Once you’ve made the decision to build your own wind turbine, you’ll need to find plans. Do a little exploring on the web, at your local bookstore, or in the library. The information is out there—and often free. But not all information is of the same great quality. Here are a few websites we like to get you started:

Vela Creations: Their Chispito wind generator can even be made from recycled materials. This couple lives off the grid in West Texas. They know their stuff.

Green Terra Firma: This project “is appropriate for high school students.” Confirmation that wind energy generation is a DIY project!

Other Power: You can not only buy “Homebrew Wind Power blueprints” here, you can also sign up for classes.

Wind Energy 7: Not sure you want to start from scratch? Purchase a professionally made kit or hire an installer.

YouTube: There are dozens of DIY videos about wind energy, but so many of them just don’t give a complete explanation. We found Bill Malta’s videos to be most instructive so far. If you’re a spelling purist, the videos may irk you, but try to get past that. This is about good, solid information, and Bill provides that. The only audio is music, which is unfortunate. A nice voice over would have been helpful, but he puts everything you need to know (including cautions about what he’s done wrong) in text overlays. Here’s the first in his series of two (that we’re aware of):

Homemade Wind Turbine, Part 1, Bill Malta on YouTube

Good luck! And please let us know about your progress.

J.M. Ratliff

Publisher

Green Energy Guru