Composites Technology - Small wind gets big
Small wind gets big
Massive growth, complex blade designs reopen challenging market in wind energy niche.
By Ginger Gardiner
COMPOSITES TECHNOLOGY August 2011
Because today’s commercial wind industry landscape is overshadowed by multimegawatt, utility-scale wind turbines with rotor diameters as large as 126m/413 ft, it is easy to forget that wind energy was pioneered by builders of small wind turbines (SWTs). But “small wind,” the marketing moniker for the very low end of the wind turbine size scale, never went away. In fact, SWTs — with a rated capacity of 100 kW or less and rotor diameters under 63 ft/19m — are making a strong comeback.
How strong? Here’s some interesting anecdotal evidence: In the U.S., for residents of California, Hawaii and North Carolina, Bergey 10-kW wind turbines are now available at Lowe’s home improvement centers. And at stores in the Ace Hardware chain, do-it-yourselfers can order the WindTronics WT6500, a compact, 185-lb/84 kg rooftop turbine.
Although it might be unrealistic to think in terms of a turbine on every roof, there is convincing statistical evidence that SWTs will play a key role in how countries will meet their goals for renewable energy and reduced fossil fuel dependence by target years that range from 2015 to 2030. As the small wind market expands, the implications for the composites industry could be big.
How big is big?
The often-cited report by the American Wind Energy Assn. (AWEA, Washington, D.C.), AWEA Small Wind Turbine Global Market Study, issued a clarion call for SWTs as a serious market. Of the total 100,000-MW of SWT capacity established thus far in the U.S. wind market’s 80-year history, half of that capacity was installed in the three-year period from 2007 to 2009. AWEA reports that in 2009, the recession notwithstanding, 9,800 SWTs were sold in the U.S. — a 15 percent jump from 2008, with approximately 11,200 sold in the rest of the world.
However, Nick Blitterswyk, CEO and cofounder of SWT manufacturer Urban Green Energy (UGE, New York, N.Y.), believes AWEA’s figure for overseas sales was grossly underestimated. “China alone produced 100,000 small wind turbines in 2010,” he claims. “The actual global market was probably closer to 150,000 units.” Blitterswyk is in a position to know. His two cofounders are Chinese citizens who enabled UGE to own a factory in Beijing and, with the help of its local sales office, to make China one of its largest markets, projected to contribute roughly half of the company’s sales by 2013.
