Wind energy is one of the most popular forms of renewable energy out there right now, and it is only growing. That means that wind turbines exist to take complete advantage of this energy source, and research is currently ongoing on addressing possible challenges that wind farms might create when they are implemented on a wider scale.
With gasoline cars, coal factories, and many other amenities making modern life easier all around us, it brings an equally large problem for our planet in the long term, as our environment is constantly being hit hard by air and water pollution from emissions. To add onto that, most of them utilize fossil fuels, which is a nonrenewable energy source as it takes millions of years for them to develop, and humanity is currently using them at a much faster rate than it takes for them to develop new ones.
Wind turbines largely negate this problem because the energy source they use, wind, is renewable. They have much less of an impact on the environment in comparison to other energy sources as they do not release emissions that pollute the atmosphere or the water.
Wind turbines can also be an alternative energy source for generating electricity, which means that power plants that produce emissions will not have to do all the heavy lifting in providing electricity to people, thus reducing the amount of air pollution that these power plants produce.
But like everything, wind energy has a couple of asterisks marked right next to it that people should be aware of before immediately jumping on board with it.
Wind energy is not consistent.
In the same way that solar panels are unable to utilize solar power during the night or when the skies are cloudy, so too are wind turbines unable to function if the wind isn’t blowing.
Both solar and wind energy rely on unstable energy sources that are not always guaranteed to work, and while wind is something that will always be there, it is not guaranteed to blow towards the wind turbines. In fact, it may not blow at all!
To cope with this, wind turbines are built in remote places, usually atop hills or near the sea. This also ensures that structures like tall buildings do not interrupt the flow of the wind towards these turbines. However…
Good locations for wind farms are built on remote locations.
This seems like a good thing at first, as this means that wind turbines will be free to spin at their leisure, but these remote areas are also far away from cities where electricity is needed the most. Still, research his ongoing for transmission lines that can greatly help supply electricity from these remote locations.
But this also has a positive spin: Remote locations such as small villages and research facilities that are too far away from the main cities can still be powered up by wind turbines without the need for electrical grids connected to these cities transporting electricity all the way yonder, especially since it may be too expensive or impractical to do so.
Wind turbines produce a lot of noise pollution.
Wind turbines can be quite annoying for people that want to live a quiet lift, as you can potentially hear them from hundreds of meters away.
As wind turbines will be a constant part of the area, this means that it has the potential to ruin the peaceful life of a homeowner if built too close to them, which is why proper care must be taken that these wind turbines aren’t built too close to residents.
Thankfully, proper research is being taken to reduce the noise that wind turbines make in the future.
Another concern that people may have is that wind turbines disrupt the aesthetic of the natural environment, but this is more personal taste, as this isn’t a complaint for too many people. Some of them even like the wind turbines being there.
Wind turbines can cause wildlife deaths.
This affects birds and bats specifically, as they can fly into spinning blades and die as a result.
On the bright side, technology for wind turbines has advanced enough that most problems for these birds have been greatly reduced, if not outright resolved. In the long run, wind turbines contribute less wildlife deaths than emission-producing power plants ever will. Still, they do contribute to said deaths nonetheless, and will need to further be improved upon in the future.
For bats, research is ongoing to help reduce the impact that wind turbines have on them.
Wind turbines are costly to build.
Thanks to technology advancement, wind turbines aren’t as costly to build as before, and are still reducing in costs, but that does not mean that the upfront cost for one isn’t still very expensive.
Site surveys will need to be conducted, which can take a good amount of time, as the wind speed of an area will need to be measured by way of a research turbine.
Then there are the costs of purchasing, transporting, and installing the turbine itself.
While the construction of the wind turbine itself does not take too long, the costs can get quite enormous.
Conclusion
Wind energy usage is still being researched for maximum efficiency with minimum adverse effects on the environment as an alternative to fossil fuels as people slowly move to the use of greener energy for the environment. However, it is important to note that it is not a perfect solution as many people would like to believe just yet. In fact, large-scale wind farms utilize fossil fuels to be made.
Still, these are simply challenges that wind energy has yet to overcome, and as continued research goes on, it is likely that most of them will be minimized to a large extent, if not completely eliminated altogether.