Mass Marketing Small Wind

by Bruce Mulliken, Green Energy News

I’m greeted by a hand written sign at the entrance of the Home Depot store in Riverhead, New York: “LEARN ABOUT SOLAR ENERGY, Weds. Nite”. Eating a sandwich at the nearby Panera Bread I overhear a conversation. A young women asks an older one, “Are there any wind turbines yet on Long Island?” The encounters were heartening.

Slowly, renewable energy is becoming mainstream, part of regular conversation, mass marketed. Home Depot has been dabbling here and there, off and on with solar system sales for years, and trendy retailer Target tried selling small wind turbines through its online store 8 years ago.

However, for the mass adoption of clean renewable energy for all, there’s still a long, long way to go.

Soon another national chain will attempt to mass market renewable energy, this time a new technology small wind turbine. Beginning in the Fall of this year Ace Hardware, and its 4,600 independently owned and operated stores, will be offering the EarthTronics Honeywell Wind Turbine, a wind energy system developed for home and business owners.

If the name Honeywell sounds familiar it should: the brand is probably best known for its thermostats that adorn the walls of homes and businesses worldwide.

Ace Hardware is the launch partner for the turbine. It will be made available to other retailers, apparently with the asking.

The Honeywell Turbine has a technological feature certainly not common in wind turbines: Power is generated at the tips of the blades, not via generator mounted on the hub, the central shaft. This gearless Blade Tip Power System design, as the company calls it, eliminates mechanical resistance and drag and allows the turbine to have low, 2 miles per hour (.9 meters per second) cut-in speed. Along the ridge of a rooftop, where the company envisions customers will be installing it (a ridge mount bracket is included) there is at least a 2 mile per hour breeze more often than not. As wind pushes up the slope of a roof it accelerates: The turbine will take advantage of that effect. At such a slow cut-in speed the turbine will nearly always be turning generating some electricity, albeit not much.

The turbine will generate power in wind speeds up to 45 miles per hour (very breezy) and put out its maximum power of 2 kilowatts at nearly that speed.

The company says areas where class 4 winds (roughly 16 mph, give or take) are the norm the turbine should generate about 2000 kilowatt hours (kWh) per year of electricity, not enough to power a whole average home, but about 18 percent of the annual needs.

The rotor diameter is 5.7 feet. The price? The manufacturer’s list will be $4500.00 . As with all products retailers should be able to fool around with that.

The turbine’s installed cost is approximately 1/3 of the cost of traditional turbines, according to the company, with a lower installed cost per kWh than any turbine on the market. Adding to the value are federal and state rebates covering anywhere from 30% to 100% of the overall cost.

The Honeywell Wind Turbine comes complete with a computerized smart box, inverter and interconnect switch to wire the system into a household panel. There’s also a proprietary battery charging system and optional ethernet wireless system and data software for remote monitoring. EarthTronics throws in a 30 pack of compact florescent bulbs (CFL) to help cut down on electricity consumption. The bulbs and the wind turbine together could save on average over 30 percent on electricity costs per year, says EarthTronics.

The turbine was developed by WindTronics, a private technology company founded in Muskegon, Michigan at the Michigan Alternative & Renewable Energy Centre (MAREC). WindTronics is the licensee for the Honeywell Wind Turbine.

To some, $4500 may not seem like a mass market product. But then cars are mass marketed and the average price for a new car is what, $20,000? For that homeowners could buy four Honeywell turbines with money to spare.

Serious wind turbine shoppers should look at the variety of options available. The mass marketing of one turbine should help other turbine manufacturers that have taken different marketing and sales routes. Mass marketing is generally good for all.

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