Installing Wind Turbine

[forever_frost]

I have a company coming out to give me an estimate on a big assed wind turbine to run my house. I'll let you know how it turns out. If this works out reasonably, I'll be off the grid electrically

[herbalpagan]

Woohoo! I'll be watching to see how it goes. This is my big goal, but it's so confusing on who can do it, how much it will cost, wether to go with solar or wind or both...it's the most frustrating thing I've been trough with prepping so far!

[Omegaman]

Before you spend your money I would do a 1 year wind survey so that you can see average wind speed, days with wind enough to turn turbine and common wind direction, most good energy companies will recomend this also. I had a company come out to my place and after the survey they said it would take between 15 and 20 years to see a return on the money I would spend. There are a lot of better ways for me to spend that $20,000. Our town did a 1 year survey at the town dump which is up on a hill 2 miles from my house. The survey said that it would make enough power for the whole dump and 2 local schools. It is huge, 40 foot blades and it was suppose to produce about 170 kilowat hours per month BUT in 1 years time it produced an average of 15 kilowat hours per month. So there was 978 thousand tax dollars out the window. The sad thing is that 3 people on my street had the same company put up smaller but not those tiny turbines and I bet I can count on one hand how many times I have seen them turnning. Don't get me wrong I think there great on the right property in the right size and place. I have 2 freinds who between wind and solar are off the grid and even sell power back to the power co. My return on solar hot water is going to be much faster about 3 years.:)

[twincougars]

Unless you live on a almost continuous windy area, and you have your wind turbine way up there, you will need a storage battery system and, if you want 120VAC, a properly sized inverter. Sizing your power requirements is just as important as assessing your wind conditions. With 8 L16HC (I think that's the number) fully charged bigass batteries hooked up as 24VDC driving a 5KW inverter, I can power our cabin with normal electrical usage for 3 days with no sun, but that's just me. Obviously you want to cut down on your power requirements, like using fluorescent bulbs instead of incandescent, no electric heat or electric stoves or electric hot water heater, keep the computer turned off when not using it, etc.

[forever_frost]

Okay, the guy just left. He walked around and found the best place to put it and sat down with me, going over everything. Very professional and I was impressed. He also went through the house with me showing me how I could conserve power with insulation and the like.

The total if I decide to do this? 15,951.00 wihtout tax. I'm still debating on it as I will have to find my own financing and I hate doing that.

[herbalpagan]

Talk to another person and get another opinion. With all of the rebates and such, there is bound to be other dealers. I know that many offer financing as well. That is not much different a price then what we found looking around. Supposedly, it will pay for itself in 8-12 years.

[Oscar Wilde]

Some states offer rebates / tax incentives for residential solar system installations....perhaps yours is one of them....if so, ask if there is a similar program for wind turbines....check with your power company for assistance as well.
O.W.

[forever_frost]

I don't pay any taxes but property so that doesn't apply to me. It limits things a bit