D.Watkins+and+D.+Brewer+Energy+and+Water+Wiki

__ Wind Power __ By Devan Brewer and DJ Watkins  There is a major energy crisis on hand. We are wasting precious fossil fuels and destroying the environment trying to produce energy. Through these sources of energy we are rapidly draining our resources and releasing dangerous greenhouse gases into the air. Politicians and scientists are working around the clock trying to alter the outcome of this nation’s desolate future. But there is a better way to do this, a cleaner cheaper way. Using Solar Power and Wind Power. Solar Power is a relatively new way to produce energy but wind power has been around for generations and it is a fairly effective way to produce reasonable amounts of energy. The situation that we, as a global population, have put ourselves into may seem insurmountable, but we can fix this mess, and we are working on effective ways to do so. One effective way is “Wind Power”. Wind Power is not anything new though. It has been around for generations with many different purposes, but the modern purpose of wind power is energy. A “Wind Turbulent” is a fairly simple machine. The wind turns the blades of the turbulent which activate many different gadgets, ultimately producing power. A more in-depth description of the process is this: “The wind turns the rotors (blades), which spin a shaft, which connects to a generator, making electricity. The electricity is sent through transmission and distribution lines to a substation, then onto homes, businesses, and schools.” __ www.alliantenergykids.com/stellent2/groups/public/documents/pub/phk_ee_re_001502.hespn __ There are many positive and negative points about wind power, most of them being positive; here are some of them: -It is a clean source of energy -It is a cheap source of energy -“It forestalls or replaces the need to build a potentially more polluting conventional power plants” -No production of polluted water, air, and soil -Installing periods are extremely quick
 * __ What’s the Deal? __**
 * __ What is currently being done or not done to fix the situation? __**
 * __ How does it work? __**
 * __ Best Aspects: __**

__ How Do Critics Feel About It? __ Critics are split in regards to how they feel about wind power. Some think it is a good system, and most agree but also feel it’s not consistent enough and not worth the money. “They’re clean, and I don’t think they bother anybody, really.”- Jim Young, Iowa farmer “In fact, these things, because they’re intermittent and volatile and unpredictable, they don’t really add a lot of capacity to an electric grid,”-Glen R. Schleede, Retire executive from Virginia __ Why isn’t it a bigger supply of the world’s energy? __ Wind power is not yet a major supplier of the world’s energy, and the chances are that it never will be. But it can still be a productive team player in producing energy. Unfortunately for Wind power, wind is not very consistent and often varies in speed. So the turbulents aren’t always producing the same amounts of energy. So Wind power is good but it will need to be used with other non-fossil fuel devouring energy sources.

__ Wind Power in the News: __ **Cape Wind Farm:** The Cape Wind Farm is currently being debated on being installed. The farm would be placed off the coast of Nantucket in the sound between the island and mainland Cape Cod. Residents feel that it is a great idea, //but//, a bad place. They feel that the farm would decrease the value of their homes and slow down tourism on the island, eventually destroying the island’s economy. If the farm was to get the o.k. to be put up it would then have to battle law suit after law suit filed by residents of the island. **Altamont Pass: **Altamont Pass is currently the nation’s largest wind farm and produces a lot of power. The farm has produced about “4,528 million kilowatt-hours of electricity” about 1.5% of the state’s energy. “That is enough to light a city the size of San Francisco”. The farm has produced about 1,200 jobs in the wind industry of California and is still growing.

Wind power is the way of the future, but it can’t be done alone. Other sources of energy need to be used and we can destroy all of the fossil fuels. This is a tough task facing our generation, one that will need to be solved!