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Is Backyard Wind Power Worth It?
eldavojohn wonders: "In the October IEEE Spectrum magazine, I read an article on backyard windmills and their growing feasibility. With the lowest model's price tag, it's about $9,000 and lasts for around 100,000 kilowatt-hours (20 year life), which results in 9 cents per kilowatt-hour. Now, the article mentions that if the market takes off, that price will drop. However, I was wondering what price range the windmills would have to fall to (or the energy rates have to rise to) before I could consider this? Well, the price of the windmills in the article are out of my price range right now. I don't imagine many Americans have $8k-$11k laying around and the current month's rates for energy in my neighborhood are 2.2 cents/kWh for the first 800 kWh and 1.2 cents/kWh after. I was wondering what are your thoughts on being an early adopter of wind energy? Do you think that if enough people bought these windmills, the price per kWh could compete with the local power grid's? Will it ever?"
Because some communities tend to be rather picky about what you put up. Even if it's only slightly visible, some drama queen or snooty neighbour may kick up a fuss about it.
1) No, on a purely financial basis, it probably isn't worth it. (Saves the posts of people doing a detailed analysis.)
2) Yes, it has the non-financial benefit of being earth-friendly, which isn't necessarily captured in a financial analysis. (Saves people from lecturing others that money isn't everything.)
3) Yes, it would probably save you money if the appropriate goods were taxed to reflect their environmental costs. What the appropriate externality compensation would be depends on your ideology, so if you wanted people to use less fuel anyway, you probably think these costs are HUGE.
4) Yes, we know that alone, windmills won't solve all energy problems. No one thinks that.
5) Yes, some birds are killed from these. No one cares, since tall buildings kill a lot more.
Does that about cover it?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
Are you sure you are reading your bill correctly? Are you in canada or something? I think i pay about 13 c / kwh
e 5_6_a.html ,,
.. the distribution cost is fixed) .. if you are making energy on site you save on both since they aren't distributing that power to you...
here is a list of average prices around the US
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/tabl
1/2 is the distribution cost and 1/2 is the generation cost..(this is only matters if you choose a different energy provider as all you can save is the generation cost
With rising energy costs, global warming, and environmental concerns, I think the answer to your final question is a resounding "maybe".
This same energy-conservation trend has shown itself in hybrid vehicles. The first hybrids were priced almost twice the cost of regular vehicles. So people doing the math and asking themselves the same questions you are about wind power. However, as popularity grew and more hybrid vehicle models became available, the prices became more competitive. Even the government has gotten involved in many areas by offering tax cuts, toll leniencies, and access to restricted lanes as incentives. While many people would argue that it still isn't cost-effective to purchase a hybrid, there have been over a million sold.
I think there are other benefits that can be said about windmills. I remember reading a report once which showed that minor improvements to homes (new paint, adding walk-in closets, new windows) increased sale prices by way more than was invested. How much more could you get for a house when you tell a potential buyer that their electricity bill will be 20-90% less other homes because of the big fan in the backyard? I'm willing to bet it would sell for at least $10k more in most areas.
So returning to your second question, I think the outcome of windmills will indeed be determined by their popularity. If they catch on, I think production will diversify and the government will get involved to offer incentives. However, the article itself says "the SkyStream turbine is not meant to wean you from the grid completely".
--
"A man is asked if he is wise or not. He replies that he is otherwise" ~Mao Zedong
Capitalism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called fascism.
Is .02/KWH right? I just got my bill today and saw that I was billed an "energy cost" of 0.029/kwh for all power over the month + between 2.6 cents and 8.5 cents per kwh depending upon the date (summer/"winter" billing). If my real cost per unit of power is between 5 cents and 10 cents, it's not quite as much of a stretch for spending $9000 on a small windmill.
I think that the power company has been taking lessons from the telephone company in producing their billing statements.
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
Depends where you live- I want to know where the submitter lives to be getting those prices on residential electricity. Here in Beaverton, OR, I'm paying 8.4c/kwh- this technology looks like it could be attractive as the cost of fuel-based electricity generation goes up. Heck- marry this tech to a Zap Xebra, and you've got independance from the gas station for (within $2000) about the same cost as a Toyota Prius.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Then don't buy a home where there is a homeowner's association. Sell your home if one gets voted in. Why should the desires of the one automatically outweigh the desires of the many? Especially when the one can simply refuse to play by selling and moving. That's the beauty of the free market: people are free to set up socialist systems such as homeowner's associations within it and you are free to buy into them or not. But you don't have the right to limit the free market by saying people can't do that. Property rights are a deal mutually enforced by property owners, and if other property owners want to say that you have to jump through a flaming hoop into a pile of dog doo before they will honor you property claims, well, what can you do except defend your property yourself.? You want the privilege of being part of a system that defends your property rights? You play by that systems rules, or leave and make your own system. What's that you say? Every place is already owned and encumbered by rules you didn't agree to? Tell that to the vast majority of humans who own no property at all, I'm sure you'll get a lot of sympathy.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
A windmill is too big and too much of an eyesore to be installed in backyards.
They don't have to be eyesores.
"The last thing I want to do is deal with a bunch of people who want something."
Major Major
The problem with that logic is that you asume those results to be true. This couldn't be more problematic then ever.
.09/KWH might actualy be .05 depending on the household usage compared to energy produced.
First there is no guarentee that outcome will be true even if this stay exactly the same as it is today.
Second, just because the acerage Joe cannot afford it, doesn't mean power companies cannot. It is more likley that power generating companies could asbsorb the costs and distribute it to people it provides power to while keeping the pricing cheaper overall to each user. Also, if power generating companies pick it up, while likley on a larger scale, it could very well reduce the price for the average joe to implement it themselves. Maybe even to a point wer eit could be cheaper then the power companies rates.
Third, the article/submision doesn't acount for unused power that should go back into the grid. The power companies should be paying for this backflow of energy and it would reduce the costs even more to the average joe. possibly making this
fourth, Even if the average joe does take this alternative energy up, there is no guarentee that 100 years from now, grand kids won't still have problems with lung disease and skin cancer. We have proven a likly conection but as science insist, they conclusion could change with new evidence.
Fith, I take issue with this do it now, we don't care what it will cost you (even if it bankrupts you or starves your children) additude and then instill some scary scenario that could happen If certain other issues are ignored. It is almost as bad as certain tv preachers claiming god will take his life if you don't donate a certain amounts of money to me. Or even these out of state charities claiming to be supporting fallen law enforcment officers and firefighters making statements like "well, if you don't contribute, they will remeber this when you need thier help" (implying the cops won't protect you or firefighters won't help you next time you need them if you don't give them money now).
Also, for those wantig to take it further, this can be applied to global warming and all the scare threats used there too. It might be one reason why so many americans even though admiting global wamring might exist, question either the facts of global warming itself or the purposed remedies. There are quite a few people who belive global warming is happening but refuse to belive the stated causes or the purposed actions to fix it. This doesn't even begin to address those who think this is some concocted problem designed to get people to by from different forces in the enrgy markets. And yes that could be applies to backyard energy sources too.
1. Someone I know lives on 50-odd acres; his house is about 1/2 mile from the road. As I understand it, the power company quoted him $18,000 to run power poles from the road to his house. Of course, this upfront cost was just for the opportunity to send them money every month thereafter. For that same $18,000 he bought a complete power system including a bunch of special batteries, high tech electronic load and generation management and a diesel generator. I think the generator and batteries came from folks who had installed Y2K panic systems, and never used them. For several years he ran the generator once a week for a couple of hours, now he's installed two solar panels and he has gone all summer without running the diesel, though he will probably have to run it occasionaly during the winter. He has a small wind generator for testing, so far. His major electricity usage is shop tools and clothes dryer. He uses propane for hot water, and propane and wood for heat. He plans more solar panels eventually, and will then use the diesel only for emergencies.
2. According to the World Bank, small amorphous silicon solar panels are replacing kerosene lamps in rural African villages - they cost about the same as two months' worth of kerosene, provide more light than the kerosene lamps previously used, and once paid for cost nothing to run, except amortized cost of replacement every ??? years. This also offers the opportunity to radically change lifestyles in these areas. Evidently amorphous silicon panels are less efficient than the more expensive solar panels but are so much cheaper that they're a better deal. I can easily foresee several families in a village connecting their panels and batteries together, and voila! Instant community power grid, that can grow incrementally.
For the large percentage of people who live outside areas that already have well-developed electric power and other networks, localized community-based or individualized solutions including wind, solar and small hydro can be very practical, and even life changing. This paper notes that:
It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
What happens a few years from now, when some new dramatic improvement in turbine design happens? Or 100% efficent solar panels are invented? Or heck, maybe they even invent portable fusion reactors, who knows what is coming in the future?
If you are amortizing the cost of a windmill over 20 years, this IS a concern. 20 years is a lot of time for technology to significantly improve. Think of how much cars have changed, let alone technology like computers and information networks. Alternative energy sources are a hot thing to invest in lately, and I have a feeling there will be some serious improvements real soon. Maybe if you could amortize the cost in 5 years, it would be a reasonable risk. But 20 years? I can't see how it would be a good idea.
I live in an area of the country (the south) where part of the culture is parking your truck in the yard and having a few appliances on the front porch or the yard. But lately we've had a bunch on Yankees move in and start creating HOAs in the new neighborhood, trying to destroy our local culture. Everything has to be painted beige and the HOAs have mailbox police to make sure every mailbox looks exactly the same.
Thats just a stupid comment. To say something like that only reinforces peoples views that enviromentalists are are a bunch of emotional, illogical and completely unscientific people. Because what you just did was scare-mongering, it was NOT rational.
To suggest that the economic feasibility of wind turbines has an effect on your grandkids getting skin cancer and lung disease is absurd. you might as well have simply written "I hate anyone who disagrees with using Eco-power, wont you think of the children!"
A much better post would have been:
Yours: That is the sort of attitude that extingushes the renewable energy movement. Thank you for your demonstration.
Mine: no comment, this is just a dumb comment and doesnt actually prove any point at all.
Yours: I agree expense is a factor,
Mine: While the cost of renewable energy is prohibitively expensive right now we should continue to support this type of research because a time might come when it becomes an affordable and maybe even neccesary option.
Yours: however, in 100 years, your grandkids will curse your mantra "not economical for Joe Average." as their skn cancers flare up, and lung disease eats away at them.
Mine: I'm a little worried about all this global warming stuff. I've heard alot of opinions in every direction, and if we learn that our use of fossil fuels is infact warming the planet, then technologies such as this one might become a neccesity for our children and grandchildren.
Kyle
While power companies may be required to pay you for your excess power, most places aren't required to pay you any more than a trivial, token amount. One fellow said that his local power company charged 14 cents/kWH, but only paid him 2 cents for his power.
Usually, folks just get set up with "net metering", where any power they dump back into the grid is deducted from how much they use. At best, you never pay for power, at worst, you only pay for what you can't generate. With a large turbine, a good, windy week could zero out your electric bill for a month or two, yet you don't have to maintain the battery banks to store that excess energy (or worry about using a "dump load" on your turbine.)
steve
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
I can't understand the people who complain about windmills being an eyesore. Sure, they're noticable, like just about any other structure. But they're also a reminder of our thirst for energy, and a symbol of our civilisation. They're something we should be proud of
I have seen much mor offending things than a few windmills in the scenery
I suppose they'd complain about these too.
There are legitimate reasons for HOAs. Any time you share a wall, an HOA is absolutly necessary. That being said, the idea that HOAs will go the way of the dodo if people don't want them doesn't fly here in California. We have laws that limit property taxes. So, the local governments have started taking the Ben Franklin approach to increasing revenue. Basically they figured out that 'A penny saved is a penny earned.', so, they now require new development projects to form an HOA if they permits. This means that for each of the houses built, they get to tax at the old maximum rate, but they do not supply the services that those taxes would have supplied in the past. It is basically a run around the tax laws.
Due to this, the number of houses per capita that are available that are not in an HOA is artifically limited. In fact, here in California, builders that successfully get houses built without an HOA, advertise that as a selling feature of the house.
I'm being mean here but there are deliberate blinders going on here, making the vendor, the IEEE spectrum writer and the Slashdot editor forget basic math. The vendor's motive, I understand, but there is no excluse for IEEE writers and slashdot people.
$9,000 for 100,000 khw over 20 years is NOT 9 cents/kwh. Why? Anybody with a mortgage knows that money paid over time is vastly different from money today. The unit presumably delivers 5,000 khw per year or about 13.7 khw per day. So at 7% interest, that's 16.7 cents/kwh, which is more than just round-off error.
And frankly, for the vendor to say it's 9 cents is very close to fraud. The power plants don't amortize without considering the time value of money when they work out the costs.
Another way to think about it. Put the $9,000 in the stock market. Historical rate of return is about 10%. That means you would pull out $900 per year -- while still keeping the principal intact, except for inflation. At California's 13 cents/khw from the grid, that buys you 6900khw, assuming the price stays even. Your wind turnbine gets you only 5000khw. It doesn't pay for itself in 20 years, it never, ever pays for itself, no matter how long it lasts. And you still have the principal when you are done.
I'm all for renewable energy. But I hate it when people also for renewable energy either get stupid or just plain lie to make it seem better than it is.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation