News & Articles on History of Wind Power
This page was prompted by a technical question about early electricity-generating wind turbines in the United States. The question followed a similar question about “who was the first” to interconnect a wind turbine with an electricity network. There is a lot of confusion internationally about both subjects.
The history of wind energy is a broad subject and many have written about it. I’ve pulled together a list of sources, books, links, and museums that I know about. This list is far from comprehensive. If anyone wants to add to this list or edit this list, please do so.
A number of the entries below are reviews I’ve written of books that include the history of wind energy. The original book can usually be reached from the review. Other news items are relevant to the history of wind turbine development.
Bibliographic Entries for Dimitri Stein German-American Engineer
By
Paul Gipe
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 designed and built a 15-meter diameter wind turbine for a remote island in 1949.
How Aloys Wobben made Enercon a direct-drive wind power pioneer
By
Eize De Vries
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 nacelles makes them easily recognisable, together with the unusual high-performance blade design featuring tip winglets and a widening spoiler towards the aerodynamically optimised spinner. Another visual characteristic is the slender prefab coning of the often concrete-steel hybrid towers with their patented colour scheme in different shades from dark green to lighter colours towards the white-grey upper structure.
Visit the German Windpower Museum–When You Can
By
Paul Gipe
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 like kicking iron if you’re into windmills.
Was the World’s First Wind Farm on Rhodes?
By
Thomas Leitlein
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.
Video of Gedser Mill in Operation
By
Paul Gipe
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.
Smith-Putnam Turbine: Patents and Movie Clip
By
Paul Gipe
Because of increasing historical interest in the Smith-Putnam wind turbine, I’ve added two new pages on the Project: patents for …
