Home Wind Generator - What Homeowners Learned

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Home Wind Generator - Roof Mounts

Unless you’re buying or building a very small (1 kW of output or less) wind turbine, don’t mount it on your roof. A turbine vibrates and large one could end up doing structural damage to your roof.

–Jason C., Tempe, AZ

Home Wind Generator - Metering

Try to arrange for the single meter system (net metering) with your utility provider. This is the arrangement where your electric meter spins backwards when the utility is buying excess electricity generated from your wind turbine. With net metering, the utility is paying you the retail price for the excess electricity you generate and feed back into the system. Under the two meter system (net purchase and sale), the utility is only obliged to pay you it’s avoided cost – the cost that would be incurred by the utility to produce a like amount of electricity. In effect, you’re selling electricity to the utility at the wholesale cost of that power, but you’re paying retail when the utility sends electricity your way. Don’t do that if you can help it.

– Cory M., Midland, TX

Home Wind Generator - Towers

A tilt-down tower is more expensive to install, but you’ll come to know that’s money well spent every time you need to do some maintenance on the turbine and you can simply lower it to the ground.

– Brian N., Stillwater, OK

Trees grow, towers don’t. Remember that when siting your tower, and keep it away from three that haven’t yet reached their mature height. The rule of thumb is that your turbine needs to be sited 30 feet above anything within 300 feet.

– Sean P., Overland Park, KS

Home Wind Generator - Wire Run

The further the tower from your house, the longer the wire run between the turbine and the house. Electricity dissipates over long wire runs, so a long wire run is costing you energy. Factor that in when doing your initial payback calculations.

– Logan R., Springfield, MO

Home Wind Generator - Resale Value

Here’s a point a lot of people forget when doing the math on whether or not a residential wind system is worth it. The National Appraisal Institute estimates that your home value increases $20 for every $1 reduction in annual utility bills. That means if you install a wind system that reduces a $150 monthly electric bill by 50%, you’ve just added $18,000 to the value of your home. That’s practically what the system will cost.

– Joan B., Pueblo, CO

(more to come...)