Wind Power
for Home & Business Data Diskette by Paul
Gipe Chelsea Green Publishing Co.,
White River Junction, VT (1996)
Data Diskette Now Available for Wind Power for Home & Business The diskette is a companion to the 413-page book Wind
Power for Home & Business, published by Chelsea Green.
The diskette contains more up-to-date and comprehensive information
than that found in the book's fourth printing. There are also text
files, worksheets, and programs included on the diskette which
are not found in the original book. Much has changed since Wind Power for Home & Business was
first written in 1992, especially the number of manufacturers of
small and medium-sized wind turbines. Information on the types and
sizes of wind turbines available on the international market changes
monthly, quickly dating any conventionally printed compendium. Chelsea
Green and the author believe that the diskette enables them to easily
and inexpensively provide the most up-to-date information possible
to the users of Wind Power for Home & Business. Chelsea Green issued the fourth printing of Wind
Power for Home & Business, the most current version of
the book, in 1996. What's New in the Wind Power for Home & Business
Data Diskette The diskette contains the most up-to-date information
possible on the characteristics of the small and medium-sized wind
turbines available on the international market. It lists three
times more small wind turbines and more than twice the number of
medium-size wind turbines than does the first printing of Wind
Power for Home & Business. It also contains one of the most
comprehensive lists available anywhere of addresses, telephone numbers,
and other contact information for wind turbine manufacturers as well
as for governmental laboratories and non-governmental organizations
working with wind energy. More Small Turbine Listings The diskette contains more information on small wind
turbines than was ever contained in any printed version of the book.
There are more than 3 times as many listings for small turbines than
in the first printing of Wind Power for Home & Business.
There are now 90 entries for models of small wind turbines available
on the international market. More Small Turbine Manufacturers The diskette includes listings from manufacturers of
small wind turbines in the United States, England, Scotland, France,
Quebec, Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, Germany, Brazil, Denmark,
and the Netherlands. Introduction of Standard Power Ratings The listing of small wind turbine models now includes
a Standard Power Rating for all entries. Users of the
data diskette can now compare one small wind turbine to another without
resorting to the confusing and sometimes misleading rating system
employed by small wind turbine manufacturers. Though the Standard
Power Rating downgrades the rating of several popular small
wind turbines, it offers a much more realistic evaluationof what
consumers can actually expect from small wind turbines than that
found in some promotional brochures . Small Turbine Prices The diskette contains approximate prices in U.S. dollars
of many of the small wind turbines on the international market. The
diskette is the most up-to-date and comprehensive source for information
on small wind turbine prices available anywhere. Small Turbine Price Comparisons The diskette contains comparative price per kilowatt
and comparative price per unit of swept area for most
small wind turbines listed. This is information that is new to
the diskette and not found in the printed version of Wind
Power for Home & Business. More Listings of Medium-Sized Turbines The diskette contains more than twice
as many listings for medium-sized wind turbines as in
the first printing of Wind Power for Home & Business. There
are now entries for 119 models of medium-sized wind turbines. More Manufacturers of Medium-Sized Turbines The diskette includes listings of medium-sized
wind turbine manufacturers in the United States, England, Germany,
Spain, Japan, Denmark, and the Netherlands. Calculations Now Available in Worksheets All calculations performed for the printed version
of "Wind Power for Home & Business" are preserved in
the worksheets found on the diskette. The user can change the assumptions
in the worksheet cells as desired. More Information Sources The diskette contains 30% more non-governmental
and governmental organizations working with wind energy
than are found in the first printing of Wind Power for Home & Business. Expanded List of Electronic Information Sources The diskette contains a greatly expanded list
of electronic sources of information, including many that are not
found in any printed version of Wind Power for Home & Business. The
new list includes both usenet news groups and world wide web sites. Expanded Source List for DIY Plans The diskette contains a broader list of sources
for do-it-yourself plans than found in the printed version of Wind
Power for Home & Business. Two New Payback Worksheets The diskette contains two new worksheets
on the economics of wind energy not found in the printed
version of Wind Power for Home & Business. These worksheets
are far more sophisticated than those found in the book and take
into account four years of refinements made since the book was
first written. Two New Worksheets for Estimating Annual Energy Output The diskette contains two new spreadsheets for
estimating the annual energy output of a wind turbine from a manufacturer's
power curve. One spreadsheet uses a Rayleigh wind speed frequency
distribution, and the other uses the more sophisticated Weibull distribution.
Both spreadsheets are far more complex than those found in the original
version of the book. These spreadsheets calculate corrections for
altitude and average temperature, as well as hub height average wind
speed, annual energy output, average daily energy, average monthly
energy, annual conversion efficiency, and annual capacity factor. Six New Images The diskette contains six new images not
found in the printed version of Wind Power for Home & Business. These
include photos of five wind turbines not shown in the book: Bergey
Windpower's Excel, Wind Turbine Industries' 17 kW, Marlec's Rutland,
Southwest Wind Power's Air 303, and World Power Technologies' Whisper
1000. The diskette also contains a color image of Battelle's map
of U.S. wind resources. Free Program The diskette also includes a free program not
found in the printed version of Wind Power for Home & Business. This
program is an easy-to-use interactive model for estimating
increases in wind speed with height. Expanded Rayleigh Wind Speed Distributions In response to suggestions from readers, the
diskette includes expanded worksheets calculating Rayleigh wind speed
frequency distributions. The distributions now cover wind speeds
from 3 m/s to 9 m/s and from 7 mph to 20 mph. The actual worksheets
are provided so the user can calculate the Rayleigh distribution
from the average wind speed at their site. Additional Documents The diskette contains several new documents
not found in the printed version of "Wind Power for Home & Business:"
- the American
Wind Energy Association's Frequently Asked Questions,
- AWEA's
publications catalog
- an Overview
of Worldwide Wind Energy Development by Paul Gipe, and
- Questions
and Answers about wind energy by the Kern Wind Energy Assoc.
File Formats and Platform Platform: IBM PC compatible.
Worksheets: Lotus 123 (TM) compatible with a *.WKS file extension.
Documents: ASCII text with a *.DOC file extension.
Images: Microsoft Windows (TM) bitmapped with a *.BMP file extension. To Order: Wind Power for Home & Business: Data Diskette (ISBN
0-930031-88-1) is available from Real Goods Trading Corp. in the
United States at 800 919 2400, or for those calling from outside
North America at +1 707 468 9214. Wind Power for Home & Business (ISBN
0-930031-64-4) can also be obtained from Real Goods as well as from
Chelsea Green Publishing Co. by calling +1 800 639 4099 in the United
States, +1 902 455 4286 in Canada, and +44 18 03 86 38 43 in Great
Britain, +61 261 91 19 in Switzerland, +46 8 745 19 34 in Sweden,
+27 11 702 2300 in South Africa, +61 49 97 08 11 in Australia. Wind Power for Home & Business is
also available from the American Wind Energy Association by calling
+1 202 383 2500 and from the Canadian Wind Energy Association by
calling +1 800 9 CanWEA. The American Wind Energy Association can
also be reached by sending email to mailto:windmail@mcimail.com. . A combination of both the book Wind Power for
Home & Business, and the accompanying Data
Diskette (ISBN 930031-90-3) can be obtained from Real
Goods Trading Corp. and Chelsea Green Publishing Co. Comments by an Early Reviewer As we would expect from Paul, there is a huge
amount of useful stuff here. . . The best of it is in the form of
spreadsheets, which my Mac version of Excel3 will open without problems.
. . I like the use of Weibull distributions to find annual energy
yield in POWCURWE. I have not seen that done before. There's nothing
like a spreadsheet to give you a feel for how one thing depends on
another. . . My favourite table is "Characteristics of Selected
Small Wind Turbines." There are quite a few (wind turbines)
I have never heard of. What I love about having the data in spreadsheet
form is that I can add to it. . . It is (also) useful to be able
to check the list of addresses on the same disk to find out where
they (manufacturers) are. And I can even print the address out if
I want to write to one. No need to copy it manually. . . Data tables
such as the resistance of cables could be used (as lookup tables
in larger spreadsheets) to build useful calculating tools. . . This
disk is a marvelous and unique resource. . . Congratulations on a
great piece of electronic publishing, Paul! -- Hugh
Piggott, Scoraig Wind Electric, author of It's a Breeze: A
Guide to Choosing Windpower (Scotland).
Worksheet
File Incompatibility with Lotus 123 for Windows
Wind
Power for Home & Business
Table
of
Contents of Wind Power for Home & Business
Reviews
of Wind Power for Home & Business
Tables
in Wind Power for Home & Business
Illustrations
in Wind Power for Home & Business
More
information on wind energy.
Wind Energy
Comes of Age
Workgroup Wind
turbines
Paul
Gipe, pgipe@igc.apc.org 26.12.96
The URL for this site is http://rotor.fb12.tu-berlin.de/wind
books/gdiskett.html
This site is maintained by Klaus
Kaiser and the staff at TU-Berlin.
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