energy such as solar or wind, however, every time I've looked at it over the years I've come to the same conclusion that it's not very realistic. It's great if you need to run some low wattage lights, maybe a fridge, and a few things like this, but the material's cost to power a whole home does not offset the cost of savings.

The equipment still costs a bunch, but I believe the installation cost can be more depending on who is installing. And then you have to consider that the actual amount of energy you get is typically only a couple hundred watts when the average home is using several kwh worth of energy. Granted you can reduce the number of lights that you use and lower the light wattage, and there are some extra things we use that we probably don't need, but I have yet to see anything run an air conditioning unit on renewable energy and be a setup that doesn't cost more to install than you would recoup on savings. And I'm not talking about a small window unit, I mean a really AC unit that every home, especially in the south, has.

Part of the problem is the batteries. They cost a whole lot to buy each battery needed and don't store enough for reasonable daily living, but they also only last for so many years before needing replacing. So if a person were to lower their energy usage and save money on the utility bill, that money would just go toward buying new batteries later down the road. So no real savings here.

Another problem, as far as wind turbines are concerned, is the generating power of the alternator. The alternator usually creates 400-600 watts for each turbine. Why is this? Why can't they include an alternator that produces several times more power for each turbine, which would reduce the number of turbines needed? And if this isn't possible to increase the wattage for each alternator, why can't 5 or 6 alternators be attached to one turbine and run with a serpentine belt or something to get the same affect?

One question I've always had is in regards to power companies. There are several places that have turbine farms. It would seem just as rediculous for the power company to invest in the same problematic turbine venture that makes us customers struggle with, high cost of turbines with low energy creation. This makes me wonder if we are all being sold junk equipment while the power companies have access to the real equipment.

I mean surely the power company is investing correctly so that one turbine will produce power to at least one home if not a few homes. So why is their equipment so much better than what we can get ahold of? I know their blades are bigger and the alternators are bigger, but surely the revolutions are still about the same, the wind only blows so hard regardless of whose turbine is spinning. And a bigger turbine means more expensive and would take longer to pay off anyway.

Can anyone explain this predicament to me? Am I missing something? I would love to buy 2-3 turbines to have free energy, it just doesn't seem cost effective when I could just use the power company for the same price or cheaper and not have to go through the hassle of putting everything together.

Any thoughts on this would be appreciative.


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

It takes twice as much energy (wind) to turn two 800 watt alternators as it does to turn one. If your 800 watt wind turbine needs 8MPH sustained wind to create 800 watts, then a 1600 watt alternator would need about double the wind to create 1600 watts. If you increased the blade span to get the power to turn a 1600 watt alternator, it won't start turning at as low of a wind speed as the 800 watt.
Attaching ten 800 watt alternators to one set of blades would result in a turbine that either needs gale force winds to turn or blades so large as to require far more tower height. Then the tower and base would need to be ten times stronger to resist this extra force.

I knew a guy that thought he'd created a perpetual motion machine. Simply an electric motor with a large pulley connected to an alternator with a small pulley. After an initial "jump start," the alternator would create double the electrical energy as the motor used, because it was being turned faster. But such things do not really work that way.

A huge wind turbine benefits from it's mass evening out wind gusts, towers tall enough to catch smoother, steady wind currents. Many wind turbines are not making money for the utility, just fulfilling the utility's requirement for a specific percentage of energy from renewable sources.


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## doingitmyself (Jul 30, 2013)

I have a buddy that works on wind turbines. He says that very often most turbines are at any given day are producing power for abut 2 hours a day! Because of the complex safety systems needed to be hooked to the grid. If the wind speed drops even for just a moment below a point below what is considered minimum RPM speed to produce a current high enough to be compatible with the grid, Yada, yada, yada, the system cuts the generator out and resets the sequence timer. The wind has to come back up to speed, turn the turbine for a period of two hours consistently before the turbine will be allowed to reengage! Seems like poor use of equipment to me but im also not a turbine guru. 

Now I'm sure its not quite that simple and for sure there are reasons for such a setup, but if it were not for very heavy gobmnt subsidies and such you would not see a commercial turbine. Our local community college has a turbine program and a huge wind farm is being erected as i type this. But as it has been represented to me the ones that make the money are the companies that make and sell the components to the turbine owners whoever that is. I have been told the value of the energy the turbines create is nill compared to the government kickbacks to the power companies that erect and
maintain them.

Homegrown stuff can work OK but you certainly can't afford to pay someone else to service and replace pats on your system that's for sure. It's a true DIY venture as i understand it.


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## TnAndy (Sep 15, 2005)

homesteadpastor said:


> I, like many people, have given much thought to getting involved with renewable energy such as solar or wind, however, every time I've looked at it over the years I've come to the same conclusion that it's not very realistic. It's great if you need to run some low wattage lights, maybe a fridge, and a few things like this, but the material's cost to power a whole home does not offset the cost of savings.


The typical home in the US uses 900 kwhrs/month of electric power. We fall right in that area. I generate all the power we use with an 11kw solar power system.....so, yes, it can be done.




homesteadpastor said:


> The equipment still costs a bunch, but I believe the installation cost can be more depending on who is installing. And then you have to consider that the actual amount of energy you get is typically only a couple hundred watts when the average home is using several kwh worth of energy.


Again...if you are talking 45w Harbor Freight solar panels, then yeah, that is true. If you're talking a bunch of REAL solar panels (250-300w each), then you'd be amazed the amount of power you can generate. Good sunny day, we will crank out 35-40kwhrs in a 6-7 hour period.



homesteadpastor said:


> Granted you can reduce the number of lights that you use and lower the light wattage, and there are some extra things we use that we probably don't need, but I have yet to see anything run an air conditioning unit on renewable energy and be a setup that doesn't cost more to install than you would recoup on savings. And I'm not talking about a small window unit, I mean a really AC unit that every home, especially in the south, has.


We run two mini-split ductless system for AC when we need it ( and we've NEEDED it the last few weeks ! ). One is an 18,000 BTU unit that cools the main part of the living area (living, dining, kitchen ), and a separate 12,000 BTU unit that does the master bedroom. We don't cool the other two bedrooms because nobody uses them. 

The typical "really AC unit" you refer to is basically a useless energy hog, cooling the entire home (central AC) when most of the time the entire home isn't being used....just parts of it. Zoned cooling (and heating) is what is done in most of the rest of the world, and they use the same, high efficiency ( ours are 18 and 23 SEER.....far above the 'typical' central units), ductless systems. You CAN build an alternative energy system that will handle ANY load.....but it sure seems stupid to do so.

Oh, and we run 4-5 freezers, plus a 10,000 BTU window AC in my walk-in cooler when we kill a beef or pig, plus my woodworking shop, 4' fan in the greenhouse, and so on. Last month, we used 792kwhrs, according to our electric company.




homesteadpastor said:


> Part of the problem is the batteries. They cost a whole lot to buy each battery needed and don't store enough for reasonable daily living, but they also only last for so many years before needing replacing. So if a person were to lower their energy usage and save money on the utility bill, that money would just go toward buying new batteries later down the road. So no real savings here.


Batteries are not required for a grid tie system. If the goal is to save money on your electric bill, don't build a battery based system. Problem solved, huh ?

Now, if you have no grid power available, then you do have to use a battery based system.....No, you aren't going to compete with grid power on cost, but the question becomes "Do you want electric power, how much, and what are you willing to pay for it". Otherwise, stick with kerosene lights.

Personally, I chose to build a grid tied ( our excess feeds the grid ) system WITH battery backup. I can flip a transfer switch and be off grid if the need arises. Personally, I believe there is a fair chance the grid will go down, and stay down, due to an EMP or CME hit, and I put my system in with that thought in mind. That part of my system is 6kw. It will provide us with a decent amount of power to run the basics......lights, refrigeration (in moderation), etc, and in a world with NO grid, will be a luxury. 

Later, I added another 5kw that is grid tied only, simply to eliminate our electric bill. Mission accomplished.



homesteadpastor said:


> Another problem, as far as wind turbines are concerned, is the generating power of the alternator. The alternator usually creates 400-600 watts for each turbine. Why is this? Why can't they include an alternator that produces several times more power for each turbine, which would reduce the number of turbines needed? And if this isn't possible to increase the wattage for each alternator, why can't 5 or 6 alternators be attached to one turbine and run with a serpentine belt or something to get the same affect?


I'm far from a wind power expert, but clearly you're below me.... 
You must be looking at very small wind turbines.....because there are plenty of them out there in the 2kw to 10kw range ( If you'd like to see some, visit http://bergey.com/ for example)





homesteadpastor said:


> Can anyone explain this predicament to me? Am I missing something? I would love to buy 2-3 turbines to have free energy....


There is no free lunch, and there is no free energy. But the costs to produce your own certain have come down in recent years. In 2007, I paid $4/watt for my first solar panels. Today, same company, I can buy them for a dollar/watt. That's a pretty significant reduction in costs in 6-7 years.

For grid tie only systems, you can use micro inverters that mount right at the panel. That type system can start with one panel and one inverter, for less than $500, and grow as you have funds to expand. No, one panel and one inverter DOESN'T produce a lot of power ( about 1amp peak @240vAC).....but you get 10, or 20, or 40 of them up....and now you're talking REAL power production !

Here's the racking for a 40 panel, 10kw system I've been working on for the last week for a neighbor of mine. And beside it is a couple pallets of 250w Korean panels that will go on the racks starting tomorrow. We'll finish it up around the end of this week, and he will go online shortly after that.


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

A number of years ago, I was interested in a wind turbine, grid connected. I studied up on how my grid works.
My power comes from a CoOp. They buy most of their power from a utility that gets theirs from water turbines. In high peak times, they either buy from other utilities (Wisconsin Power and Consumers Power) or turn on their diesel generators.
At night the water turbines produce much more power than they need, so it is sold, steeply discounted, to Consumers Power. Consumers Power uses some of it, but this cheap electricity is used to draw water out of Lake Michigan, up a steep hill and fill a man made lake. During the day, this lake is drained through turbines, back into Lake Michigan. The resulting electricity is still cheaper than coal fired generation plants.

Near Mackinac City the huge wind turbines never seem to stop. Near Ithaca, I often see a dozen sitting idle. Must by the difference between wind patterns.


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## TnAndy (Sep 15, 2005)

Texas could finally become a leader in solar, thanks to a new resolution passed by the city council of Austin.
The bill will require the municipal utility, Austin Energy, to obtain 60 percent of its electricity generation from renewables over the next decade, and to be completely carbon-free by 2030. It calls on Austin Energy to build 600 megawatts of solar power by 2017, and it mandates the city support the build out of 200 megawatts of distributed solar on rooftops.
The council resolution, passed on August 28, could directly lead to the installation of an additional 800 megawatts of solar power, or about four times the total installed capacity in the entire state.e


More at: http://www.financialsense.com/contributors/oil-price/texas-set-to-become-solar-powerhouse


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## NorthTexasGuy (Sep 8, 2008)

As homesteadpastor has stated we in the south struggle with cost vs benefit. When we built a house several years ago I looked into solar/wind with the expectation it would be a supplement only. I decided it wasn't worth it. Yes we built a conventional house with conventional hvac system, although we did get it energy star certified. I know that in order to make it work my thinking needs to change, but the cost is still high. I don't know a great deal about it, but was pricing systems at backwoods solar. 

Yesterday I was listening to Dan Celia on AFR and he had a guest on that was an energy expert having been in the business 52 yrs. His guest said get ready for energy prices to double in the next 4 yrs due to new regulations. I was in and out of the pickup so I didn't hear the whole conversation, but they were both confident in the information. Double prices could shake us up and may even bring down the price of alt energy. Or could it rise based on increased demand?

TnAndy, I would like info your walk in cooler. I have need for this on occasion for deer, beef, pork. I always bone out and put in ice chest, but that is less than ideal especially with beef.


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## NorthTexasGuy (Sep 8, 2008)

Oh btw for those not familiar with Texas heat we use our ac from May to Oct almost constantly. We can get 100 deg any time that entire 6 month span although this year has been mild in my neck of the woods.


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## Jim-mi (May 15, 2002)

pastor you sure have gotten a lot of misinformation.
I have installed many wind turbines for customers . . .all on at least 100' towers, and never those little 500watt units.
I have installed 200' data towers for the company that then built a wind farm with many 2.5 megawatt big boy turbines..
Very often I run a air conditioner with my solar panels. . and or my wind turbines.
The sun/wind generates power for me to run my deep well 240vac pump . . . . to fill the big holding tank.
There is a guy (12 volt man) who posts on here often, he has been living well on a small 600 watt (I think) system for years . . . .

So with out tearing apart your post sentence by sentence, to point out all your incorrect information, I suggest you do a who lot more homework . . .and not just read all those nay-sayers . .who spew forth negative stuff.

Solar and wind do work very well . . .thank you......

Why do it . .?? . . . . .When the grid eventually goes down, I can still pump my life giving water............


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## TnAndy (Sep 15, 2005)

NorthTexasGuy said:


> Yesterday I was listening to Dan Celia on AFR and he had a guest on that was an energy expert having been in the business 52 yrs. His guest said get ready for energy prices to double in the next 4 yrs due to new regulations. I was in and out of the pickup so I didn't hear the whole conversation, but they were both confident in the information. Double prices could shake us up and may even bring down the price of alt energy. Or could it rise based on increased demand?


Yep. Obama said a few years back.....the Feds intend to put coal fired power plants out of business, and the resulting rise in the cost of electric power will shock folks. That is one reason I decided to get off my duff and get with it a few years back.






NorthTexasGuy said:


> TnAndy, I would like info your walk in cooler. I have need for this on occasion for deer, beef, pork. I always bone out and put in ice chest, but that is less than ideal especially with beef.



Sending you a PM. Check your inbox.


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