You may have heard the term small wind and never given it much thought. It’s a phrase that’s intended to designate a wind energy system for use in a residential or farm setting. It’s typically a smaller wind turbine that has a maximum power output that’s much less than the huge commercial wind turbines that you may have seen appearing across the countryside. Power outputs of 10 kilowatts or less are generally considered a small wind system. The turbines themselves will have a much smaller blade diameter and tower. These wind generators are designed to help alleviate the homeowners electric bills, and in certain circumstances, even eliminate them altogether.

If you’re considering installing a wind turbine, you may have some concerns. One of the more common questions related to small wind turbines is, how loud is it? The answer is not very loud. A typical home wind generator is normally direct drive. This means that the blades are directly connected to the generator. There is no gearbox in between the two of them. Because of this, there is very little noise produced by the wind turbine itself. The bulk of the noise that occurs is caused by the wind passing over the blades. And even then, tests have shown that the sound level from this is only slightly higher than that of the ambient background sound levels. At very close distances from the turbine, the noise will be audible, but it won’t be loud. The further you go from the turbine, the lower the sound level will be. And on days with wind speeds that are less than what’s required to spin the turbine, you won’t hear it at all.

Another question that frequently comes up is will having a wind turbine decrease the value of my home. The answer to this is no. There have been several surveys that show that having a small wind turbine won’t affect the value of your home. Even though there hasn’t been a formal study commissioned to prove this, there is more than enough informal and anecdotal evidence to support the claim that property values are not decreased because of a wind turbine.

Related posts

• Animation of how a wind turbine works (0)
• Installed U.S. Wind Energy capacity hits the 20000 MW mark (0)
• A Huge Commercial Wind Turbine Explodes (0)
• Before you build wind or solar power generators, improve your home’s energy efficiency (0)
• DIY Basics-What You Need To Build a Solar Panel from Photovoltaic Cells (1)