Wooden shoes & Foghat: The secrets of wind power!

BILLY: Something for nice Dutch people in uncomfortable wooden shoes – that's how a lot of us have been taught to think about wind power.

GREG: Well, cue the class action lawsuit, because you've been taught wrong. Wind power is working, right here in North Carolina. And we have Jeremy and Addie to prove it.

BILLY: Addie Randall and Jeremy Peang-Meth run Blue Sun Renewable Energy, which distributes Windspire, a new kind of turbine. And they're building a water-front community, Cedar Shores, which will use the new turbines www.bluesunrenew.com. Let's grill'em.

GREG: So, the whole wind power = wooden shoes syndrome?

JEREMY: America wants both wind and wooden shoes. There's a great analogy here... Wooden shoes are actually good for your posture, especially the new high tech versions of clogs (not the old Dutch kind). Chefs, who stand for long periods of time, love clogs, and they're also popular as fashion. Same for wind power – it's coming into fashion and we're realizing its good for us. The new wind turbines are a better fit ... Here in North Carolina, where wind is abundant, we are just following this trend.

I also think that more people are becoming aware of the need to shift priorities. Saving in energy use or living in spaces that are a bit smaller, that's common sense – and you'll save money, too. In the long run, we'll all be better off. That goes also for North Carolina and wind power ... And it's especially empowering when people can make wind energy in their own backyards.

BILLY: About those backyards – we love the sight of wind mills, but some see only ugly.

ADDIE: Getting used to it is definitely part of it. We're used to electric power lines and cell phone towers – I haven't heard of too many people complaining about them. We seem to have just accepted those structures as necessary eye sores. Wind turbines, by comparison, are certainly prettier – all in a row or scattered over field, they can be magical. They should be easier to get used to.

Hopefully, technology will continue to make wind turbines more efficient and compact, so that fewer will produce even more power and they will blend in easily with existing infrastructure. The vertical-axis wind turbines, or VAWTs, different from propeller-style turbines, are being introduced with the goal of working them into more urban environments.

GREG: What kind of policy gust does the wind power industry need in NC to really start spinning?

JEREMY: North Carolina has great wind resources. And North Carolina has some good incentives in place. But the state needs to do more to encourage use of its renewable wind resource at all levels, utility as well as personal.

For instance, if Tennessee can be OK with mountain top removal to access coal... then NC should be able get people to accept a mountain top or offshore wind farm, which should be more palatable than chopping off a mountain. NC also needs to make net-metering more equitable for power customers by forcing utilities to give consumers full credit for energy they put back in the grid.

BILLY: Let's try to quantify wind's potential. Approximately how many turbines or how much wind would it take to power my 2,800 square foot house for a day? And remember, I keep the stereo on all day cranking old Foghat records.

JEREMY: The rule of thumb for residential wind power is to install them on sites with at least a 12 mph average wind. As low as 10 will work if your utility rates are higher. The average house will be covered with 3 or 4 Windspires, while you still access the grid to take up the slack when your usage is higher or when the wind is calm.

But if you're jamming to "Slow Ride" and have it cranked 24/7, you may need to go utility scale, with a 500 foot tower. The Chet Baker crowd will probably do just fine, but Foghat, well....

GREG: During recent ice storms in the mid-west, stories emerged of turbines tossing off ice javelins! Some wind proponents claimed the tales were the products of a conspiracy to discredit alternative energy. So settle this – have you ever been speared? And how bad did it hurt?

ADDIE: No - we're pretty safe from ice spears in Down East North Carolina. We can assure you, though, that a Windspire is a more loving turbine, slower and quieter, with no scary propellers, and it would never spear anyone.