Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

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Gimpy
Gimpy Registered Users Posts: 3
in Wind Power Generation #1
I have more than a couple of acres. Growing season is about 90 days long. Plenty of clouds during a long winter season. Constant year long 10-20 mph wind with gusts of 35 mph. Solar I'm guessing would be limited in my area. Wind seems to be the most logical choice. But I need an education. I tend to try to be knowledgeable by the time I buy.

One of my first eye openers was a quick google search. Used 10kW as a number for comparison. Wind turbine with 40ft tower, about $25K. 10kW solar was about $45K. I know, both are likely off. But . . . how much would I be looking at per kW?

It's for a ranch with tight use of power but having at least 2 log homes (not kits) and shops/garage and water pumps. Would be grid tied but would like to generate enough to be even or so annually.

Kindergarten please, but I catch on quickly. I'm young enough to understand and old enough to not have all the answers.

Thanks in advance. Gimpy
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  • Gimpy
    Gimpy Registered Users Posts: 3
    #2
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    I should have added, I'm not interested in building a system from scratch, but not looking for Trump Towers either.
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  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    #3
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    welcome,
    1st order of business is to state your typical daily loads in either watt hours or kilowatt hours.

    2nd is to state if this is grid tied or off grid.
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  • Gimpy
    Gimpy Registered Users Posts: 3
    #4
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    I'm presently using 21-22kW's per day. But that's living in an apartment with 2 teen kids in northern CA. We're moving to our property in Oregon soon we hope. Our power bill will drop significantly with just the wife and me. Power consumption then will be minimal compared to today. It'll be grid tied as I have lines already on the property.

    I appreciate the help.
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  • Cariboocoot
    Cariboocoot Banned Posts: 17,615 ✭✭✭
    #5
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    This may sound like a very strange question but ... if you will be on-grid, why are you looking at solar and/or wind?

    If the answer is to reduce your electric bill you're probably going to be disappointed with the result. Utility power is generally far cheaper than self-generated of any type.
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  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    #6
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    you should know that just because a turbine is rated at 10kw that even with some winds it most likely will be far below that and my guess would be less than 1kw, but this depends on the turbine too as many out there are being scammed by some companies. i don't have a turbine, but i'll let others kick advice on a turbine to you. in general turbines have been poor performers for the costs and those costs can go high being the turbine will need much maintenance over the years being it has moving mechanical parts.

    no matter if you get wind power or not some solar is warranted and even in gloomy areas it will still produce some viable power.

    now i have to ask if this is for just offsetting your consumption some or are you trying to eliminate your bill? another point may be if you get power outages often or long as a generator and/or a battery backups may be warranted then.

    i don't need to tell you that conservation is the best thing as you don't have to generate power to compensate for power you never used. hopefully you will have a much lower bill without any offspring present, but they do tend to return so you may need to teach then if you had not already tried to. for the record that would be 21-22kwh's not kw's.
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  • Wattless
    Wattless Registered Users Posts: 4 ✭
    #7
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    Gimpy, have you looked at otherpower.com. Some of Dan B's designs are easy to build (and fun). They would perfrom well in constant 10 to 20 mph winds. There is a lot of power avaiable if you have a steady wind. Gusty days are a pain, and the machine is chasing it's tail all day, pun intended.
    I built a Dan B 17 footer along with the design improvements he put into his 20 footer. I have a fairly light tail on mine so it furls a little after 20 mph but it's putting out about 2400 watts by them. I have never seen a sign of any heat related issues in three years. I would rather keep running it in a slightly derated mode than being on the edge trying to pull every amp fom it. The only issue I have had in three years was a failed diode bridge (on a very windy day) that shorted 2 of the AC phases together. I happened to be walking past the base when that happened and resulting bang from an instant stop on the blades gave me a bit of a jump, but no long term damage to the alternator or blades.
    I see that you are planning on grid tie so at least you can take advantage of all of the wind available and don't have to suffer through the dump load issues that we off grid folks have to deal with.
    Is it the best use of your money? Depends if you like building stuff that works well and enjoy the project.
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  • 65DegN
    65DegN Solar Expert Posts: 109 ✭✭
    #8
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    Re: Newbie from Oregon's South Central high desert region

    I would advise against a 40' pole. This is the most common mistake that people make when they install a wind turbine.
    What size trees are around your place? And at what distance are the trees from the proposed site for the turbine?What is the average wind speed for your area?
    Typically you won't get good performance until you get the turbine up at least 80', 120' is usually considerably better. Thats about where the laminar wind usually starts.
    Short poles are tempting because of ease of installation and service but wind close to the ground will always have turbulence and wind sheer which robs the power out of the wind. Around here I see turbines put on short poles over and over and talking to the owners not one produces worth a darn.
    Consider that a 10KW machine will have ~ 23' diameter blades. On a 40' pole that puts the bottom tip of the blades at only ~29' above the ground and thats a waste of a good turbine.
    Try flying a kite around the proposed site. This will take some interpretation but can be revealing if done several times and carefully observed. The tail can be quite revealing of turbulence.

    I have calculated that for a grid tie system in my area here in Alaska with $0.22 cents per KWH it currently takes about 8 ~ 10 years of solar power to pay it off. Then the electricity is basically free for decades.
    Here wind takes longer than solar to pay back because our average wind speed is about 9 ~ 10 mph and because solar panels are now aailable for ~$1.55 (retail)a watt, last I checked.
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