Although I’m guessing that the only thing “personal” item flying off the shelves of
Home Depot stores across the country right now are personal cooling units, the big box purveyor of paints, potted plants, and home improvement accoutrement is now also selling
personal wind turbines at
select stores in Idaho, Nevada, Texas, Utah, Wyoming, and California.
Similar to
Lowe’s teaming up with Sungevity to offer shoppers affordable, in-store
solar leasing options, the Home Depot has partnered with Flagstaff, Ariz.-based company Southwest Windpower in an effort to bring clean, renewable wind-based power to the masses.
As reported by Preston over at
Jetson Green, the particular product being offered by Home Depot is the sleek (read: quiet), grid-connected
Skystream 3.7, a unit described by Southwest Windpower as “the first compact, all-inclusive personal wind generator (with controls and inverter built in) designed to work in very low winds.” Included with the actual turbine is
Skyview monitoring software that allows homeowners to track the Skystream 3.7’s performance from the comfort of their PC. Weighing 205 pounds, the unit comes with a five-year warranty and is capable of producing up to 400 kilowatt hours of clean electricity per month (based on prelim data).
The total price for the Skystream 3.7, including installation costs, varies by location but from what I gather the units alone are in the ballpark of $6,000. Homeowners, if qualified, will be able to knock off a few bucks of the sticker price as the turbine is eligible for local, state, and federal incentives including a 30 percent federal tax credit. And although the turbines will only be available for purchase at select stores in the aforementioned states, the company plans to expand the program to “windy locations across the United States.”
Says Southwest Windpower CEO Dixon Thayer is an
official release:
The Skystream install program represents Southwest Windpower’s commitment to making renewable energy affordable and accessible to consumers everywhere. We are excited to help residential and commercial customers take advantage of their area’s exceptional wind resource by using Skystream 3.7 to produce clean, emissions-free energy.
Home Depot shoppers in windy areas of Idaho, Nevada, Texas, Utah, Wyoming, and California: Any interest? Anyone out there have experience with compact, grid-tied turbines including the Skystream 3.7? Has owning a compact
wind turbine freed up time for you to
toss a beach ball or
play tug-a-war with your children?
This is the sort of good news that must be shouted from the mountaintops of Appalachia (while there are still mountaintops there)…and run head to head against other energy sector news stories that have come out in recent weeks such as these three stories:
Piedmont Energy’s announcement of investing $3 Billion for a new gas/coal plant, touted as being more efficient and cleaner than older powerplants, but also ignoring the gas fracking issues for gas, mountaintop removal, and the same old risks of mining that have always been part of the industry.
The recent tragedy of loss of life at a Massey Coal Mine, which is actually the second accident in a Massey Mine since April 2010 (in less than one year) resulting in a total loss of life of about 50 souls. This horrible news coming from a company that posted a 2007 report on Wikepedia praising themselves for their safety record by comparing their “non-fatal safety record” as nearly even to the workplace safety record of the “retail industry” in our country.
Also, in less than a year of prior bad news, BP was just granted within the last few days, “permitting to drill for oil offshore in the Arctic.”
The record of the fossil fuel sector in the last few weeks and months is status quo for these fuel sources for more than 100 years. Chevron is accused of massive pollution of the Amazon, Exxon had a really bad day at the office in Prince William Sound Alaska.
In the 1970′s coal miners went on strike for safer working conditions after a few dozen miners where killed in an explosion, and the mine owner, Duke Energy refused to negotiate for more than a year, and only came to the table after one of their thugs shot and killed a miner on the picket line.
Pete Seeger wrote a song about a similiar situation that occurred in the 1900′s when dozens of miners striking for safer working conditions were murdered and thrown into a hole.
It is the very definition of “irony” that the employers in the fossil fuel sector tell their employees that the EPA, the Dems, the liberals, and the commies don’t care about them. Nothing could be further from the truth. The reality check is that the EPA, Dems, liberals, and commies care about everybody.
In fact, if you step back to see the whole picture, the Republicans, right wingers, and Libertarians (although some doubt the latter)also care about everybody. So why the impasse? Why make the employees and the families in the fossil fuel sector the scapegoats for the status quo? It’s not the economy, or climate change, however both are on our shoulders poised and ready to slash our throats…. it is our food supply, which at this moment depends on fossil fuels in order to be harvested, transported, and refridgerated.
The ugly truth is that our leaders are paralyzed with fear, of disrupting our food supply, their hands could be frozen on the steering wheel until we all crash and climate change does us all in. It is horribly unfair to tell coal miners, all other fossil fuel employees, and their families that their own brothers, sisters, and government don’t care about them. They deserve the best jobs in the green energy sector nationwide.
The news of the success of the LADWP of going from 5% to 20% renewable in 5 years must be shared. It will give people hope that this is not the end, rather that this is a whole new beginning for mankind. LADWP’s recent success is more than applaudable. If we all work together we can even do much better than that, and on a global scale. Other people in other countries want the same future and same survivability that we all do.