OT(ish) - small wind turbine longevity

[David]

A smallholding near us has a farm shop, nursery, grows much of their own vegetables. All nice and green.

They also have a pair of small wind turbines near to the buildings (at least, I assume that they are part of the business).

I thought this was a good thing because they were always spinning when some of the bigger ones on local farms were in wind shadow (one is so much in wind shadow that I can't see it generating much at all).

Anyway, for the last few months one has not been spinning and the other had the turbine removed (I assume it didn't just fall off). No sign of repair or replacement.

I assume from this that the installation has not recouped the outlay, and also not covered the manufacturing carbon debt.

I also assume that it is not financially attractive to repair (possibly no grants, possibly manufacturer gone bust or ceased support).

This doesn't seem to bode well for larger wind farms if this is an indication of the long term reliability.

If I can summon a combination of energy and nosiness I may drop in and ask them about it.

Cheers

Dave R

[Bill Wright]

A few years ago a mate of mine with an electrical business, wishing to diversify almost got into bed with a Chinese wind turbine manufacturer. Luckily he saw the quality of the products and pulled out. Shortly afterwards the Chinese company supplied the turbine for a business that I drive past quite often and have a tenuous link with. It lasted until the first strong wind and has stood broken for several years now. Bill

[Harry Bloomfield]

Bill Wright expressed precisely :

There are around 3 or 4 privately owned local ones, all are turning regularly, apart from the smallest/ oldest one which hasn't moved for a few years now.

[Tim+]

Were these perhaps the notorious "Windsave" turbines that in many cases consumed more electricity that they generated?

How small is "small"?

Tim

[Tim Streater]

[snip]

According to a couple of rellies who participate in this sort of scam, a "small" turbine will take quite a long time to recover its outlay.

[Harry Bloomfield]

As will a 'large' one, if ever they do..

[Chris Hogg]

I remember them being sold through B&Q. A couple of metres or so in diameter.

[Andy Burns]

[Ash Burton]

Quite a few large windfarms in the UK have been operating reliably for

25 to 30 years but they are mostly with Danish built turbines.

[harry]

The site is everything. You see them in some daft places.

[Brian Gaff]

Many boats seem to have wind turbines these days, one supposes to keep batteries charged up while moored etc. I'd imagine these have to stand a lot more windd and weather than land based ones, so maybe the best plan is too get some of those instead! Brian

[alan_m]

And probably never in an urban environment

[Harry Bloomfield]

harry brought next idea :

So if the location is so obviously daft to you, why did the supposed experts not notice when they did a potential site survey? The answer is that it didn't really matter, all that mattered was a sale.

[Harry Bloomfield]

Brian Gaff used his keyboard to write :

If you mean the narrow boats and similar, they don't need to have a vast output to keep a battery topped up.

[JoeJoe]

They can always borrow the missing part from the one that David Cameron had fitted to his house a few years ago (until he realised that it wouldn't even power his phone charger, and removed it).

[Chris Hogg]

Around here there are a lot of wind turbines, singles and pairs, generally much smaller than the those on the big commercial wind farms, and a large number only rated at around 5-6kW. See for example

and These are installed by local landowners, presumably seduced by the green arguments to reduce CO2 and keen to 'do their bit'. I have seen data for one such turbine, and the capacity factor is pretty poor at 14%. I assume that a salesman has just made a presentation to the landowner and said something along the lines of 'this is what we normally install in your situation' without any assessment of the wind characteristics in the immediate location, and the landowner has just gone along with it.

[David]

By "small" I am talking in relative terms.

I would guess the mast was between 30' and 60' tall. [Going from "looks a lot taller than the average house".]

The turbine is/was in proportion.

Cheers

Dave R

[David]

Ugh! I remember them.

Order of magnitude larger.

Just small in comparison to a couple of others round here and tiny compared to the offshore ones.

Suffolk being mainly flat, they seem to be in a good rural location with no obvious obstructions to free flowing wind. [{cough} a bit like myself, perhaps{cough}]

Cheers

Dave r

[Roger Hayter]

Is this sarcasm, or have you not noticed the huge subsidies they get? According to a local farmer's planning application a moderate size turbine would halve his five figure electricity bill, while only generating a fraction of his usage, even on a good day.

[The Natural Philosopher]

UKIP successfully stopped a turbine plamning application here by claiming that it was too *small*.

If you get permission to plant one, you have to show that it will do more good than harm - i.e. generate more electricity.

The landowner was reluctant, as the larger turbine returned less in FITS on his investment.