Applications and Wind Industry - Wind Energy: Renewable Energy and the Environment - page 222

PROBLEMS
1. What is a wind-assist power system?
2. Go to the Windpower Monthly website. Then go to Windicator. Which country in the
world has the largest installed capacity of wind power? How much? What is the installed
capacity in China? Another place to obtain information is the Global Wind Energy
Council, www.gwec.net .
3. Estimate the wind installed capacity 5 years in the future for the world, for your
country.
4. Estimate the capacity of offshore wind farms in the world today.
5. Are there any small wind turbines in your region? If yes, find out how many are rated
power, stand-alone, or grid connected.
6. Are there any wind distributed or community systems in your region? If yes, for one proj-
ect, provide number of turbines and rated power. If no, find information on the Internet
for one system.
7. Should distributed wind systems receive incentives? If yes, in your opinion, what
incentive?
8. What is the main difference between low and high penetration for wind-diesel systems?
9. Go to the National Wind Technology Center, NREL, website. What R&D programs do
they have?
10. Go to the National Wind Technology Center, NREL, website. What non-R&D programs
do they have?
11. Find an example of a village project that is not in the text. What type and size systems
were installed?
12. In your opinion, what are the major advantages and disadvantages for renewable vil-
lage power?
13. Why are wind-electric water pumping systems installed rather than the proven farm
windmill?
14. Compare the annual efficiency for the farm windmill to a wind-electric system.
15. What factors contributed to the initial wind farm boom in California?
16. Which manufacturer is the largest supplier of megawatt wind turbines?
17. Go to two or three manufacturers' websites and find out what is their largest commercial
wind turbine. State diameter, rated power, and tallest tower.
18. Does the utility from which you buy electricity have wind farms on its transmission
lines? If yes, for one wind farm find out the number of turbines and rated power.
19. What are some applications of small wind turbines? Bergey Windpower has examples of
applications, or use an example from the text.
20. In your opinion, why are there not more manufacturers of large wind turbines in the
United States.
21. Find two example projects of wind-diesel on the Internet. State specifications of the
systems.