Make your own wind turbine/energy - have you done it, and is it worth it?

Hi,

we have just moved into a 90's pre-fab wooden house in New Zealand (start of winter - with frosts many mornings). It has no wood stove and no insulation.

We have limited budget, and so are trying to cut our power bill, particularly in terms of heating. Wood stove is too epensive to install to town council regulations ($6000 ++++). As we are setting up 8 acres organically and need to heat compost it all anyway, we are trying to heat at least our hot water in compost heaps, and hope to have enough heat to heat the house or then will look at making some sort of rocket stove outside and bringing the heat into the house with radiators.
We also want to look at temporary methods of insulating the house to keep the heat in.
Also hope to make an outdoor cook house for the major cooking.

We are also wondering about making a wind turbine to make some of our remaining electricity. Have seen various "make it ourself" on the website, but wondering which is the best, and also wondering how much it is worth the time an money by the time you buy the inverter and batteries. Any esperience of of someone that has made their own wind turbine and made it worth its while?

Or should it be down the bottom of our list of priorities? (We also have 8 acres to set up as organic gardens).

You can build a savonius wind turbine out of some old barrels and an alternator. Google around for plans. They are better for low wind applications, which most places are (unless on a mountainside or a 50 meter pole).

How much power you will get is extremely variable depending on your wind, how efficiently you build the device, how big your sails are, etc. That is of course one of the problems with wind power. But we are probably talking on the order of hundreds of watts, not kilowatts.

look at the info in the link below. Should answer your questions.

http://www.otherpower.com/otherpower_wind.shtml

Some more info here:

http://www.mdpub.com/Wind_Turbine/
http://homepower.com/basics/wind/

Annie Hope wrote:Hi,

we have just moved into a 90's pre-fab wooden house in New Zealand (start of winter - with frosts many mornings). It has no wood stove and no insulation.

We have limited budget, and so are trying to cut our power bill, particularly in terms of heating. Wood stove is too epensive to install to town council regulations ($6000 ++++). As we are setting up 8 acres organically and need to heat compost it all anyway, we are trying to heat at least our hot water in compost heaps, and hope to have enough heat to heat the house or then will look at making some sort of rocket stove outside and bringing the heat into the house with radiators.
We also want to look at temporary methods of insulating the house to keep the heat in.
Also hope to make an outdoor cook house for the major cooking.

We are also wondering about making a wind turbine to make some of our remaining electricity. Have seen various "make it ourself" on the website, but wondering which is the best, and also wondering how much it is worth the time an money by the time you buy the inverter and batteries. Any esperience of of someone that has made their own wind turbine and made it worth its while?

Or should it be down the bottom of our list of priorities? (We also have 8 acres to set up as organic gardens).

energy is very important. At this point heat is good. if you die from frostbite, that makes all your other efforts moot.

look at rocket mass heaters. You will not be able to make enough electricity to make a dent in your bill without a significant investment. That is just the truth... Better to invest that somehwere else.

For really cheap heat, look at solar heated air... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LCWISE5Jgg&feature=related

good luck. Let us know your progress.