75 Green Businesses You Can Start to Make Money and Make a Difference. Glenn Croston
opportunity to develop.
One source of funding for training programs is government grants. The 2007 energy bill provides up to $125 million per year for green-job training, and other government and private investments in training are expected to follow. This funding can provide training for tens of thousands of workers who can be part of the green wave and ride it to success. From the solar industry perspective, Zepeda says, “It’s a step in the right direction.”
Types of solar opportunities include:
• Building a solar worker-training program
• Developing new solar technologies
• Creating alternative funding for solar power
• Launching a job board for renewable-energy workers
• Creating online courses and programs for renewable training
Although solar power is growing rapidly, solar panels still are found on only a few scattered homes. Those who see the glass as half empty might be discouraged, but others see an opportunity waiting to be realized. Success is when every home generates its own electricity. In addition to solar, wind power and biofuels are growing rapidly, and trained workers are needed in these areas as well. By one estimate, renewable energy already employs 8.5 million people in the United States and might employ as many as 40 million people by 2030 (American Solar Energy Society, “Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency: Economic Drivers for the 21st Century,” 2007). The green wave is growing rapidly, but continuing its growth will take far more trained workers. Now is the time to start training them.
OPPORTUNITY 2 Small Wind-Turbine Installer
| The Market Need | Renewable energy other than solar power in cities and suburbia |
| The Mission | Provide small wind turbines for customers to produce their own clean power |
| Knowledge to Start | Electrical, mechanical |
| Capital Required | $ |
| Timing to Start | Weeks to months |
| Special Challenges | Small market today, but has large potential |
When it comes to renewable energy, wind power is cheap, clean, and effective. With strong and steady wind, the cost of electricity from utility-scale wind power can be as low as $.03 or $.04 per kilowatt hour—competitive with natural gas and even coal. Factoring in the additional costs of burning coal—air pollution, destruction of land, and climate change—makes wind power look like a real bargain. This is helping to drive rapid installation of large wind turbines and an emerging market in installing small wind turbines at homes and businesses.
INDUSTRY INFO
The American Wind Energy Association provides support for wind entrepreneurs in many ways. For more info about the opportunities in small-wind-turbine installation see the association’s 2007 Small Wind Turbine Global Market Study (awea.org).
Globally, the wind business grew an incredible 50 percent in 2006 (The Clean Tech Revolution, 2007), and wind power will continue to benefit from commitments to increase the use of renewable energy. There are already many winners in wind power: Producers of large wind turbines are doing very well, with manufacturers of towers, blades, and turbines in Europe, Asia, and North America jockeying for a lead position. The turbines being installed increasingly are enormous towers for megawatt-scale wind farms run by utilities—larger towers can produce power more efficiently. Some utility-size wind towers have blades more than 100 meters across, a football field in size. Companies building improved turbines, blades, or other components are expected to continue to find opportunities to grow with utility-scale wind power.
RELATED TREND
The cost of importing wind turbines produced outside the United States increased somewhat in 2007, in part due to the declining dollar and increasing cost of imported components. This should increase the competitiveness of turbines and components produced inside the United States.
Large wind towers can produce a lot of energy, but they also can raise objections from the local community. To one person, a wind farm may be a thing of beauty, replacing coal with clean, renewable energy. Others feel towers mar the scenery, leading communities to block prominent wind projects in places like Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Some residents have objected to noise or potential harm to birds. Wind power developed in wind-rich rural areas like North Dakota also is a long way away from major urban centers where most of the power is used, leading to transmission difficulties. A way for wind to contribute to our power needs avoiding some of these problems is with small wind turbines located at homes and businesses, bringing wind power directly to the consumer.
RELATED TREND
One form of wind investment is community wind projects, described in Greg Pahl’s book The Citizen-Powered Energy Handbook. With technical, financing, and regulatory issues properly addressed, locally owned wind projects stimulate the local economy and could grow rapidly.
Large wind towers work best for utility-scale energy in open remote areas, and are not generally welcome in urban or suburban environments. Small wind turbines with blades that are, at most, a few meters across are starting to pop up in locations where large turbines would not work. Local regulations permitting, small turbines can generate enough power for the average home’s needs. There were about 6,800 small wind systems sold in the United States in 2006 (AWEA Small Wind Turbine Global Market Study, 2007), with U.S. companies dominating this part of the wind business. A variety of state or local tax credits or rebates may apply to wind systems, although there isn’t a federal tax credit for small wind systems at this time. The U.S. market for small wind systems in 2006 was $56 million, a figure that is small compared with large wind turbines but growing between 14 and 25 percent a year (AWEA Global Market Study, 2007). If given a federal tax credit similar to that given to solar, the market for small wind systems likely would see much faster growth.
Wind systems like the Turby or Skystream are installed on small towers in rural and suburban markets for homes and small businesses. The Skystream from Southwest Windpower costs between $12,000 and $15,000 installed, and a typical home with a properly sited wind generator and 12 mile-per-hour wind speeds can generate 400 kilowatt hours a month, a large proportion of what most homes use. This cost compares favorably with solar power.
GREEN MARKET
Small wind may really take off in cities such as San Francisco and Chicago that have wind to spare.
Wind power might be a harder sell in less windy locations.
According to Miriam Robbins at Southwest Wind-power, “Small wind systems, especially our new Skystream design, cost less to install than the same amount of PV.” It has been estimated that electricity produced from small wind comes to about $.11 per kilowatt hour, compared with about $.18 for solar power. While small wind has been more common in rural areas, installation in suburban regions is expected to increase as people get used to seeing turbines. “We anticipate that installs will get more and more residential as more and more are installed and accepted within communities,” Robbins says. As small wind grows, so do opportunities for small-wind-turbine installers and dealers.
To become a small-wind-turbine installer, turning to the experience of others is helpful. The paper “How to Build a Small Wind Energy Business: Lessons from California” presented at the ASES Solar 2007 Conference (available online at nrel.gov) describes the ins and outs of starting a wind business. The paper describes many factors that come together in