This is an archive of articles and news on both large and small wind turbines, wind energy & the environment, and links to topics on the history of wind energy.
I've been working with wind energy since 1976 and my professional experience in the subject runs the gamut from wind resource assessment to installing and testing small wind turbines. I continue to follow the industry and analyze its growth and increasing contribution to renewable electricity generation worldwide.
Herr Fedor Seidler has forwarded a link to several lengthy documents summarizing the work of Albert Betz, Ludwig Prandtl, and their colleagues at the University of Göttingen. [more]
I’ve posted two new videos of historic wind turbines in operation. [more]
Turbine blades owned by ESI Energy hacked many birds to death, a violation of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act
Patrick McCaffrey (37) from Rossinver, Co Leitrim died at Derrysallagh wind farm
The California Energy Commission released a draft report that outlines what some call “aggressive” goals for offshore wind energy development in the Pacific Ocean — and Morro Bay will likely play a...
Included in the correspondence from Palmer Putnam to Herman Drees is a letter from Richard Heckscher who was involved in blade development on the Smith-Putnam project. (See Palmer Putnam to Herman...[more]
18-page scan of documents in the archives of Wally Thompson of correspondence from Palmer Putnam to Herman Drees in 1979.
Wally Thompson forwarded to me some fascinating correspondence from Palmer Putnam to Herman Drees of Pinson Cycloturbine fame.[more]
Experts cite Scottish example, with turbines along roads and rail lines, as a way to make better use of ‘cheap, clean’ energy source
Block Island, off the New England coast, overcame political strife to lead the way on energy independence.
Presentation to the Tehachapi Democratic Club on how best to help Ukraine and fight climate change by driving an electric vehicle today not tomorrow.
The United States set a major renewable energy milestone last Tuesday: wind power was the second-highest source of electricity for the first time since the Energy Information Administration began...
Ten years of the turbine in our backyard has shown we can coexist with wind energy.
Plans for 17 or more offshore wind turbine arrays off the U.S. East Coast mean more imminent peril for the endangered North Atlantic right whale – unless regulators and wind power developers...
Erik Grove-Nielsen has confirmed that the Tvindkraft wind turbine was designed to be slightly larger than the Smith-Putnam wind turbine and become the world’s largest wind turbine in 1978.[more]
A massive expansion of wind farms across the UK is now needed for national security reasons, the business secretary has declared, as, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the government considers...
Danish wind turbine manufacturing giant Vestas will suspend work on four Russian wind projects in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Vestas will also suspend all new commercial activities in...
Since I posted my article on the revised rating of Smith-Putnam’s famed wind turbine of the 1940s, I’ve received several comments. (See When is a 1,250 kW Wind Turbine Only 1,000 kW? Setting the...[more]
China is leading the race for offshore wind, setting a new record year for turbine installations in 2021, according to the World Forum Offshore Wind (WFO)'s annual report.
The Swedish government announced plans for a massive expansion of the country’s offshore wind power generation capabilities targeting capacity nearly equal to the country’s current annual consumption...
Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy Inc. plans to lay off workers in Kansas and Iowa because of a reduction in orders for commercial wind turbines.
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday that France plans to multiply its solar energy production capacities roughly tenfold by 2050.
Another sea eagle which had been fitted with a GPS tracking device as part of a monitoring programme has died after being hit by the blade of a wind turbine in Flevoland, nature journal Nature Today...
I receive a fair amount of mail of the “What do you think of this” variety. Often it’s a quick push of the delete key and I am off about my business. Occasionally I’ve been known to go “Hmm” and...[more]
French colleague Philippe Bruyerre called my attention to an error I’ve been promulgating for at least four decades. He noted that I’d described the famed 1940’s era Smith-Putnam wind turbine as...[more]
China connected 16.9 GW of offshore wind capacity to the grid in 2021, the latest data from the country’s National Energy Administration has shown.
Service provider dies after falling around 100 metres while installing Enercon turbine at a wind farm in eastern Austria
Thirty years ago Cornish farmer Peter Edwards, his late wife Phillipa, and his son Martin installed Great Britain’s first wind farm despite the attacks of those who said it couldn’t or shouldn’t be...[more]
UK renewable power company Good Energy Group Plc (LON:GOOD) has sold its entire 47.5-MW portfolio of renewable generation assets to Bluefield Solar Income Fund Ltd (LON:BSIF), the firms said today.
Several gigawatts of offshore wind capacity were added to the Chinese grid in the final weeks of 2021 to beat the announced scrapping of feed-in tariffs, according to Windpower Intelligence, the data...
A waterfront lantern festival powered by a 'wind tree' was the last gasp for a failing business. In the final in a three-part series, Jonathan Milne reports how Evan Price's chickens came home to...
Three of the five codefendants charged with manslaughter for their alleged involvement in the death of a Chehalis man who died in January 2020 when a trench collapsed during construction of the...
The research for an article on the history of early wind turbines took me down one fascinating rabbit hole after another. Previously, I mentioned Dimitri Stein and his Nordwind turbine on the Island...[more]
Overall, 106 projects totalling 5.6GW of wind capacity were in construction for a planned feed-in-tariff (FIT) of 0.098USD (€0.09) for offshore and 0.085USD for onshore wind.
With the exception of FloDesign/Ogin, shrouded turbines have fallen out of favor with inventors as well as the media. The buzz in 2013 was all about kites or as their promoters prefer to call them...[more]
The world record for the longest 'kite fly' is 180 hours.[more]
While working on an article on the history of early wind turbines, I tumbled down a very deep rabbit hole. How was Dimitri Stein able to work on wind energy in Berlin during the height of World War...[more]
Ron Swenson, an old hand at solar and electric vehicles reached out to me after I mentioned Sky Sails when I railed against a thoughtless article in the Guardian about a bladeless wind turbine. Turns...[more]
The head of Siemens Gamesa warned on Wednesday that a decade-long race to bring down the cost of generating wind power could not continue, as it would reduce the financial muscle of turbine producers...
Two firms have been fined nearly £900,000 over the death of a security worker left in freezing conditions at a wind farm in East Ayrshire.
The turbine, which whirls on Outer Main Street across from Maxcy Hall, was engineered by Ducted Wind Turbines, founded by Clarkson professor Kenneth Visser.
Despite overwhelming support for onshore windfarms, planning rules mean it is possible for only one person to prevent development
The York County History Center’s Virtual Exhibition of the Smith-Putnam wind turbine has gone live. Opening with a stunning photo of five men standing on one of the two blades after the giant turbine...[more]
19 October marks 80 years since testing began of the 1.25 MW Smith-Putnam turbine on Grandpas’ Knob near Rutland, Vermont in 1941. To mark the occasion, the York County History Center in York,...[more]
Deliveries of the massive blades for wind turbines have drawn questions and second looks in recent days as they make their way to their future home southwest of Lompoc. Read more at:...
Locals around Lockerbie in Dumfries and Galloway now own 5% of the £50 million, 46 MW Crossdykes park, thanks to the Holyrood government’s Community & Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES).
A company director has been returned for trial in relation to charges arising out of the death of a worker who was killed in a windfarm landslide.
The idea behind the NSL is for it to harness Norway’s hydropower and the U.K’s wind energy resources.
Offshore wind is no longer a distant possibility in California. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill into law on Thursday mandating that the California Energy Commission create a plan for offshore wind...
La Puissance du Vent: Des moulins á vent aux éoliennes modernes by Philippe Bruyerre is a major work on the history of wind energy particularly in France, but also elsewhere. His book earns a place...[more]
The following are the bibliographic entries I've been able to uncover for Dimitri Stein, a German-American engineer who studied wind energy in the mid 1940s. He and the company he started with others...[more]
After settling an appeal in July with a state appeals board, the three companies found to have violated worksite safety laws that led to the death of a worker at the Skookumchuck Wind Farm will pay...
Five people are facing manslaughter charges for the death of a Chehalis man who died in January 2020 when a trench that had not been reinforced collapsed during construction of the Skookumchuck Wind...
Truck hauling a wind turbine blade gets pulverized by a train
Elser said the scam was years in the making and a working ducted wind turbine prototype was never built. Instead, Davis and Ridings misrepresented engineers' opinions about the concept to scam...
A construction company and a security firm have admitted breaching health and safety rules in an incident which led to the death of a 74-year-old wind farm security guard. Ronnie Alexander died in...
While traveling in Belgium the day after hearing about Wobben’s death, his direct-drive Enercon turbine heritage was prominently visible along the way. The turbines’ characteristic egg-shaped...
On 26 June 2019 the Raleigh, North Carolina News & Observer reported that James Allen Rowan of Mag-Wind fame appeared in federal court in an orange jump suit to stand trial for fraud.[more]
So far, the technology has proven highly successful in protecting the local population of “Wedgies,” with just one mortality due to a turbine collision identified during the initial commissioning of...
Enercon founder Aloys Wobben has died aged 69 after a serious long-term illness.
Aided by canines, researchers found larger models do not necessarily pose a greater threat to wildlife
Much like the resistance to fracking in parts of the U.S. and the U.K., oceanfront towns have fought against power lines running ashore from wind farms, even as the massive turbines themselves are...
A new front has opened up in the post-Brexit tensions between Boris Johnson and the EU over Brussels’ concerns that the British wind turbine industry is being favoured for government contracts worth...
Currently working its way through the Tom Green County legal system is a lawsuit filed by Lacey Johnson whose husband, Aaron Johnson, died after falling at a wind turbine in southern Tom Green...
A new item was added to my pages on cultural icons under the category Cycling.[more]
Danish wind turbine giant Vestas has announced today that it, along with a coalition of industry and academic leaders, has figured out how to fully recycle wind turbine blades.
Preben Maegaard died 25 March 2021. He was 84. His death likely won't mean much to most North Americans. After all he wasn't a household name like reality TV stars Caitlyn Jenner or Kanye West. It...[more]
The job never ends of chronicling the cultural icons that feature windmills and wind turbines. This time it's cookie cutters--or biscuit cutters as the Brits like to say--and a big, expensive Lego...[more]
his week, a bill by Assemblyman Jordan Cunningham (R-San Luis Obispo) that would jumpstart offshore wind projects on the Central Coast passed its first committee. AB 525, which would formalize the...
Presentation to Winterwind 2021 21 April on a Comparison of Wind’s Fatalities to that of Other Industries. Wind energy’s hazards, like its appearance on the landscape, are readily apparent. Wind...
We show that experts in 2020 expect future onshore and offshore wind costs to decline 37–49% by 2050, resulting in costs 50% lower than predicted in 2015. This is due to cost reductions witnessed...
The family of a Chehalis wind farm worker who died last year while on the job has settled a wrongful death claim for $12 million after filing suit in King County Superior Court.
Here’s why California’s environmental justice experts and advocates from organized labor think California needs to go all in on offshore wind.
To detect and minimize conflict between wildlife and wind generation, they have installed artificial intelligence devices. In 2018 they erected a geofence, which tracks GPS-tagged condors entering...
As a subscriber to the Guardian newspaper I nearly choked on my coffee at 4.30 in the morning last week while I was scrolling through my news feed. I stumbled on Bladeless turbines could bring wind...[more]
Should Joe Biden’s plans for a huge expansion of renewable energy across the US survive the gamut of congressional bickering, a very different obstacle threatens progress – wealthy homeowners who...
Bruce Hatchett of Pacific Solar & Wind gave me a call a few weeks ago to tell me they were installing a Bergey 15 kW wind turbine in Tehachapi, wondering if I wanted to get some photos of it. “I...[more]
Four states — Pennsylvania, Montana, Utah and Wyoming — have counties named Carbon, after their wealth-generating coal deposits. The last, in the south-central part of the nation’s least populous...
Presentation to the Kern-Kaweah Chapter of the Sierra Club by Zoom on 6 March 2021. A visual summary of our nearly 50 weekly escapes from Covid-19 lockdown.
Asian country has now overtaken Germany to become second largest market by cumulative installations, says GWEC
The nearly 3,000-acre project, on the ridgetops near the end of San Miguelito Road, calls for erecting 29 wind turbine generators up to 492 feet tall, constructing an electrical substation at the...
Citing a market participant, Jenkins noted on Twitter that roughly 26 gigawatts of thermal energy is offline because natural gas is being diverted to provide heat instead of power. Only about 4...
New bill would set state target to build hundreds of tall turbines in the Pacific Ocean by 2030
The fossil fuel giants need to find new ways to reduce emissions, generate growth and maintain their share price
Zoom presentation for eMERGE Guelph, Ontario on the environmental benefits of EVs, what to look for in an EV, and how to charge them.
Behind paywall.
IdentiFlight’s smart cameras, which spot birds of prey such as eagles and then halt wind turbines to protect the birds, can result in a large percentage reduction of bird deaths, according to a new...
China has done it again! It has beat expectations on the amount of wind power added in 2020, with a staggering 72 gigawatts of wind power added last year.
I’ve just learned that an open-air museum of wind turbines in Germany has expanded its collection to include two US-built machines. I hope to get there some day--once Covid-19 has lifted. Nothing...[more]
Indigenous communities say planned Øyfjellet turbines will interfere with migration paths
Ok everyone, I’ll give in. I’ll say something about GE’s big new wind turbine that’s all the rage in the media.[more]
Mario Contreras Jr was working for Site Constructors Inc at an unidentified project near Palm Springs
I just added chocolate as a category of subjects that celebrate wind turbines or traditional windmills. Yes, chocolate. I thought “home decor” would be the last category on the topic. I never...[more]
In response to my article Who Built the World's First Wind Farm? Thomas Leitlein argues that it was the island of Rhodes off the coast of Turkey in the Aegean Sea. He makes his case below.[more]
As interest in the Smith-Putnam project heated up, a colleague directed me to a video of the famous mill at Gedser in Denmark. It was at Gedser where the modern wind industry began.[more]
Because of increasing historical interest in the Smith-Putnam wind turbine, I've added two new pages on the Project: patents for the wind turbine and four industrial drawings from the 1941 patent,...[more]
By now you’ve probably seen the viral video of a woman or girl jumping or skipping over the shadow of a wind turbine blade as it sweeps across the ground. It’s all over the “interweb” as a friend...[more]
GE Renewable Energy has found a new use for old turbine blades — chop them up and use them to make cement. In a press release, the company says it has signed a multi-year agreement with Veolia North...
Guy Dauncey’s novel Journey to the Future: A Better World is Possible has been extolled by a who’s who of Canadian environmental thought leaders from Elizabeth May, onetime leader of Canada’s Green...[more]
Going to be up on YouTube Tuesday morning 1 December 2020 talking about EVs and wind energy.[more]
The turbines are set to go up in 2021 at the southern end of Fields Point, on land owned by the Port of Providence and Johnson & Wales University. When they’re completed, on a date expected to come...
David Toke's China’s Role in Reducing Carbon Emissions: The Stabilisation of Energy Consumption and the Deployment of Renewable Energy provides a valuable service in explaining--in English--China's...[more]
Germany’s Energy Transition is a compilation of articles on the progress of Germany's revolutionary transition to renewable energy from fossil fuels and nuclear power. It joins a growing list of...[more]
On 21 November Thilo Wirth visited the Grevenbroich test site west of Cologne and took several photos of the damaged Agile Wind Power's Vertical Sky 32.[more]
For those who've fought the wind wars and done battle with renewable energy skeptics, climate denialists, and the "wind turbines cause cancer" crowd, Wind Turbine Syndrome: A Communicated Disease by...[more]
For those who've fought the wind wars and done battle with renewable energy skeptics, climate denialists, and the "wind turbines cause cancer" crowd, Wind Turbine Syndrome: A Communicated Disease by...[more]
"Long overdue, this guide on how to place renewable energy in the landscape to maximize public acceptance is critical to the energy transition that is so desperately needed."[more]
"Long overdue, this guide on how to place renewable energy in the landscape to maximize public acceptance is critical to the energy transition that is so desperately needed."[more]
Small-Scale Renewable Energy Systems is a slim 210-page book on hybrid renewable projects by Swedish authors Sven Ruin and Göran Sidén.[more]
Small-Scale Renewable Energy Systems is a slim 210-page book on hybrid renewable projects by Swedish authors Sven Ruin and Göran Sidén.[more]
Swiss VAWT Vertical Sky 32 lost one of its three rotor arms and blade Sunday 15 November at the Grevenbroich test site according to German media. The prototype turbine was installed at the test site...[more]
I bristled when Vaughn Nelson contacted me for help with his new book Innovative Wind Turbines. Not that it was Vaughn. He's my mentor and the founder of West Texas A&M University’s Alternative...[more]
Ok, I am a windmill geek, have been for decades now. I work with modern wind energy, but my interest in the subject has led off in many directions, including traditional or "Dutch" windmills. I have...[more]
On this date in 1941 an ungainly wind turbine atop Vermont’s Grandpa’s Knob fed electricity into the lines of Central Vermont Public Service Company. This was the first time in North America that a...[more]
The transatlantic car carrier is being designed by Wallenius Marine, a Swedish shipbuilder, with support from the Swedish government and several research institutions.
Guinness Book of Records is considering a new category--world's longest running or oldest megawatt-scale wind turbine. The question was thrown at me by Britta Jensen, one of the operators of...[more]
“We believe that in 10 years’ time offshore wind will be powering every home in the country, with our target rising from 30 gigawatts to 40 gigawatts,” he will say. “Your kettle, your washing...
Times change. People die. The rest forget. The past is lost and with it the knowledge we gained at so much cost.[more]
An incident report from the Tom Green County Sheriff's Office has revealed more details into the accidental falling death of Aaron Scott Johnson, 39.
This week, a 13-year experiment in harnessing wind power using kites and modified gliders finally closes down for good.
A study published in October 2019 shows that when electrical power demand is highest in the evening hours, offshore wind power production off the Central Coast would be at its peak.
A question arises whether large wind turbines are more or less materially intensive than small wind turbines. The answer, as with most things in life, isn't that simple. [more]
Seven environmental organisations in Greece denounced the installation of wind turbines near protected habitats after three pelicans were found dead on Sunday following collision with blades.
This resulted in an average levelized cost of energy (LCOE) fall of 33% for new projects to 48€/MWh at the end of the study period. Analysis of the components of levelized cost change indicated that...
Imagine this: thousands of wind turbines situated in our Great Lakes, out of sight from treasured coastal vistas but close enough to be economically viable. Technology and site placement mitigate...
An autopsy Saturday revealed the cause of death to be multiple blunt force trauma to the upper torso, the Tribune-Democrat of Johnstown is reporting.
Renewable energy developer RES and two contractors were condemned over the “heartbreaking and completely preventable” death of a wind farm worker who died while trying to rescue a colleague after a...
A standard for dismantling and recycling of wind turbines presently exists neither in Germany nor in Europe. This changed on July 17, 2020, when the German Institute for Standardization (DIN) e.V....
Further confirmation of Bernard Chabot's "Silent Revolution" in large wind turbine design.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is looking into how 145 LM Wind Power employees contracted COVID-19 in March and April.
The state's central coast presents particular opportunities for offshore wind development, since it is equipped with transmission infrastructure that was built to carry deliveries from the 2,000 MW...
Hermann Honnef and his dream of giant wind turbines powering Hitler's Third Reich until the SS quashed his plans. Auf Deutsch. Rare photos of Honnef's vision and key players in the Reich's program...
Budding Youtube channel by Australian Rosemary Barnes dubbed Wind Engineering with Rosie. [more]
The area – where many residents belong to the Ikoots indigenous group – is coveted for its open, windy coast, and the two sides have been feuding for years. The conflicts date back to 2012 when a...
Or how the Ohio Power Board's poison pill to stop the first offshore wind farm in Lake Erie could--and should--backfire.[more]
This emerged from a statement issued by the police following a story by Reuters and the Times of Malta, in which Dubai based company 17 Black was revealed to have made a previously undisclosed profit...
The offshore company investigated by murdered Maltese journalist Caruana Galizia before her death was linked to a wind farm in Montenegro, Reuters has reported.
The scientists therefore recommend the widespread introduction of turn-off times during the migration months, which—as the team was able to show in a local wind farm—would massively decrease bat...
Under Cultural Icons Featuring Wind Turbines, I've added two new categories.[more]
When it comes to energy in Ohio, there’s always a whiff of wrongdoing in the air. And the smell can almost always be traced to the vicinity of Broad and High streets in Columbus, where various state...
I've received a portion of Intertek's 2016 power performance test of Ogin's Model 2.2 150-kW ducted wind turbine "over the transom" as we say. The much hyped and controversial device delivered its...[more]
So we need to address two problems at once: inequity and resistance to renewables. This paper proposes public, national ownership as the double solution. A commons of the wind will make the energy...
An Ontario appeal court has reinstated EDP Renewables’ right to build a 100MW wind farm after the government abruptly revoked consent for the project.
An LM Wind Power employee has died, but it is unclear if the death is related to the COVID-19 outbreak at the plant. In a message sent to employees Wednesday afternoon, the company announced that...
One fully expects a Moore movie to be in-your-face contentious, provocative, and highly controversial. That it certainly is, but not in an accurate way, riddled as it is with out-of-date information,...
Flamboyant ducted wind turbine venture Ogin died a costly death in 2017, taking with it hundreds of millions in investments. The debacle tarnished the reputations of Technology Review, Arpa (DOE's...[more]
Swedish engineering and industrial design company Modvion has erected the first wooden wind turbine tower on an island outside Gothenburg, Sweden. It was a pilot project for the Swedish Wind...
The US Department of Energy (DOE) announced 19 November 2019 that the Distributed Wind Competitiveness Improvement Project had awarded a grant to Ducted Turbines of Potsdam, New York for nearly...[more]
Yep, it's still there. Derelict and long abandoned, the FloDesign-Ogin prototype ducted wind turbine is still standing in the Antelope Valley between I-5 and Lancaster and north of Hwy 138.[more]
Cheaper turbine models, possible demand from the growing microgrid market, and an intensifying focus on distributed energy resources in general may all contribute to putting some wind back in the...
According to the complaint, Stimm raised more than $3.5 million from 435 investors in WNY over the years, utilizing illegal sales and false and misleading statements.
Neal Livingston called and asked me to watch the film Planet of the Humans and provide some context on the environmental benefits of renewable energy. Neal's an award-winning documentary film maker...[more]
On Earth Day, a documentary entitled “Planet of the Humans” appeared on Michael Moore’s YouTube channel. You might expect a film from the acclaimed rabble-rousing film director, who served as...
Anyone interested in saving the planet who watched this poor excuse of a film, would come away thinking solar and wind energy were bad, and electric cars were horrible. I’m not kidding.
Gibbs’ and Moore’s truthiness and falsehood-filled product isn’t helpful because they created something that is being leveraged by climate deniers/delayers to attack (not complete, need to improve,...
Shame on these filmmakers for making a film like this, full of misinformation and disinformation, to intentionally depress audiences, and make them think there are no alternatives.[more]
Health officials and National Guard members plan a second round of large-scale testing in Grand Forks as a result of an earlier coronavirus outbreak associated with a wind turbine blade factory in...
Visit virtually many of the world’s most important wind markets with us, listen to WWEA partners and take part in interactive discussions with our speakers!
The Kern-Kaweah Chapter of the Sierra Club will lead a hike among the wind turbines on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) at 9:00 am on Saturday May 16, 2020 near Tehachapi, California. [more]
Martyn Taylor has made a wonderful video about the development and preservation of the English windmill. Sales of the video will go to preservation efforts.[more]
A few decades ago a theme--or meme in today's parlance--among wind energy aficionados was movies or TV shows that included scenes of wind turbines. We dubbed the theme Movie Madness.[more]
The World Wind Energy Association was formed because existing organizations were narrowly focused on the often arcane and specialized needs of the commercial wind industry. There was no organization...[more]
Makani was still being touted as the leader in the space for the 2019 Airborne Wind Energy Conference, held in Scotland in August. And now, it’s dead. Alphabet pulled the plug a couple of days ago....
For three decades, citizens, e.g. in local energy cooperatives, have been promoting the energy transition, by initiating and installing individual wind turbines and later also larger wind farms....
A key gatekeeper with the U.S. Navy says they are ready to move forward on plans for offshore wind along the Central Coast — particularly efforts to install floating turbines off of Morro Bay.
The primary reason, let’s be clear, has been the global trend towards support schemes which favour large investors; in particular, auctions have caused such results. Looking at the frightening...
On a 4-0-1 vote, with 4th District Supervisor Peter Adam absent, the board denied the appeals and granted de novo approval of the project southwest of Lompoc but added a new condition and expanded...
Researchers, including Dr. Julia Ponder, executive director of the Raptor Center, want to learn what frequencies and levels of sound can be heard by the birds, and their reactions to them.
Presentation for the Buena Vista Group of the Kern-Kaweah Chapter of the Sierra Club 1 February 2020 Bakersfield, California. Check against delivery.
There were 5,250 fatal work injuries in the US in 2018, with falls a leading cause of death – and cuts in government oversight may lead to more
When a trench partially collapsed on a coworker at the Skookumchuck Wind Project outside of Rainier on the morning of Thursday, Jan. 9, 24-year-old Chehalis man Jonathan Stringer didn’t hesitate....
Latvia has had a system of support for energy production in place for many years, based on compensating investment through a feed-in tariff (FiT). However, the support has been provided not only to...
One person working at the Skookumchuck Wind Project construction site is dead and another is critically injured after a trench collapsed on the two workers Thursday morning.
The International Energy Agency said in a report in November that by 2040, offshore wind power alone has the potential to meet Japan’s total power demand by over ninefold and the world’s total...
America's foremost scholar on the power-generating prowess of wind turbines has been challenged by a lesser expert from Bakersfield. That foremost scholar, according to President Trump, is President...
The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) on Tuesday announced the 2020 feed-in tariff (FIT) rates for renewable energy generation, with the rate for onshore wind power facilities with a capacity of 1...
The turbine started spinning on Dec. 17, providing power to nearby buildings, according to the Bronx Times.
A wind turbine collapsed in the Bronx on Monday, setting off a frightening series of events.
Yes, the United States could be generating 100% of its electricity from renewable energy if we had used the money spent on our ill-advised wars in the Middle East to build wind and solar systems, as...
Tasmania’s Musselroe Wind Farm will undertake an Australian first trial of new radar technology that the operators hope will help reduce instances of collisions with wedge-tailed eagles.
THE EU’S COURT of Justice has fined the State €5m over its failure to comply with EU legislation that might have prevented landslides linked to the construction of a wind farm in the west of Ireland...
Don’t believe everything you hear about the green-energy revolution. It’s coming, but more slowly than advertised. Fossil fuels, in absolute terms, are still on the rise because of population and...
Thilo Wirth was working in the LVR building the Cologne district of Köln-Deutz and sent me his cell-phone picture of the Clean VerTec wind turbine on the roof. [more]
Commissioners approved the Strauss Wind Energy Project that will bring 29 wind turbines mounted to towers more than 260 feet tall and capable of generating 98 megawatts of electricity per year to the...
The latest feed-in-tariff for onshore projects, introduced last year, stands at 8.5 US cents/kWh, while offshore wind power generators will be paid 9.8 US cents for every kWh of power exported to the...
The global climate crisis could lead to more renewable electricity being generated by spurring faster wind speeds for the world’s growing number of windfarms, according to research.
One of the reasons is the failed policy of leaving the working feed-in tariff in favor of an experiment with auctions. Said experiment has failed in a spectacular way. As a part of my job I follow...
Wind energy was found not guilty of health impacts 48 times in 5 countries
"It’s bullshit," said Paul Gipe, who has published five books on wind energy since 1995 and who has closely studied California’s wind farms. (Now the American Wind Energy Association does that.)
Preliminary results from a study involving a wind turbine at Heartland Community College in Normal indicate that using software that turns off turbine blades at lower wind speeds can cut bat...
While most of a turbine can be recycled or find a second life on another wind farm, researchers estimate the U.S. will have more than 720,000 tons of blade material to dispose of over the next 20...
Donald Trump’s family firm is refusing to accept a legal bill worth tens of thousands of pounds after he lost a lengthy court battle against a windfarm near his Aberdeenshire golf course, according...
An MIT student's defense of urban ducted wind turbines.
A fatal, work-related incident this past weekend at Arcosa, a wind tower manufacturing plant in Newton, has resulted in one person dead and another critically injured, the Newton Fire Department...
One wind farm in Glenrock and two from the Saratoga area have partnered with the Casper Regional Landfill to dispose of their old wind turbine blades. More than 900 blades will be brought to the...
Martin Frey's wonderful little guidebook to the Energiewende in Germany is now available in English. Germany - Renewable Energy Experience Baedeker Guides. Frey's book is highly recommended for...[more]
We find that most wind project developers, sponsors and long-term owners have increased project-life assumptions over time, from a typical term of ~20 years in the early 2000s to ~25 years by the...
Good news — neither the president nor anyone else will lose their wealth because of wind energy. On the contrary. A green energy system is cheaper, cleaner and safer than most systems dependent on...
French historian Étienne Rogier examines in depth one of the great wind turbine development programs of the post WWII years. En francais.
. . . supply that would be sufficient to cover the global all-sector energy demand from now through to 2050.
The family of a 29-year old man who died while clearing trees for construction of a wind farm has settled various legal actions for a substantial six figure sum.
Farmers in France are claiming that electromagnetic fields created by wind farms and other electrical installations are leading to low productivity and high rates of mortality.
Alan Grimsley, Director of Business Development of White Electrical is seeking to buy a Honeywell Windtronics 6500. Grimsley wants the device for experimentation.[more]
Vaughn Nelson has pulled together some links to web pages that display either humanity's incredible ingenuity relative to wind energy, or humanity's folly, depending upon your point of view.[more]
In another blast from the past, Vaughn Nelson has tracked down a promotional film (now on youtube) from August 1985 of the Windjammer IV sail wing wind turbine. Patterned after Cretan sail windmills,...[more]
In research for his new book, Vaughn Nelson is turning up a number of fascinating videos. One he found is a video of Heidelberg Motor's H-rotor operating in Germany. The VAWT was unusual in that the...[more]
In the research for his new book, Vaughn Nelson has been dredging up some amazing videos. (See Hywind Scotland Floating Offshore Wind Turbine Video.) [more]
In another sign of the times, I've closed Wulf Field and sold the property to the neighboring wind farm managed by Windstream Properties.[more]
I don't often comment or link to news about offshore wind projects or technology. There's plenty of land available for wind energy. In most cases we don't need to go offshore. [more]
Christopher Booker had campaigned vociferously against wind turbines for over a decade, describing them as 'one of the most dangerous political delusions of our time'
A worker at the site of a wind farm under construction in north-central Iowa has died after being run over by a semitrailer.
We find that average all-in lifetime OpEx has declined from approximately $80/kW-yr (~$35/MWh) for projects built in the late 1990s to a level that is approaching $40/kW-yr (~$11/MWh) for projects...
While deleting some old files--yes, I am one of those who deletes unnecessary files--I came across two photos I meant to post in 2018.[more]
Davis was CEO of Dragonfly Industries International, LLC, which sought to build a wind farm on 300 acres near in Elm Springs for electric power generation in 2015.
At the same time, we notice with growing concern that there are increasing barriers against the rapid growth of renewable energy globally, e.g. through the introduction of auctions in the renewable...
Seventeen intrepid hikers crossed the Cameron Canyon segment of the Pacific Crest Trail Saturday on the 33rd annual Windmill-Wildflower hike near Tehachapi, California. [more]
One possible way to prevent these deaths is to chase the birds away with acoustic signals—sound. To determine what types of sounds are most effective in deterring the birds, researchers at the...
On 26 April 2019 the alumni association of the Natural Resources and Environmental Management Department at my alma mater, Ball State University, presented me with its Award of Distinction, the...[more]
Massive pods of 700-foot floating wind turbines off the coast of California are edging closer to becoming a reality, now that the state has firm applications from several companies hoping to realize...
It is uncertain if the Company’s efforts (i) to address its cash constraints and its legal difficulties with Comerica and/or (ii) to effect one or more strategic transactions will be successful.
A group of French cattle farmers is suing the state over the mysterious death of hundreds of cows, which they believe are the victims of harmful electromagnetic fields. Local vets are at a loss to...
The Kern-Kaweah Chapter of the Sierra Club will lead a hike among the wind turbines on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) at 9:00 am on Saturday May 18, 2019 near Tehachapi, California. [more]
No, Mr. President, windmills don’t cause cancer. What they do cause is the creation of thousands of jobs and businesses in Kern County, and technical innovations that help keep America energy...
Thank you, Mr. President, for the timely attention. My recent book about windmills, or what we call wind turbines, has been languishing in a New York warehouse not far from Trump Tower--until now,...[more]
Thank you, Mr. President, for the timely attention. My recent book about windmills, or what we call wind turbines, has been languishing in a New York warehouse not far from Trump Tower — until now,...
U.S. President Donald Trump mocked renewable energy at yesterday's campaign rally in Michigan. Implicating Hillary Clinton as part of Big Wind, Trump said, "If Hillary got in...you'd be doing wind....
The dream of Morro Bay as a new hub of offshore renewable energy production in California could be over before it even gets its sea legs — or it could just be ramping up.
While there is ample land area for both wind and solar power plants, there is also ample area offshore of major metropolitan areas to power the world's major cities.[more]
The French offshore Vertical-Axis Wind Turbine developer Nénuphar closed its doors in early 2018. Their web site is dark, though there are several Nenuphar Animations on YouTube.com.[more]
One of the conclusions then is no doubt true today: "There is no well established relationship between Darrieus wind turbine prototype costs and volume production costs because only one company,...[more]
The report was prepared by Lawrence Schienbein Associates, Kennewick, Washington.[more]
World-renowned wind energy expert Paul Gipe of Bakersfield joined The Californian's Robert Price for his weekly "One on One" webcast to talk about California's energy future. Gipe said PG&E's...
Japan’s nascent offshore wind industry is expected to increase dramatically over the next ten years, according to energy analysts Wood Mackenzie, who predict that by 2028 the island country will...
Gregory Jaczko was an outsider. He wasn’t from the industry. But somehow he was appointed to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, eventually becoming its Chair. His 2019 book, Confessions of a...[more]
Peddling green works. After watching Budweiser's 2019 Superbowl commercial-- the Clydesdales racing through wheat fields on Tejon Ranch, with wind turbines turning serenely in the background--I...[more]
How about just one really important climate-control thought? How about windmills? If the country really threw itself into wind power, we could, er, breeze toward our goals on that alone. Wind...
Peddling green works. After watching Budweiser's 2019 Superbowl commercial-- the Clydesdales racing through wheat fields on Tejon Ranch, with wind turbines turning serenely in the background--I...
Up in the Air is a short film about the wind turbine project in Prince Edward County. For nearly two decades, a group of County residents have been supporting wind energy initiatives. The White Pines...
he Logan County Sheriff's Office identified Carl Pierce, 41, of Portland, Ore., as the man who was pronounced dead at the wind tower work site Tuesday.
Elsevier has published an extensive survey of attempts at building commercial Vertical-Axis Wind Turbines on its digital platform. The print version of the survey by Swedish academic Erik Möllerström...[more]
Since the 1970s, there have been several VAWT projects with installed turbines of significant size, either as attempts to commercialize VAWTs, or as university led research projects, or as a...
Nine years after the first was built beside Falmouth’s waste treatment plant, both turbines now stand idle, no longer producing a kilowatt of electricity, totems of good intentions gone awry.
The Associated Press circulated a news item on 14 January 2019 about a field hand killed near Visalia when the blade of a "wind machine" fell off. See California orchard worker dies after 600-pound...[more]
A new study published in the Journal of Environmental Management has found that offshore wind turbines in the German North Sea are having an effect on where birds fly and land. As a result, loons...
The renewable energy company Pacific Hydro confirmed to The Courier that three deaths of the eagle – Australia’s largest bird of prey – have been recorded at the wind farm since it began operating in...
Sheerwind-Invelox, a ducted-turbine fiasco, officially went bust in early 2018. Incredibly, there are a number of promotional videos still on line at youtube.com and on vimeo. The latter is even more...[more]
While poking around on the Internet to see if anything new had popped up on some of my favorite ducted turbine projects I came across some videos of FloDesign-Ogin that I hadn't seen before.[more]
James Rowan, whose wind turbine venture attracted the attention of celebrities, now awaits extradition to the U.S. to be tried on fraud-related charges.
I've been alerted to an error in the second edition of Wind Power (2004): Renewable Energy for Home Farm and Business.[more]
Hundreds of wind turbines could pop up along the coast off Los Osos and Cambria — but before they do,the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Managment wants to know if you think that’d be a good idea.
A trial of its ultrasonic acoustic Bat Deterrent System reduced overall bat fatalities at the Los Vientos Wind Energy Facility in Starr County, Texas, by 54 percent. The results of the test prove...
Texas now produces four times as much wind energy as California, which has fallen to No. 4 in the United States — not a promising trend, given the state’s ambitious goal of switching to 100 percent...
The worker has since been identified as Joseph Hill of Minnesota. Mitchell County Sheriff Greg Beaver said deputies responded to the site, and provided medical attention. The deputies determined that...
Mitchell County Sheriff Greg Beaver said the fatal accident occurred about 1 p.m. Saturday while the worker was loading heavy equipment at Turtle Creek Wind Farm, which is under construction near St....
An Iowa construction worker was killed in what authorities are calling an "industrial accident" in St. Ansgar, Iowa over the weekend.
Windustrious Cleveland's Sara Taylor calls for opponents of offshore wind in the Great Lakes to evolve, as others have done in past, to avoid technological stagnation.[more]
In 1980 the Department of Energy published a short film titled Wind: An Energy Alternative. The 12-minute film was produced by the Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI) probably in 1979.[more]
The presence of wind turbines can reduce the number of birds and lizards in an area, a new study has found. Should we start tearing the farms down?
I've added several rare photos and scans Vaughn Nelson found in his files from the 1970s. Nelson, one of the wind industry's pioneers, has an extensive collection of experimental wind turbines from...[more]
New technology to detect and prevent eagles from colliding with rotating wind turbine blades will be applied in Australia for the first time – at Goldwind Australia’s Cattle Hill Wind Farm in the...
I've added a new page on photos of historical Vertical-Axis Wind Turbines to include VAWTPower Management's prototypes at Clines Corner, New Mexico.[more]
Since 2010 the small wind industry in North America has been in steep decline. First Congress turned its back on the industry in the United States. Then the descent accelerated with the rapid fall in...[more]
The findings indicate an overall positive attitude toward the nearby turbines, including for those living even as close as ½ mile. Roughly 8% of the population had negative attitudes within 5 miles.
In the mountains 20 miles west of Willcox, 15 wind turbines stand 450 feet tall, spinning with the wind. This is the Red Horse II Wind Farm, the only wind farm operating in southern Arizona.
Ulrich Mertens has done us all a very big favor. With graphic clarity and a professional photographer’s keep eye for composition, Wind in Sicht – Landscape in Transition illustrates the newest...[more]
In an Aug. 30 rally in Evansville, Indiana, President Donald Trump made three unsubstantiated claims about wind turbines, which he calls “windmills”.
Efforts to build fields of floating wind turbines off the coast of California are gaining momentum, and Morro Bay might be at the front of the line.
Christopher Bruce lost his automotive job, sulked, then reinvented himself
What struck my eye is the quote, "Indiana is a better location for the use of windpower than many eastern states, since most wind speeds are higher, the terrain flatter, and most of the trees cut...[more]
The growing excitement for offshore wind development on the Great Lakes is great to see. William Friedman, of the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority, has announced that they have identified the...[more]
A crawler crane operator has died in an incident at a wind farm in Poweshiek County, Iowa over the weekend.
The unexpected cancellation of a wind energy project by the new Ontario government will cost ratepayers more than $100 million according to the company spearheading the project.
So, the question is, do these assertions hold up under scientific scrutiny? The answer appears to be “no.”
Green Energy Act allowed province to ignore local concerns, but election gives opponents new optimism.
The House of Representative is set to authorize a study to determine if offshore wind facilities are killing whales and other sea life.
A wind farm comprised of 432 vertical-axis wind turbines on the coast of Changhua County’s Fangyuan Township (芳苑) has become the county’s latest tourist attraction. The turbines look like egg...
Tubs of Strawberry Breeze-cake, Cherry Gale-cia and other wind-themed ice-creams will feature in a campaign by Ben & Jerry’s to persuade the government to rethink its opposition to onshore windfarms.
There are some books that simply bring a smile to your face--even to someone as jaded as I. This is one of them. There is a joy in discovering what the future may hold that comes across in Ulrich...[more]
Research published today by Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) claims that wind farm technicians often struggle to recall key safety instructions.
The digital version of Paul Gipe's Wind Energy for the Rest of Us has been re-launched on several platforms at $19.99, 33% off the previous e-book price.[more]
Wind, meanwhile, saw a drop in installation activity due to the transition from a feed-in-tariff (FiT) scheme to auction mechanism, with less than 2 GW of new wind parks coming online, a year-on-year...
The United States Wind Turbine Database (USWTDB) has gone live according to a Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) press release.[more]
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for PG&E 21 April 2018 at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo, California. Check against delivery.
Presentation for the CORE Energy Summit in Winnipeg, Manitoba 12 April 2018.
Presentation for CORE Energy Summit in Winnipeg, Manitoba 12 April 2018.
Presentation on Electric Vehicles for the CORE Energy Summit in Winnipeg, Manitoba 12 April 2018.
What's up with Canada? I've gotten two enquiries from the Great White North about Bluenergy Solarwind, a US company claiming to have developed another vertical-axis wind turbine (VAWT).[more]
4 April the transfer of remaining copies of Wind Energy for the Rest of Us to a new distributor was completed.[more]
Celebrities like former Tonight Show host Jay Leno and actor Ed Begley Jr. endorsed the Canadian entrepreneur's product. Rowan was making national headlines with his invention. But skeptics wondered...
One of the UK’s best-known and most iconic small-scale wind companies, Gaia-Wind, has been forced into provisional liquidation and the company and outside observers are highlighting government...
Cleveland has been a city of innovation, right from the very beginning. In 1796 Moses Cleaveland, in his westward journey from Connecticut, discovered the area around the mouth of the Cuyahoga River,...[more]
Yesterday trade organisation RenewableUK added its voice, calling government decision-making a “key factor” in the fall of one of the sector’s “best-known and most iconic companies”. The Feed-In...
Bosnia’s maiden wind farm began producing electricity on Wednesday as part of the country’s efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions and meet the renewable energy standards of the European Union it...
Gaia-Wind, which celebrated the roll-out of its 1000th device from Glasgow last April, has appointed a provisional liquidator. The company moved its operations to Scotland from Denmark seven years...
Sex sells. Always has, always will. Sex has been used to sell beer, cars, and even wind energy--well, at least articles about wind energy.[more]
Wind power prices have plummeted in recent years since Germany switched to auctions. Now, a study has found what readers of this blog already knew: the prices only look low because they are reported...
The family of a security guard who died after becoming trapped in heavy snow on a remote wind farm are demanding answers about his death.
CGE Energy recently issued a press release applauding the US Congress for extending tax subsidies to small wind turbines. The press release also touts CGE's Darrieus wind turbine, the Wind-e 20.[more]
The 1992 report on the project by the Centre de Recherche Energétiques et Municpales reads like so many of the others from the period. In short, the four-year project was a failure for a host of...[more]
Wind historian extraordinaire Etienne Rogier sent me a carte postale (post card) promoting a 1988 French postage stamp. The card depicts the postage stamp and an experimental Darrieus turbine.[more]
The turbines ran for three months before one blade fell to the ground 190 feet below. Then a second blade crashed through a nearby storage building's roof, falling into a conference room. No one was...
Daryoush Allaei extolling the wonders of his device in his native land. Note the location of the device--down below the ridge on which they are standing. Also notice that there are some real wind...
Additionally, the sound-level drivers (modeled wind turbine sound level and background sound level) are poor predictors of very annoyed responses; one’s prior support for or opposition to a local...
A similar mean level of annoyance to sound is found in European results. In the U.S. sample, the mean levels of annoyance to lighting, shadow flicker, and landscape change are similar but slightly...
Attitudes were significantly correlated with compensation, sensory perceptions of the nearby turbines, planning process perceptions, and attitudes toward wind turbines in general. It was also found...
In 2015, the U.S. Department of Energy funded Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) to lead a 4-year project collecting data from a broad-based and representative sample of individuals...
A manufacturer and exporter of wind turbines based in the People’s Republic of China was convicted today of stealing trade secrets from AMSC, a U.S.-based company formerly known as American...
The Unite union has called on the UK government and Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to toughen the laws governing the construction and maintenance of wind farms, following the death of a worker at...
UK: A 74-year-old man has died at a wind farm in southeast Scotland after becoming stranded without heat or power.
The Ohio Power Siting Board (OPSB) has been reviewing the application by Icebreaker Windpower Inc., regarding its proposal to install six turbines on Lake Erie, a few miles offshore from Cleveland....
The feed-in tariff is currently applicable to electricity generated from plants gen¬erating electricity from renewable sources with an installed capacity not exceed¬ing 15 MW (“Preferential...
The Nature Conservancy (TNC), one of the nation's premier land preservation trusts, isn't talking about its failed investment in a ducted wind turbine debacle 1,000 miles from Hawaii.[more]
French wind historien Etienne Rogier has published an article on French post war wind turbines in the latest issue of the house organ for the Fédération des Moulins de France.[more]
The following are comments to Another Ducted Device Dead: SheerWind-Invelox Bankrupt. They were so insightful I decided to repost them here where they are more easily archived.[more]
My inbox saw a flurry of emails 4 January 2018 to inform me that ducted turbine darling SheerWind-Invelox was bankrupt. While the event wasn't much of a surprise, it did take much longer than I'd...[more]
But after 16 years — and $100 million of his own money — that dream is, well, gone with the wind. Mr. Gordon has pulled the plug, stymied by endless litigation and a series of financial and political...
"Grind up the SUVs and build wind turbines with them," says David Blittersdorf, founder of AllEarth Renewables. Podcast with more provocative thoughts on renewables, transit, and energy policy in...
The Interior Department has quietly rolled back an Obama-era policy aimed at protecting migratory birds, stating in a solicitor’s opinion that it will no longer prosecute oil and gas, wind, and solar...
A big reason Dow chose wind energy in gas-rich Texas, is that wind power has a completely predictable fuel cost (zero), which budget planners like. They don't have to guess what their costs will be a...
We feature full sized wind pumps, steam engines and a unique scoop wheel along with a collection of photographs, models of various mills which all depict the evolution of the drainage of the Broads. [more]
Someone sent me a link to a YouTube video titled Abandoned Vertical Axis Windmill In The Magdalen Islands.[more]
Renewable energy and electric vehicle fan Bob Tregilus was out and about in rural Nevada when he came across an odd wind turbine powering a well pump in the Reese River Valley. So he sent along his...[more]
Contrary to the ideas promulgated by some opponents of wind generation, most of the substantial investment in wind farms in South Australia is not being paid for by taxpayers or electricity consumers...
At first I resented the way they blocked the view. But now the towers look like part of a brighter future.
Permitting for the project dragged on for more than ten years and the 30-megawatt project is expected to go online in 2018. A contract worker died on the site in April after he was electrocuted.
Science deniers needlessly killing animals, in order to needlessly kill more animals. Appalled but not surprised. People who don’t care about the massive extinctions brought on by climate change...
Located on the arid and windswept plains of northeastern Iran, 30 miles from the Afghan border, the small village of Nashtifan is keeping ancient traditions alive amid the winds of change. The town...
David Sprague, of Windham, Maine, was 59 years old when he was electrocuted at the Putnam Road construction site on April 18.
Anxiety over “wind-turbine syndrome” stems from a decades-old misunderstanding of inaudible noise. (Jun 19, 2017)
Even though the blades appear curved, each is made of 11 sections with hinged connections. The rotor will be limited to about 80 rpm by using several aviation-style airbrakes in the center sections...
At £57.50 per megawatt-hour (MWh), it is far cheaper than the state-backed price of £92.50 awarded in 2016 to Hinkley nuclear power station. The speed of wind’s progress is extreme and inarguable.
I pay a price for debunking various wind turbine flim-flams and posting critiques on my web site. Consequently, I am cursed to be listed by Google and Indian call centers as the person to call if a...[more]
In response to a query from a Swedish researcher, I’ve posted eight historic photos of the Adecon Darrieus wind turbine to my web site. See Adecon under Vertical Axis Wind Turbines (VAWTs) in the...[more]
Hans-Detlef Feddersen sent me a copy of a little picture book celebrating the 25th anniversary of Bürger-Windpark Lübke-Koog. He included a DVD video of interviews with the founders of the...[more]
Small Vertical-Axis Wind Turbines (VAWTs) come and go so fast no one can keep track of them before they become history.[more]
The ruling would push back community wind projects by "at least a decade''.
Benny Christensen knows his windmills. An early anti-nuclear activist and proponent of 100% renewable energy—a photo of him appears in Steven Borish’s Land of the Living—Christensen has now turned...[more]
The title, Störfall mit Charme, is a playful thumbing of the nose in German at the critics of a movement by citizens in a small village in the deepest reaches of Germany’s Schwarzwald or Black Forest...[more]
One of Victoria’s best-known wind farms, Waubra, 35km north-west of Ballarat, has been shot at several times in recent years, police have revealed.
Geothermal energy is one of the dark horses of renewable energy. Few “renewable energy advocates” know much—if anything—about it. They don’t know what geothermal contributes today and have no clue...[more]
Given that this is offshore wind, it stands to reason that lenders and investors will work from what they know (offshore wind using fixed-bottom foundations), and try to understand how different FOW...
At the heart of the problem has been governments’ trust in market solutions without a sharp eye on the shortfalls in market performance and without adequate leadership on the long term outcome the...
The world’s first ever offshore wind farm has finally been dismantled, with DONG Energy announcing this week that it had completed decommissioning the 4.95 megawatt Vindeby Offshore Wind Farm.
The Snickers, Twix, Milky Way and Skittles maker has also revealed plans to champion renewable energy through its M&M’s brand, featuring images of things such as wind turbines alongside its red and...
In response to my review of Energy Democracy, a new book on Germany’s energy revolution by Craig Morris and Arne Jungjohann, long-time colleague Bernard Saulnier contacted me with his thoughts.[more]
Rightwing Poles have raised the old canard that wind turbines and, hence, wind energy, is the detestable spoor of Nazi racial ideology. Nothing could be further from the truth.[more]
Tom Gray, former executive director of the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) died Wednesday.[more]
The copyright was finally issued for Wind Energy for the Rest of Us. A long time coming, the copyright was issued under Title 17 of the United States Code and became effective 5 December 2016.[more]
Is one of the most powerful books on the renewable energy revolution in decades. It’s a chronicle of the remarkable transformation underway in the world’s fourth-largest industrial economy.[more]
Cody Hubbard, 29, was electrocuted and trapped at the top of a wind turbine at a farm on CR 183 Thursday. He was doing work for Ivenergy LLC when the accident occurred, injuring one other employee,...
When was the Energiewende born? Lots of dates are tossed around, but one German press report argues that it all started today 30 years ago, when a test wind farm was connected to the grid.
I’d seen a reference to the technical paper, Optimization of a vertical axis wind turbine for application in an urban/suburban area, by two academics making the rounds but didn’t take much notice of...[more]
Germany’s Network Agency has announced the results of the second round of onshore wind auctions. The new price is 4.29 cents/kWh, a quarter lower than the 5.71 cents from the first round.
We find cumulative wind and solar air-quality benefits of 2015 US$29.7–112.8 billion mostly from 3,000 to 12,700 avoided premature mortalities, and cumulative climate benefits of 2015 US$5.3–106.8...
$13 billion was invested in new wind power plants in 2016. In 2016, wind energy contributed 5.6% of the nation’s electricity supply, more than 10% of total electricity generation in fourteen states,...
It is a meaningless concept at the least and dangerous at its worst
Yes, I’ve written about this subject once before, Everything You Need to Know about Wind Energy Was Written in 1957!, but I am moving the date back thirty years in the light of more research. The...[more]
Largely forgotten today, Georges Jean Marie Darrieus was one of France’s great engineers. While he is mostly known in the English-speaking world for his patent on vertical-axis wind turbines (VAWTs),...[more]
A wind-turbine-blade factory in Southwestern Ontario that Siemens Wind Power Ltd.’s former parent company called “a key part of our global supply chain” just last September is winding down...
In response to the June 24, 2017 piece, “Block Island Wind Farm May Have Killed Young Humpback Whale,” several of us, researchers at the University of Rhode Island (URI), feel it is important to...
Oh the ways of the wind. It blows where it will--or something to that effect. We were on our way to pick cherries. That’s a fairly innocuous activity. From Bakersfield we had to cross the Antelope...[more]
The Chaska, Minnesota promoter of a ducted wind turbine appears to have fallen on hard times. The fabric covering of the intake duct for their demonstration turbine is torn and in disrepair and the...[more]
York University’s International Renewable Energy Academy designated 29 June as the “wind day” on their week-long program. [more]
The 29 June was the “wind day” for York University’s International Renewable Energy Academy. As the featured speaker to start the day I donned one of my favorite wind tie.[more]
(1) North American support for wind has been consistently high. (2) The NIMBY explanation for resistance to wind development is invalid. (3) Socioeconomic impacts of wind development are strongly...
The Chinese Government is therefore set to publish at least 2 or 3 additional reductions to the onshore wind FiT level before 2023.
Right-wing media find a new renewable energy bogeyman.
Presentation by Paul Gipe for York University's International Renewable Academy on 22 June 2017. Check against delivery.
In 2014, Senate Republicans tucked into an 822-page mid-biennium budget review (HB 483) a rider that more than doubled the distance a wind turbine must be from the adjacent property of anyone who...
"Wind farms and nuclear power stations are responsible each for between 0.3 and 0.4 fatalities per gigawatt-hour (GWh) of electricity while fossil-fuelled power stations are responsible for about...
They say that a good book should always tell a story. And this is true for this book by Paul Gipe. Titled "Wind Energy for the Rest of Us" is not just about the technology, but it tells the whole...
While thumbing through German renewables magazine, Sonne Wind&Wärme, a table jumped out at me. The table confirmed that the Silent Wind Revolution that French renewables expert Bernard Chabot first...[more]
Dr. Alt is a journalist who has been promoting the vision of a renewable energy world for more than two decades. As head and presenter of important political tv magazines, he became one of the most...
I have a Casella CEL-464 professional-grade sound level meter for sale. I used the unit during the early 2000s to measure the noise emissions from small wind turbines.[more]
The onslaught of super-dooper new windmill inventions is never ending. Frankly it’s wearing out us old timers. We can’t keep up with the damn things. We try to ignore them but our friends and...[more]
It is no wonder that a modern wind turbine looks so beautiful.[more]
So, are wind and solar killing coal and nuclear? Yes, but not by themselves and not for the reasons most people think. Are wind and solar killing grid reliability? No, not where the grid’s technology...
Ogin raised more than $150 million in funding — even attracting the attention of former Vice President Al Gore, now a senior partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, one of the company’s earliest...
Four years after a federal grand jury in Raleigh, North Carolina returned a two-count indictment against James Alan Rowan for his fraudulent wind turbine investments, the fugitive was caught in...[more]
Among all those who lost money in the FloDesign-Ogin fiasco is the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Compared to others the state lost a relatively modest amount of $3 million.[more]
Urban environments are challenging locations for small wind turbines. Moreover, the sector must deal with cases of small turbines poorly sited and installed by companies that are more interested in...
The work within this thesis is made in collaboration between Halmstad University and Uppsala University. A 200-kW semi-guy-wired VAWT H-rotor, owned by Uppsala University but situated in Falkenberg...
James Alan Rowan was apprehended in Saskatoon, where his parents live. A Saskatoon judge committed him to be extradited to the U.S. to face two fraud charges filed against him amid allegations he...
Recently a Dutch wind farm developer’s home was firebombed. Dutch Wind Developer Fire Bombed What other instances of violence against wind industry staff have occurred?
New Zealand’s Superannuation Fund has written down its $47.5 million (NZ) investment in ducted turbine promoter Ogin. [more]
In June 2016 the Ogin Board of Directors and management mutually agreed to separate. At that point we wrote the Fund’s NZ$47.5 million investment down to nil, and that was included in our annual...
Sometime around midnight 10-11 April the home of Bob Jans was firebombed in Assen, the Netherlands. Both Jans and his wife were home, asleep at the time.[more]
Keynote presentation to the 2017 Small Wind Conference 11 April in Minneapolis, Minnesota.[more]
When she's not climbing in Patagonia, Jessica Kilroy hangs off wind turbines
Bergey Windpower, an American manufacturer of small wind turbines for residential and commercial applications, recently announced a new product, the Excel 15 wind turbine.
"Als die Gemeindevertreter der drei Gemeinden mit diesem Konzept auf die Bürger zugingen, war das Vorhaben schnell akzeptiert“, erinnert sich Schäfer.
Investigators are looking into the possibility that the man may have taken his own life, it is understood.
Police have identified a worker who died in an accident on a wind farm site in the south of Scotland.
Another interesting concept being considered is to locate one or both reservoirs below ground (sub-surface).
