The whiff of patchouli oil and gentle sounds of George Harrison playing the sitar....

[stevieannie]

Not a surprise to many of you people, but I'm a sad old hippy. Except I'm actually pretty happy, and not particularly old. But the phrase "cheerful, youthful hippy" doesn't have quite the same ring, does it?

On learning why organic lifestyle magazines are an 80s paint colour and my opinion of B&Q wind turbines...

Comments

[ex-lark-asc.livejournal.com]

Oh? What's so Mickey Mouse about the B&Q wind turbines? Where should I look instead?

I'm definitely intrigued by microgeneration, being stuck with a partner who won't turn his computer off because it would spoil his uptime (and yet gets all indignant about documentaries talking about the plight of polar bears. Gah!). Though it has occurred to me we might get more mileage out of waterwheels in the drainpipes than solar stuff, given the recent weather round here.

Point about *buying* less definitely taken; I'm a sort of half-hippy myself, and charity shopping/Ebay clothes shopping/making stuff myself/not bloody caring about designer labels is certainly something I'm more than happy with. Since I stopped working we've been doing a lot to live on the cheap as well - the House of Eco-Weenie came with homemade curtain rods and low-energy light bulbs pre-fitted, and has super extra 100% biodegradable flooring too. Haven't quite got the organic gardening for extra cheap thing going yet, need to import some Martian slug-eating monsters and get the compost going, but give it time :)

[keristor.livejournal.com]

The B&Q turbines are a rated 1kW at around 28mph wind speed. Unless you are in a very windy area that's not going to happen very often (as an example, in Cambridge today it's very breezy and the Met Office site is saying winds up to 25mph). They cut in at between 8 and 11mph and cut out at 31 mph, since power output is non-linear that means that at the lowest speed you'll probably get well under 200W. They cost 1500 pounds (plus installation?). In order to repay itself that would need around 15 thousand hours (at the rated wind speed), or around 2 years continuous output at the rated speed.

This is actually a lot better than the turbines available several years ago, and I do like the way it can be plugged straight into the mains to provide power when it's got it available. I suspect that if you have excess, though, it won't let you sell it back to the Grid. Hopefully in several years we'll have some which are actually worth it.

[armb.livejournal.com]

> probably get well under 200W

Cut in speed is about 1/3 of rated speed, and IIRC power output varied with cube of wind speed, so 1000/27 ~= 37. well under 200W.
Enough to run a few high efficiency bulbs in a power cut - but then the "plug straight into the mains" feature means it won't work in a power cut (this is a legally required safety feature, think of it as "won't electrify the mains when it has been cut off to work safely on it").

[keristor.livejournal.com]

OK, I thought it was the square of the wind speed and rounded up. Your calculations make the power output for 'normal' wind speeds either in Aylesbury or in Cambridge look pretty sick, it would take between 20 and 40 years to pay off (quite possibly more given that today's winds and for the weekend are actually below the minimum speeds so would produce nothing). If it lasted that long (heck, if I last that long!).

[filkarchive.livejournal.com]

It's worse, its the cube - google around a bit on it. I got very keen on these a while back, then checked into the physics.