There’s a whole load of people who are into a more “hands-on” approach when it comes to living Off The Grid and harnessing the many clean, renewable energy sources we have available to us. There is also a book’s worth of questions from our go-getter friends regarding the process and components needed to start building their very own energy-pulling power systems.

Wind Energy is probably the most infinite source available because there will never be a lack of wind, and too much wind activity is a good thing when it comes to using it to generate power for your home – a great situation indeed! Lets take a look at what a wind turbine is built from, and more importantly, how wind turbines generate electricity.

Wind

Modern day wind turbines generate electricity for three primary purposes: to power homes, business properties and to provide energy for sale back to the utility companies. Most wind turbines found today generate power ratings between 250 watts all the way up to 5 megawatts. Wind plants, also known as wind farms, generate a capacity which ranges from a few to hundreds of megawatts – which is a lot of power.

The greater majority of wind “power plants” are modular in nature, which essentially means they are designed with smaller modules (turbines) and at a moments notice can increase or decrease the overall output capacity – simply by adding more or less modules.

Energy

Here’s how a wind turbine generates it’s energy: The wind’s energy causes the turbine blades to spin around a rotor. The energy produced by the turbine’s generator is transformed within standard of the National Power System and delivered to the appropriate distribution units. Wind is moving air, and air contains mass therefor when in motion there is kinetic energy. That energy is converted into various forms of mechanical and electrical power. Common turbine subsystems include the following parts and components:

• A rotor or blades
• An enclosure which contains the drive train
• A gear box
• A generator
• A tower
• Ground and interconnection equipment
• Controls and electrical cables

Turbine

Turbines are monitored on a continual basis using a SCADA or Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system. The turbines and generators are constantly monitored for conditions that may affect operation – in which case the data is immediately sent back through the system to a central monitoring station for indexing, analytical process and documentation. This process helps the utility companies and appropriate government offices collect data just like they would for a nuclear power plant, to recognize trends and work towards improving the overall efficiency of the wind farms.