make it affordable

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Permalink Reply by John Nistler on October 9, 2009 at 7:50am

Here is a website I found in researching wind generators /turbines on google. http://www.allsmallwindturbines.com/ I have no recomendations but offer this for those who are interested. Prices are typically in euro, but range from about $1.5 per watt and up. Keep in mind that freight may add significantly to your price. You can look up your wind and solar potential in the USA by going to http://www.windpoweringamerica.gov/wind_maps.asp.

As a rule of thumb a 500 Watt system which will cost anywhere from $750 to $3500 (including tower, hardware, inverter, etc - not including freight) and will generate 30 to 45 KWHrs per month in marginal areas (20 to 30 mph winds).

For one of our projects I have considered a smaller unit, 5KW or less and am primarily interested in an AC wind generator/turbine which would allow us to control AC grid tie directly with (Phase lock) or step down transformer/DC conversion to run or hydrogen electrolysis unit. Any suggestions on this type of a unit?

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Permalink Reply by Ian MacKenzie on July 17, 2008 at 4:20pm

I saw this special also, more efficient smaller and more affordable. but you cant paint them with trippy things like the windmills type LOL.

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Permalink Reply by W. Wood on July 17, 2008 at 9:18pm

Your cost would be between $40,000.00 and $100,000.00 depending on many kilowatts your home required. Don`t forget to do a wind survey of your area before you invest. The turbine has to be spinning at a required level of RPMs` before the unit will allow itself to generate a wattage load.

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Permalink Reply by simon on July 17, 2008 at 9:25pm

first we have to define affordable. what could the average american spend on a home turbine? i think they ought to package them with new homes, or even with hybrid/electric cars. maybe even a property tax credit?

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Permalink Reply by Ian MacKenzie on July 18, 2008 at 1:23am

In New Hampshire there is a property tax credit but it is only about 2000 dollars a measley sum in comparison to the total cost of an alternative energy source. I'm sure other staes have simular tax credits but I'm not sure of the amounts. http://www.dsireusa.org/ is the site to start at

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Permalink Reply by wayne roman on July 18, 2008 at 5:13pm

I have read all the previous comments and seen very little in answer to the initial query so I am adding one that I hope will be a little more productive.

Many of you out there have several thousands of dolars invested in 401K and other retirement plans. Why not use your some of that money to fund a viable solution. That is, form a corporation, or limited partnership through an attourney with the goals spelled out.

It is too expensive for most individuals to buy a wind turbine and few have a viable site to put it on. However, a group could pool their money, buy land at a suitable site, and set up a small instillation that would provide enough power for all their homes, and then some. they coud do this in a state where there are tax breaks and incentives and sell the power to the local utilitiy company.

Instead of using the power generated diretly for each persons own home, the corporation would pay their local utility for their electricity. This way They would be contributing to the solution of the problem, help reduce the cost of turbines by increasing demand, and overcome their own expensive electric bills even if they have no local access to reliable winds.

How about it? Are any of you willing to invest $5,000 or $10,000 of the money you already have invested in the stock market into your own private wind farm? 100 people at $10,000 each is $1,000,000. Is that enough? Or, would you need 500 people?

You know that you will need electricity for the rest of your life, so do you want to pay $100 or $200 or more a month forever, or $10,000 now?

Now this can be considered a shareholder owned investment scheme,(Capitalism) or the workers owning the means of production (Communism). Either way it is one viable solution.

Anyone want to run with this, or is it all talk?

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Permalink Reply by neil cox on October 9, 2009 at 6:47pm

Possibly a 10 foot wind turbine could sell at Walmart for $999 if someone built a highly automated factory to make a million of them per month. Likely it would cost at least that much for a tower, installation, liability insurance, a grid connect inverter and/or some batteries. With very favorable wind it would produce about 10 KWh worth about one dollar per day, so pay back might be as soon as 2000 days. Realistically figure 8 years as repairs would be necessary eventually. That is affordable, but average wind conditions likely are payback never. It would be about as noisy as a typical outside unit for a heat pump, so you probably don't want to fasten it to your house = it needs a stand alone tower. With a 10 foot tower, you won't get favorable wind hardly anywhere and you risk serious injury of neighborhood children who may play with your wind turbine. With nearby trees, you may need a 100 foot tower, which won't be legal in many locations. Neil

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