Читать книгу The Self-Sufficiency Handbook - Alan Bridgewater - Страница 63

It seemed obvious to us. There we were, living in a place where the wind blew so fiercely that every tree and building seemed to be braced against it, so what would be more natural than to build a wind generator? I wrote to a hippie commune in the United States, and they sent me a batch of designs for DIY generators made out of bits and pieces salvaged from old cars.

When the big day came, we mounted the generator in place and connected the wires, and the propeller began to spin. It looked so beautiful. To make a long story short, we had power for a few glorious minutes, and then the lights blew, the cables melted, and the propeller cartwheeled across the field. From then on, we settled for gas lamps and candles.

Now, of course, wind turbines are de rigueur. They are everywhere: rows of giant wind generators on hillsides and mountaintops, medium-sized machines outside gas stations, mini wind turbines alongside highways. The question now is not how to build one, or even where to get one, but what type of wind generator to install. In fact, there are so many options and so much jargon (e.g., utility tie-in, off-grid with battery bank, traditional two-blade) that it can be a bit confusing.