An Oregon State University engineering professor has helped design a new “micro” wind turbine that can be mounted along the edges of building roofs to generate electricity.
The new small-scale turbine design could revolutionize the wind power industry, with rows of small rooftop turbines enabling power generation in urban and suburban settings, instead of only from large, towering, traditional wind farms in rural areas.
Stel Walker, director of the Energy Resources Research Laboratory at OSU and a leading consultant in the wind energy industry, helped create the design with AeroVironment, Inc., the California-based manufacturer of the new wind turbine.
Denmark Wind Consultant Findings (BTM Consult Aps.)
by BTM Consult Aps, the leading authority on wind energy development concludes that:
· 844,000 MW of wind power can be installed worldwide by the year 2017.
· This would produce 10 % of global electricity, 2,071 Terrawatt hours (TWh) in 2017.
· Annual savings of 232 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2010, and 1.889 billion in 2020.
· This target can be achieved at the same cost as fossil fuel options and is based on current market trends.
The report states that "to realise the goal, governments need political will to support the development - not so much with money, but by establishing the institutional framework". This means a regulatory framework for access to the grid, fair payment and adherence to the Kyoto protocol. All three organisations called on Ministers, due to arrive next week, to ensure that the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), outlined in the Kyoto Protocol signed last December, promotes renewable energy technologies and excludes nuclear power or the misleading labelled "clean coal" (a term coined by industry to refer to a type of power station which burns coal more efficiently).