(Northboro News Posting of this article)
Courtesy of Margaret Harling of the Wind Committee
Hey Northborough,
Some of you may have heard that there are plans afoot to erect a power generating wind turbine in Northborough. Well, a Wind Committee has been appointed by the town and this will be an ongoing effort to let you know what is going on. Most people on the committee are engineers and they speak in technical, and sometimes confusing terms. I have a graduate degree but I'm not an engineer, so I thought I could pester them for translation and keep you all updated as to their progress.
In spite of recent weather, Northborough is not a very windy place. If you refer to the wind map on the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MTC) website (generated by computer predictions) you'll see there are only a few spots in town where a wind turbine might be possible A number of sites were initially identified, some on town land and some not, and each of these were reviewed by the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative and UMass. Amherst for suitability as a wind turbine site. Factors included amount of wind at the site, proximity of dwellings and connectivity to the power grid. The next step is to pick a site and erect a "met" tower, which will measure the wind flows, orientation of wind, and temperatures at the site for one year.
A meteorological, or "met" tower is a temporary tower erected to measure wind velocity and temperature at various heights on the tower. These readings are saved several times every hour over a ten month or more period and the data are subsequently analyzed to predict the orientation, height, and energy generating capacity of a wind turbine at that general location.
At this point, three sites have emerged as potential sites for a wind turbine. Two are on privately owned farm land and one is on town-owned land It is preferable to place the turbine on town land, but that may not be possible. In fact, each of the sites has some issues which are being worked on by the Committee currently.
In order to erect a "met" tower, and eventually a wind turbine, we will need the assistance of consultants who are in wind energy business. These are people who have knowledge of the industry, access to the equipment we will need, and experience transporting and erecting wind turbines. These consultants will be chosen using a fair competitive bidding process with a detailed bid analysis by the Town Administrator and Engineer.
The decision was made, and agreed on, by the Committee that this wind turbine would generate power for the use of the Town of Northborough municipal needs (town hall, schools, police, fire, street lights, public works etc.) The power generated by the turbine will be delivered to the National Grid local distribution power system (wires that run along the streets) via typical overhead wires and be measured in Kilowatt\hours (KWHRS) The town of Northborough will receive monetary credit for the electrical power from The National Grid . The monthly town electrical bills for operating the schools, fire/police departments, town hall and other offices will be subtracted from the power generated by the wind turbine. This should result in considerable savings to the Town over time. How, you may wonder , is this all going to be paid for? Well, the cost of the "met" tower is covered by a grant available from the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative. The wind turbine itself will be paid for by a combination of state and federal grants, fundraising and...you guessed it, funds raised by your vote at Town Meeting. We don't yet know the cost, and the size of the wind turbine will be dictated by the information gleaned from the "met" tower. You can be sure though, that the information we get from the "met" tower and identified during the Feasibility Study will let us know if this project will, or will not, work here in Northborough.
Q.WILL THE ENERGY GENERATED BY THE WIND TURBINE ALLOW NORTHBOROUGH TO GO "OFF THE GRID"?
No. The energy generated by the wind turbine will be fed into the National Grid and the Town of Northborough will receive a credit for that amount of energy on it's bill. Credits will vary month to month reflecting the performance of the wind generator and the town demands. In the summer, for instance, when the schools are closed, extra credits could be accumulated to offset higher winter demands.
Post questions here, and Maggie and the Wind committee will do their best to translate engineer-speak into plain language.