A couple of years ago, my daughter did a science fair project about maximizing the energy generated by a wind turbine. We bought a kit from Kid Wind that included the gear box, shafts, and PVC parts for constructing a tower. It was my daughter’s job to construct the blades and decide which aspect of the blade design she would test. It was a cool project – definitely one of those that I hovered over and wanted to take control of so I could play with it myself!
Don’t have one of these nifty sets in your basement? You can still get an idea about the factors that affect wind energy production by visiting an interactive feature on the environmental page of the National Geographic website. It has tabs that provide a basic introduction to the parts of a wind turbine and the factors that affect energy production. Then you can try it out yourself by adjusting various factors: wind speed, altitude, tower height, and blade radius.
Give it a try!