Wind to power manufacturing shop

July 22, 2009

By JoAn Bjarko

The Wellington

 

An agricultural equipment manufacturing shop at 3901 Wine Cup St. will be the first Wellington (Colorado) business with a wind turbine.

 

The Wellington Planning Commission approved the site plan for a 45-foot tower at its July 13 meeting, and the company hopes to have the turbine generating electricity by mid-August.

 

The family business, known as Groff Ag and Winick Farms, is located in a light industrial zone adjacent to Allan and Judy Winicks’ home on the south side of town. Their daughter, Nicole Sterler, is also a partner in the business.

 

The Winicks have hired Cheyenne Wind Energy Inc. to install a Skystream 3.7 three-phase wind turbine. It has a three-blade rotor that is 12 feet in diameter, so the peak point of the blades will be about 52 feet high.

 

“We use a lot of electricity in our shop,” Allan Winick said of his motivation for buying a turbine.

 

This is a particularly good time to do so. Groff Ag is eligible for a 25 percent energy tax credit on the $16,700 turbine, Winick said.

The turbine will start making power when the wind blows 8 miles per hour, he said, and it is designed to automatically shut down if wind speed exceeds 56 mph.

 

Power will feed directly into the Xcel Energy grid. The business’s electric meter will run forward or backward, depending on whether Groff Ag is adding energy to the grid or using energy. Winick estimates the business will save $200 to $250 a month as a result.

 

If Xcel power goes out, Winick can disconnect from the grid and feed wind energy directly into the shop’s lines to operate some of the smaller machines. Noise from the blades will be about 50 decibels, the same level as normal talking.

 

“We’ve done a lot of research on this,” he said.

 

Winick will use computer software to monitor how much energy the wind turbine produces and how much it reduces the company’s carbon footprint. It’s a logical complement to a business that specializes in agricultural planter attachments needed for carbon sequestration (long-term storage). Winick said sales this year alone made it possible for farmers to sequester 600,000 tons of carbon.

 

Wellington will have another wind turbine at its middle school, though an installation date has not been set. The Governor’s Energy Office chose the school as one of six in Colorado to receive funding to install and operate a wind turbine on site. In addition to the $5,000 GEO grant, each school will get $2,500 from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to purchase the equipment. The school needs to raise additional money to pay for a cement pad and electrical work.