I am writing a historical analysis for why we don’t use more wind power. I am having a hard finding historical reason for why we don’t use wind power. Any help in finding historical reasons for this problem would be great. Thanks for any help.
Who am I ?
Hi, I’m Erik Astrand and the man behind this site.
My story? I am about to be 50 and all my life I have been interested in technical things. Not sure if the special interest for the wind, and how to use the wind, started when I as a 5 year old boy and got my first sail dinghy.
Anyway, wind power and to build my own wind generator was a dream for several years. I studied many websites and also bought many courses before I finally built my own windmill. This site is about that journey and you will also find some more general articles about wind power.
Enjoy! and check out the about me page to read more.
It costs a lot more than using fossil fuels.
The reason the US hasn’t used more is because cheaper more reliable methods have always been available.
The Dutch historically used windmills successfully on a small scale, but it makes no sense to use them commercially for generating power though in some places this is being done.
They’re expensive to set up and maintain, unsightly, very noisy and the limited power derived does not justify the cost of producing them. About the only benefit is that they can be located in isolated areas far from the power grid for limited, local use.
Oil and Coal companys lobbying and giving money to Congress to convince them not to promote or invest in Alternative engery reserch and implementation.
It’s more expensive and less reliable now and historically it always has been.
The immediate answer that springs to mind in the U.S. is the REC, which brought cheap electricity to most rural homes in the country. Before that wind power was used to pump water from wells, but once homesteads had the convenience of electricity they opted out of wind power.
Of course, technology-including storage capacity-was also a big issue.
EDIT: A couple of notes here-reliability, availability of sufficient wind and efficiency were of course not exactly "historical" reasons, but modern turbines, according to the most recent information, are generally operating at approximately 60% capacity-but on average, a 1 Mega watt (oh geez, I am suddenly drawing a blank on wattage, but the standard measure of turbine capacity) is producing, on average, $370,000 worth of electricity each year, which results in a 6-8 year amortization of the original construction cost and a minimum of 12 years of profit after that. Second, while ground level wind may vary, the height at which the turbines are placed generally catches enough prevailing wind to drive the blades every day. When the wind blows TOO hard, the turbines rotate on their masts and can vary the angle of the blades to maintain a constant rate of production and rpm-which is about 17 rpm per minute on some units. This is all computer controlled from a central location, so it doesn’t require a lot of manpower. While I am not an expert by any means, this is all information I got directly from the manufacturers, builders production and site managers, and engineers involved in construction in the course of working on legal documentation for a couple of the large projects here in my area.
The main reason is quite simple
COST.
Because cowboys used windpower and George bush is a cowboy so everytime you see a windmill you will have to think of George Bush!
Lack of reliability in most regions of the world. There are a few places where wind is a somewhat practical source except a lot of the time it is blowing to hard or not enough for the typical prop on a stick unit. There is a cheaper, better and more reliable design that could be incorporated into the structure of any building, but as it is not a profitable or wasteful of resources it is ignored.
When electricity became wide spread and oil and gas available they were cheap enough to keep us from expanding on wind power.So it fell by the wayside.Now it is more cost effective and a viable source of almost continuous power so it will re invent itself and hopefully be more usable in the future.
There are cheap, more reliable power sources than wind.
Nuclear is what we should be using.
France is 90% nuclear. And we’re 30% nuclear.
The primary reason is poor reliability which results in higher cost to produce the same power as the conventional methods. Power needs to be produced 24/7 for a reliable grid.
Wind power only produces power about 35% of the time in a "good" area that has a lot of wind. Wind generators need 8-9 MPH sustained winds to begin generating.
The cowboys had large "tanks" that could store water for the periods when the wind did not blow. Storage of electricity is very difficult and drives the price even higher. Like many good things in life – it is possible, but is it practical?