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Community Wind Assessment Program at Unity College
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Wind
Links: (MS
PowerPoint required) Maine
Wind Maps as PowerPoint slides (Includes,
Waterville area, Jackson, Dixmont, Thorndike area, Sumner, Blue
Hill area, MDI area, Charleston area) Wind resource
map of Waldo County (MS
PowerPoint required) National Renewable
Energy Research Lab Idaho
National Lab Wind Programs Sustainability Activities Blog Maine
Community Wind Assessment data |
Our wind assessment program: Unity College now has a
research and public service program in Community Wind Assessment. Unity
students and faculty make use of the latest equipment and technology to
assess wind power resources for Maine communities, learning science, math,
and engineering at the same time. Read on to see how this program might
benefit you or your community. To email the lead faculty
with a question, use mwomersley@unity.edu Introduction to Community Wind and
Wind Assessment and FAQs: Large and medium scale
wind power, using wind turbines from 50KWH to over 1MWH, is one renewable
power source that Maine communities can use to improve energy security,
reduce energy costs, and contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and
other air pollution. Industrial scale turbines,
however, are not a do-it-yourself solution. The wind resource needs to be
carefully and scientifically assessed to make sure a turbine is viable on a
particular site, a technique using computer modeling, the choice of right
turbine to use requires some math and engineering knowledge, and the finance,
installation, and successful running of a turbine over time requires a
considerable amount of professional and engineering expertise. This web site aims to run
through the basic processes for wind turbine site planning, providing
information that Maine communities can use relatively easily to get going on
an industrial scale project, and to find the more detailed help they need to
complete the process. FAQs: What is an industrial scale turbine? Industrial scale wind
turbines are those larger turbines, typically over 50 KWH rated output, with
towers over 25 or 30 meters, and blades of diameter 12, 15 meters or more, turbines
that were designed to produce energy for the energy grid. Another term is grid scale turbine. A grid-tied
turbine is one that is connected to the grid. Large users of power, such as
schools, farms, or industrial operations, can have such a turbine on the
demand side of their electricity meter and actually use much of the power the
turbine makes, but sell the power generated when they are not actually
operating (evenings, weekends, holidays), or any surplus power, back to the
grid. Communities, especially isolated communities such as islands or
peninsulas, can likewise sell the power produced from their turbine into the
grid, and benefit from a reduction in overall electricity costs to
householders. What kind of wind is needed to run an
industrial scale turbine? Typically industrial
turbines begin producing power at wind speeds above 4 or 5 meters per second,
about 9 to 11 miles per hour. The amount of power they put out increases
rapidly and exponentially as wind speed increases, to between about 14 and 20
miles per hour, or 6.5 to 9 meters per second, a flat spot on the power curve where
they produce their rated output, more or less. Turbines automatically shut
down by feathering
the pitch of their blades after about 25 meters per second or 45 miles per
hour. An example of the power curve of a typical 100 KWH turbine is shown
above. Each manufacturer’s make
and model of turbine has it’s own specified power curve. Different turbines
do better under different wind conditions. A turbine with a lower cut-in
speed may do better on a low wind site, while a turbine with a longer flat
spot at the top of the curve may be better for a windy island or offshore
site. How can our community know if a
turbine will work on our site? Professional wind resource
assessment is required for any industrial scale turbine installation. A
preliminary survey can be made using local meteorological data such as that
available from the National Weather Service archives, or the National
Renewable Energy Laboratory wind power support program (see links to left).
The wind
atlas method is one form of preliminary survey, using equations that have
been tested for use as estimators or proprietary programs such as WAsP, which use the same estimators embedded
in automated calculators. If the preliminary survey
suggests there is sufficient wind on the site, but not obviously sufficient wind, or a
smaller margin of error is needed for financial applications, a secondary
survey using a meteorological tower (or anemometer tower) is needed, known
colloquially as a met tower. There are several manufacturers of met towers. Unity
College uses met tower equipment from NRG
Systems Inc, a leading firm in the development of equipment and software
for wind resource assessment. In both cases, preliminary
and met tower surveys, the data produced by the survey is matched against the
power curves of various makes and models of turbines to produce a prediction
of KWH output/year, as well as an estimate of the margin of error. The margin
of error is generally low if the work is done carefully, allowing a good deal
of confidence in the results. These results are used to run financial
analysis to determine if a project is economically viable. Because of the
high confidence in the numbers, the finance can be relatively easy to
justify. This high confidence in predicted output and thus revenue, plus
excellent equipment warranties from turbine manufacturers and renewable
energy tax breaks from federal and state government, are the reasons why private finance
is currently interested in wind power development, but communities can have
the same high confidence if expert help is used in planning turbine
installations. Unity College is currently
working with several Maine communities to perform feasibility studies, and
can help you with yours. If you are a Selectman, community organizer, or a
member of a community organization that is interested in a wind resource
assessment study, email mwomersley@unity.edu At the time of writing we
are evaluating sites for the 2009-2010 study year. It takes at least a full
year to perform a met tower study. How can we finance a community-owned
wind project? Community government
organizations such as Maine towns and municipalities have access to financing
at lower interest rates than for-profit corporations. Bond issues, federally
guaranteed loans, federal and private grants, and combinations of all the
above, have been used to finance community wind power developments. Maine
Community Development Corporations such as Coastal Enterprises Inc., which
works in our own mid-coast area,
and the larger municipalities
have expert planners and grant makers to help you with community wind
financing. What about local opposition to wind
power? Some members of the Maine
public oppose the development of wind power resources. Sometimes this is due
to worries over viewshed, noise, general ugliness and other aesthetic
effects, sometimes due to concerns for wildlife, particularly birds and bats,
and sometimes due to concern over the viability of wind power. We cannot
address all these concerns on a website that is primarily intended to support
scientific wind assessment for Maine communities. But it will be helpful to
mention some of these concerns and to point the reader in the direction of
more information. In addition to cheaper
finance, community government organizations also typically have professional and
political resources for addressing public concerns about the wind turbine
site planning process. We recommend using these resources to properly plan
the project with the public invited to all meetings. We recommend holding a
series of community meetings during the run-up phase, before data is even
collected, to gauge the amount of opposition and high feeling. In some cases,
the opposition will be so great as to suggest immediately that the project
not go ahead. In other cases, well-facilitated meetings, where professional
wind power experts explain concepts, pros and cons, and options, can provide
better information, and permit a project to succeed. Generally speaking, if a
majority of the voters of a town or municipality want a publically owned
turbine project to go ahead, then it will likely go ahead with less
difficulty than an identical commercially owned project might encounter in
the same town. Pros and cons of wind power: Pros: Economic and technical viability: Worries over the viability of wind power
typically stem from out-dated information. Wind power has come a long way in
recent years, and is now considered a proven technology, with many of the
designs, makes and models of turbine typically recommended for community wind
power having as much as twenty years of safe reliable operation and thus
in-service testing. Of the various options to provide energy that would
reduce climate emissions and improve energy security, wind power is also the
most cost-effective. There are no other renewable energy options currently
that offer as good an economic return for community organizations. Because of
these good returns, private finance is interested in wind power development,
hence the large number of private schemes, but wind power development also will
help keep electricity prices down for ordinary people, compared to other
sources of power, assuming fair competition and regulation in power
generation. Proper siting is essential. A million dollar wind turbine on a
good site may produce a megawatt or more of power 70-90 percent of the time.
On a bad site, it may barely run at all. No rational person would put such a
turbine on a bad site when a good one is available. Jobs: Wind power development is already providing
contracts and thus jobs in Maine for wind development corporations,
construction corporations, manufacturing corporations, and maintenance
contractors. Although these are mostly specialized engineering, development,
and finance jobs, they can be captured locally or at least regionally. As Maine
corporations develop expertise to deliver wind services, far more jobs will
be created in-state. Lease and tax payments: Local jurisdictions can benefit from property
taxes on wind power installations, and landowners benefit from lease payments
on turbine sites. Energy Independence: Wind power also helps meet state and federal goals
for energy independence, reducing the need for fossil fuel imports. There are
also benefits to communities from the deployment of distributed power
generation systems, especially as the nation moves towards “smart grid”
technology. Distributed generation reduces cost and pollution significantly,
and when combined with smart grid technology, can contribute to improved
power security and emergency preparedness, and helps meet targets for
greenhouse gas reductions to slow or stop climate change. Climate change: Most climate scientists expect that to abate dangerous
climate change of 2 or more degrees Celsius in the next 100 years, we need to
reduce emissions by 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. Wind power is one part of
the possible mix. Climate change by itself doesn't make a good argument for
any specific form of clean energy. There are lots of others to choose from,
including efficiency and conservation. But the European countries, who are
ahead of us in reducing emissions, have generally found wind power helpful
and inexpensive so far. The Danes in particular have reduced their oil
consumption 30 per cent based largely on wind power, a large proportion of
which is community-owned. The consensus climate
change prediction for New England, from the New England Regional
Assessment (NERA), is that our region will experience a 3-6 degree
Celsius increase in average annual temperature, giving us roughly the climate
of Virginia (3 degrees) or Georgia (6 degrees) within 90 years or less. This
kind of rapid warming will destroy forest ecology, make farming initially
quite difficult, force wildlife to migrate, and generally overturn most
efforts at conservation. This is without taking the likelihood of damage to
houses and other infrastructure from increased extreme weather such as
floods, hurricanes and windstorms into account, or sea level rise. Cons: Wildlife: There are documented effects of wind turbines on
both bats and birds. Bats may actually suffer more than birds, according to
new research in Europe. The federal-level USFWS
Wind Turbine Guidelines Advisory Committee will shortly issue
recommendations for mitigating these effects in turbine and wind farm
planning. These guidelines will be binding and legally effective wherever
there are federally registered endangered or threatened species, and where
not binding will be recommended as best practices. Viewshed, noise and flicker: Wind turbines can be noisy, they can create
discomfort through noise and shadow flicker, and they are considered
unsightly by many, although not all. Local control, planning and
management: Wind turbines are also
relatively new to Maine and we don't yet quite know how to best control their
development, or how to efficiently tax them for the benefit of local
jurisdictions. The experience of locals in some communities where development
has already gone ahead seems from some vantage points to have been somewhat,
or in the worst cases, largely negative. The turbines used may have been
noisier than promised, companies have not always done a great job of
education or outreach, there have been published accusations of unfair
dealing, and the towns themselves may not quite have known how to cope well
or professionally with the strong feelings that developed. A more rational approach
such as that found in the various Wind Turbine Ordinances passed now by some
Maine towns would emphasize stricter performance standards and deeper setbacks
to houses and abutting properties, would anticipate skyline and viewshed
effects carefully, specify public disclosures needed from corporations
wishing to develop sites, such as the specific equipment to be used and its
specified noise and other characteristics, would allow for a stronger say by
the community and by abutting landowners, would look for a much more
structured and deliberative process in town meeting, and would plan to tax
turbines, output, and site leases carefully (not just the capital value of
the equipment). Writing town ordinances to do all this that would survive
court and even constitutional challenge is a specialized business. The Maine
Municipal Association and the State Legislature and agencies are working on
the problem. A draft ordinance is now available from the State Planning
Office. To email the author use mwomersley@unity.edu |
