Micro Hydro Powered Systems
How awesome would it be to make all the naturally clean power you can use? Very Awesome! We have a heck of a hill but no stream. Something to think about if your looking for land. Hydro power is usually running continuously day and night so you don’t need the storage capacity of a similarly sized solar system. Here are 3 Micro Hydro Videos with totally different systems.
This guy in Northern California explains his system well and it’s one of the larger private micro hydro power systems I’ve seen. The generator is putting out about 475 Watts continuous or roughly 10-11 kW per day. The entire system cost about $5,000 to build. The hydro location is about 250 ft from the cabin. With the solar panels, I get about 12.5-13 kW per day in the summer.
micro-hydro power bucket
Very cool portable system
Ya I’d imagine if you lived on the coast or in a windy open area a small wind turbine would be ideal. Those Air-X models are only $400 for a 400w wind turbine. Our area in the woods is totally sheltered from the wind though so stream would be ideal. Not that we need more power. Our 75w solar panel provides plenty for our small needs and I still have another to install if we need it.
I have checked out Otherpower before, there the guys that make wind turbines from car disc brake rotors right? That would be a cool project. If I had a windy area I would totally tinker with it.
Good wind is apealling for much of the same reasons, and while a lot more subtle, it’s equally as powerful and much more abundant. The folks at otherpower.com really have fleshed out he small wind turbine.