Wisconsin Windmills
- Thread starter CJ3Flyr
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shawnstcyr
New member
I work on wind turbines for a living. Modern turbines can power around 300 homes or more apeice.
You say there was a substantial impact to the environment? This sounds like a new site. If the dirt areas around the turbines was not planted and green, then this is a new site. If so, it was probably in the commissioning stages. This is the phase of the process where all wires are traced and tested, as well as all torques and parameters checked.
If this is an older site, there are many reasons why they might not have been running. Keep in mind that wind speed and direction change with altitude. You may have been working your butt off at 3000 ft, while there was little or no wind at ground level. I once worked a Gamesa site in Illinois that would shut down above 90 degrees. Before it was built, a yearly temperature study was conducted. It was determined that the average summer time temp was around 82, I believe. So the turbine thought it was overheating and would shut down late in the day. A minor programming error.
Also, the thing your friend said is incorrect. Utility companies do not shut them down to avoid paying the landowner. A non-running turbine is drawing 3 to 7 Kw at any given time. Running they produce 1.5 to around 3 Mw here in the US. If a utility chooses to curtail production, it is simply because the "grid" cannot handle the amount of power being put into it. Like I said, an idle turbine is loosing money, not making it. Most sites have to meet a preset obligation on "availabilty" to produce power, or face stiff fines.
Sites are each bid differently as far as what the land owner makes. There is a site here with 200 turbines. The land owner gets $10,000 each per month, regardless of production. In the Midwest, you can lease the land, or buy the turbine for around 1% down. After you make your payment, you may clear $7000 or more apeice per month, depending on the wind conditions.
If you have any questions or thoughts on wind energy, feel free to post or PM me. I'll be happy to answer them.
You say there was a substantial impact to the environment? This sounds like a new site. If the dirt areas around the turbines was not planted and green, then this is a new site. If so, it was probably in the commissioning stages. This is the phase of the process where all wires are traced and tested, as well as all torques and parameters checked.
If this is an older site, there are many reasons why they might not have been running. Keep in mind that wind speed and direction change with altitude. You may have been working your butt off at 3000 ft, while there was little or no wind at ground level. I once worked a Gamesa site in Illinois that would shut down above 90 degrees. Before it was built, a yearly temperature study was conducted. It was determined that the average summer time temp was around 82, I believe. So the turbine thought it was overheating and would shut down late in the day. A minor programming error.
Also, the thing your friend said is incorrect. Utility companies do not shut them down to avoid paying the landowner. A non-running turbine is drawing 3 to 7 Kw at any given time. Running they produce 1.5 to around 3 Mw here in the US. If a utility chooses to curtail production, it is simply because the "grid" cannot handle the amount of power being put into it. Like I said, an idle turbine is loosing money, not making it. Most sites have to meet a preset obligation on "availabilty" to produce power, or face stiff fines.
Sites are each bid differently as far as what the land owner makes. There is a site here with 200 turbines. The land owner gets $10,000 each per month, regardless of production. In the Midwest, you can lease the land, or buy the turbine for around 1% down. After you make your payment, you may clear $7000 or more apeice per month, depending on the wind conditions.
If you have any questions or thoughts on wind energy, feel free to post or PM me. I'll be happy to answer them.
CJ3Flyr
Super Moderator
That's good to know, thanks. I guess my biggest beef was that the politics of the 'system' in WI is so screwed up that the power company is incentivised to NOT USE the windmill. If that's false then you're right and there was some other reason, well over 90F, a computer glitch or something. (The lakes were all wavy looking that day indicating good ground level wind.)
Thanks for sharing from your unique perspective. Very cool. I like info like the 90F thing and the 1.5-3MW.
Why do they take 3-7KW just sitting? I would have thought something but that much?
If you had to guess and I said you had a constant 1.9MW being produced, how many typical 1800-2000ft houses is that? I have no idea what average house uses during a hot summer day...
:cheers:
Thanks for sharing from your unique perspective. Very cool. I like info like the 90F thing and the 1.5-3MW.
Why do they take 3-7KW just sitting? I would have thought something but that much?
If you had to guess and I said you had a constant 1.9MW being produced, how many typical 1800-2000ft houses is that? I have no idea what average house uses during a hot summer day...
:cheers:
shawnstcyr
New member
Your typical US home consumes more than 10,000 KWH per year. So, a 1 MW turbine could produce 2.5 to 3 million KWH per year, depending on your average wind speed. Your 1.9 MW turbine could potentially produce up to 6 million a year. This would equate to around 600 homes. In my little part of the state, we have over 4000 turbines. Some of ours are rated into the mid to upper 2 MW range.
We curtail ours frequently. Our grid won't be able to catch up for several more years. This problem is nationwide. The turbines I worked on in northern Maine had to route their power through western New Brunswick, Canada in order for it to reach southern Maine. They are missing 17 miles of transmission lines in that region. Bottom line, we need more high tension power lines to distribute all this new available energy.
In your part of the country, your highest production comes in the winter months. Your turbines reap the benefits from numerous cold fronts. California gets more production in the summer months. I once clocked a 10 minute average wind speed of 110 MPH in Palm Springs. BTW, never ever approach a wind turbine in icy conditions. The blades act like wings in freezing weather. They can and do begin to accumulate ice at a few degrees above freezing when they are running. We usually shut them down if they begin to ice. They run very inefficiently and become hazardous. They can throw ice up to several hundred feet. Imagine a 3 inch thick, 8 ft long sheet of ice falling 300 ft. It will ruin your day!
As to the usage question, turbines have several systems that draw power when they are not running. They have computer systems, cooling fans, heaters, hydraulic brake pumps, oil pumps, yaw drives, lights, and blade pitch motors. I usually shut down the oil pumps and coolers when I enter the top. This quiets my work environment considerably. At this point, my computer screen shows that I am drawing 1 or 2 KW. As the turbine yaws to stay into the wind, my KW's shoot up to between 8 and 11. My turbine is running 4 500V motors to stay facing into the wind. You are drawing a lot of amperage to rotate a 60 ton machinery room (nacelle). Some blades weigh over 16000 lbs each x3. It takes a lot of power. But once you are up and running, all your power comes from the turbine itself.
If you have more questions, keep 'em coming. There is also a group I belong to, the American Wind Energy Association. Very informative. http://awea.org/faq
We curtail ours frequently. Our grid won't be able to catch up for several more years. This problem is nationwide. The turbines I worked on in northern Maine had to route their power through western New Brunswick, Canada in order for it to reach southern Maine. They are missing 17 miles of transmission lines in that region. Bottom line, we need more high tension power lines to distribute all this new available energy.
In your part of the country, your highest production comes in the winter months. Your turbines reap the benefits from numerous cold fronts. California gets more production in the summer months. I once clocked a 10 minute average wind speed of 110 MPH in Palm Springs. BTW, never ever approach a wind turbine in icy conditions. The blades act like wings in freezing weather. They can and do begin to accumulate ice at a few degrees above freezing when they are running. We usually shut them down if they begin to ice. They run very inefficiently and become hazardous. They can throw ice up to several hundred feet. Imagine a 3 inch thick, 8 ft long sheet of ice falling 300 ft. It will ruin your day!
As to the usage question, turbines have several systems that draw power when they are not running. They have computer systems, cooling fans, heaters, hydraulic brake pumps, oil pumps, yaw drives, lights, and blade pitch motors. I usually shut down the oil pumps and coolers when I enter the top. This quiets my work environment considerably. At this point, my computer screen shows that I am drawing 1 or 2 KW. As the turbine yaws to stay into the wind, my KW's shoot up to between 8 and 11. My turbine is running 4 500V motors to stay facing into the wind. You are drawing a lot of amperage to rotate a 60 ton machinery room (nacelle). Some blades weigh over 16000 lbs each x3. It takes a lot of power. But once you are up and running, all your power comes from the turbine itself.
If you have more questions, keep 'em coming. There is also a group I belong to, the American Wind Energy Association. Very informative. http://awea.org/faq
