At a General Electric research site in southern California, wind turbines that have been up and running for more than a decade are still being improved in efficiency through testing and studies.
Today, GE turbines operate at 97.6 percent power availability, the same as an electrical coal plant, while their energy efficiency’s capacity has risen from 35 percent ten years ago to more than 50 percent, according to Clean Technica.
By developing algorithms to predict wind and networking between turbines, GE’s advances have drastically improved along with the company’s ability to produce turbines itself. Ten years ago, the company could product 10 turbines weekly; they can now make 13 of them daily.
By analyzing the surroundings of around 18,000 of their 22,000 turbines, the company can contribute more than ever to electricity using wind power, which has lowered the cost of wind-generated electricity from its overall cost of between $1 and $7 per megawatt-hour.
Reaching the median cost of all electricity
GE’s continued advances in wind energy technology have driven the cost of the produced energy down by around 60 percent, general manager of wind products Keith Longtin told the news source. Wind-generated energy can now achieve a cost of only five to seven cents per kilowatt-hour, he said, which rivals the median cost of power from natural gas power plants or gas combustion turbines.
The advantages of turbines mean that energy is produced without contamination and waste from other forms of energy, which can protect the environment and public health in an effective way, and 40 percent of new energy generation capacity installed in the United States was via wind power.
Storing excess wind power
More innovations in the development of wind power and turbines include a new project in Washington to store excess electricity created by the machines. The Nine Canyon Wind Project is testing new lithium-ion batteries that could each store enough energy to power about a dozen homes for more than 12 hours.
The early testing projects are planned to be small, only capturing a portion of available power, but could revolutionize the technology, according to the Salem, Oregon Statesman Journal. If successful, they could possibly allow turbines’ energy to be stored during low-demand periods so they can assist production when demand is high.
Further use of these tests, both by General Electric and the Nine Canyon Wind Project, can revolutionize wind technology. Not only can products’ life spans increase in longevity, but efficiency will sharply rise while maintenance costs and production costs can be lowered.