The Science of Wind

When we first bought our home in Nederland, the first comment we hear was, “It’s awfully windy there.”  I remember thinking, how windy can it be?  We found out pretty quickly.  We have a weather station on our house that measures wind speeds, and have found them reaching more than 70 mph on several occasions.  We’re not alone, in that many spots near Boulder also can receive strong winds, as storms travel west to east, the winds gain speed and strength coming off the top of the Divide, or what we call downsloping winds.  As I was working on a project the other day near Marshall Mesa, the massive turbines loomed overhead.  It got me wondering more about what wind energy was all about.  Those downsloping winds dominate during winter, but also are put to good use through scientific research at a place called the National Wind Technology Center (NWTC).

There have been great strides in renewable energy the last decade, and where better to study and  make use of it than in Colorado.  With an average of 300 days of sunshine, it is one of the best places in the country to make use of solar panels.  In fact, one of the largest solar panel installations is at no other than the Denver International Airport.  Not far behind solar energy, is wind energy.  The NWTC is located just south of Boulder at the base of the Flatiron Mountains.  I’ve been by the NWTC many times driving south from Boulder and have seen the incredibly large turbines.  I guess I just thought it was some sort of wind energy plant, and didn’t think much about it.  But I happened to drive a different direction the other day and saw the signs referring to a Wind Laboratory.  My interest was piqued.

The NWTC is part of NREL, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, which is part of the Department of Energy.  They use those incredible downsloping winds to test the reliability and productivity of those giant wind turbines, using the results to develop effective wind energy for everything from small scale turbines for residential use to mammoth, off shore operations.  They hope ultimately to find wind energy solutions that are dependable at a reasonable cost.  It is considered one of the top research facilities in the country when it comes to wind research.

It’s strange to think of all this going on just a little over a half hour from my mountain home, but exciting too.  Maybe one day all that hurricane force wind we experience during winter can be harnessed to power our home.