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**Seerseraxlils** · 02-07-2012, 06:06 AM

But very few places it is steady enough to do the job, even up in the columbia river george it is known for it's wind but doesn't seem to be to good, PPL I think it was that set up a couple of big towers with each blade over 150 feet in length but never seemed to come to much, while down in Altamont pass in north central calif. they have very large wind farms, the wind is not so strong there as the columbia but is more dependable and they seem to make a lot of power.
I have never been anywhere in Thailand where they have the kind of wind that is needed, but there might be somewhere.
At all the water falls and streams in the mountains there is the potential for small hydro plants, maybe not big enough to be of a commercial potential but for a village would be sufficent.
I have a friend in northern calif. that has a couple of large springs on his ranch that they have improved for max. output and runs it thru 2 18 inch penstocks to a powerhouse they have built down close to the creek, runs the water from the springs to the PH and produces 150 KVA which is sold to PP&L, but there you can make power and it runs thru your meter, which makes the meter spin backwards when you make more than you use and so forth, and if you make more than your total usage then the power co. has to pay you.
But in Thailand I understand that you need special permission to generate power, I know I get some strange looks from some people when they come and walk on my back deck, there is a 5200 watt gen set hard wired into the system with wires running to my inlaws house next door. But I made the safety switches so the line switch has to be open before you can get power from the gen set and you can not throw the line switch til you open the gen switch. Sure wouldn't want to kill some lineman working on the power lines.

The amount of head required is dependant on the volume of flow too, you can have low head if you have a large volume of water, the more head you have, the less water you need, they make pelton wheels for both senarios, and they are really cheap for what you get, if you has 400 feet at 50 GPM you could set up a very nice high voltage unit and run the house directly off of that and not worry about a battery bank and low voltage.

02-07-2012, 06:06 AM	#8
Seerseraxlils Join Date Jan 2006 Posts 562 Senior Member	But very few places it is steady enough to do the job, even up in the columbia river george it is known for it's wind but doesn't seem to be to good, PPL I think it was that set up a couple of big towers with each blade over 150 feet in length but never seemed to come to much, while down in Altamont pass in north central calif. they have very large wind farms, the wind is not so strong there as the columbia but is more dependable and they seem to make a lot of power. I have never been anywhere in Thailand where they have the kind of wind that is needed, but there might be somewhere. At all the water falls and streams in the mountains there is the potential for small hydro plants, maybe not big enough to be of a commercial potential but for a village would be sufficent. I have a friend in northern calif. that has a couple of large springs on his ranch that they have improved for max. output and runs it thru 2 18 inch penstocks to a powerhouse they have built down close to the creek, runs the water from the springs to the PH and produces 150 KVA which is sold to PP&L, but there you can make power and it runs thru your meter, which makes the meter spin backwards when you make more than you use and so forth, and if you make more than your total usage then the power co. has to pay you. But in Thailand I understand that you need special permission to generate power, I know I get some strange looks from some people when they come and walk on my back deck, there is a 5200 watt gen set hard wired into the system with wires running to my inlaws house next door. But I made the safety switches so the line switch has to be open before you can get power from the gen set and you can not throw the line switch til you open the gen switch. Sure wouldn't want to kill some lineman working on the power lines. The amount of head required is dependant on the volume of flow too, you can have low head if you have a large volume of water, the more head you have, the less water you need, they make pelton wheels for both senarios, and they are really cheap for what you get, if you has 400 feet at 50 GPM you could set up a very nice high voltage unit and run the house directly off of that and not worry about a battery bank and low voltage.
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