Wind turbines are sometimes on a small scale for a single property and increasingly in a wind farm arrangement, with power being supplied to the grid. One turbine will typically produce enough energy to power a household.Wind turbines are constructed with multiple blades and are installed in high altitude areas which receive high speed winds. The minimum required wind speed for a turbine to produce power is about 18 kph.Wind Energy is very useful in remote and rural areas, on boats and anywhere that isn't built up. The amount of energy required for operating the turbine machinery is relatively low and in line with this, wind power significantly reduces environment pollution since it has a low carbon footprint.There are some issues with wind power, especially with the unpredictability of supply. The speed of wind does vary, resulting in non-uniform production of power. Wind farm transmission losses can also be high as wind turbines are often installed in places distant from the area being supplied by the energy. There is also ongoing argument about the perceived impact of noise pollution on humans, flora and fauna.
As at July 2018, wind power supplied around 33.5% of Australia's renewable electricity or 7.1% of Australia's total electricity, was sourced from wind power. (Wikipedia) Electricity is generated from wind’s kinetic energy as the turbine blades are pushed around, driving magnets in the turbine to move past stationary coils of wire called the stator. This movement creates AC energy which has to be converted into DC energy for storage in batteries or fed into the grid via an interactive power inverter.
Wind farms have been established over water and are generally more reliable power supply with more even wind. Maintenance and construction however are expensive!