Renewable Energy - How Does Wind Power Work?

When we talk about renewable energy, normally we will relate it to the power from sun, or better known as solar power. But, other than the sun, wind is another source to generate renewable energy. Let's explore how does wind power work in generating energy that can be used to replace the non-renewable fossil-fuel energy.

Back to the basic, the wind power is actually a form of solar power because the wind is generated due to the heating effect from the sun. When the sun heats the earth's surfaces at different speed on sand, water, stone and various types of soil, these surfaces absorb and release heat at different rates, creating different temperatures. At a certain temperature, the hotter air begins to rise from the surfaces very quickly because it is lighten than the equal volume of cool air. As the results, the hot air rises and reduces the atmospheric pressure near the earth's surface, which draws cool air to fill the gap the hot air leaves behind. This action causes air movement or is known as Wind.

Based on the physic theory, when the air moves, it generates kinetic energy, a type of energy created with the motion of mass. With energy conversion technology, we can capture and convert the kinetic energy into other forms of energy such as electricity. Energy from wind is a renewable energy that can be generated endlessly. It has become the future trend as the one of major power generation sources besides the solar power. The world is put a great effort to make wind power a long-term energy strategy to produce electricity, mainly due to the wind power generation is clean and most importantly, it is renewable and environment friendly, a stark contrast to traditional power plants that rely on fossil fuels.

A wind power system consists of wind turbine, which is made up of tower, blades and a nacelle, a control gearing system. The wind power generated from a wind turbine is determined largely by the length and the design of the blades. The design of blades creates a pressure of difference in wind, high pressure at one side and low pressure at the other side. The pressure difference between the sides of blades rotates the blades. The rotation of blades generates kinetic energy and being transferred into electric energy, is in turn transferred into electricity via transformer.

With the technology improvement that leads to a better generation techniques, the cost of generating electricity from wind power has been greatly reduced, making it a feasible renewable energy solution to be used as the major source of electricity for future. In fact, there are many homemade wind power system building guides available that give guidance to people who are interested in implementing renewable energy system at home to make a homemade wind-power system to generate electricity for home uses. The renewable energy generated from wind has started to become an alternative energy source from today, and it will definitely be the major sources for future, replacing the finite fossil fuels as the power generation source.

Summary

Wind power works to generate electricity by converting the kinetic energy captured from wind turbine to electric energy via transformer. Wind power is clean and renewable energy that will become the long-term energy strategy for the world.