Why Wind Power Is a Good Choice for Clean Energy

Wind Energy

To what extent is wind power an effective from of renewable energy? The question is an important one when situated within the context of today's world of energy wars (as in the Middle East), air pollution causing cancer (as indicated by the World Health Organization), and more and more communities looking to "go green" all over the world. But what are the advantages and disadvantages of wind power? This essay will address this question and discuss just some of the ways that wind power can be utilized to change the way we live our lives.

As Sahin (2004) notes, wind energy is a "clean, practical, economical and environmentally friendly alternative" to energy created from other sources which damage the planet and ruin the health of individuals, such as the burning of fossil fuels (p. 501). Wind power is effective at cutting energy production costs, it has been utilized in industries around the world, and it is now viewed as a direct competitor of other energy producers (Sahin, 2004). But what is wind energy and how does it work to be an effective producer?

As Herbert et al. (2007) observe, wind power is the "indirect form of solar energy and is always being replenished by the sun" (p. 1117). Therefore, unlike a fossil fuel, it is never in scarce supply. (This may be one reason that energy companies don't like it -- there is less likelihood of them controlling the price based on scarcity). On the contrary, wind energy is plentiful and renewable -- and, best of all, it is clean. But how does it work? Wind is created by the sun's rays, which heat the earth differentially. As the earth heats and cools, it releases energy in the form of wind, which has been estimated to contain "10 million MW of energy" at any one given time (Herbert et al., 2007, p. 1117) -- however, maximum energy power depends upon the site and the wind speed that is there, and this changes from place to place and time to time (Shepherd, Zhang, 2011, p. 68). Nonetheless, there are some disadvantages to wind energy, as researchers around the world have shown.

First off, the component parts of wind turbines face various shortfalls, regarding noise and breakdown (Herbert et al., 2007). However, in the 1990s, wind power development made significant strides in overcoming a series of hurdles to make it a more effective energy producer and the disadvantages of noise and technical reliability have for the most part been reduced (Ackermann, Soder, 2000).

But noise and technology are not the only drawbacks. It is also important to have good wind sites and this can be problematic as some of the windiest places on the planet are in hard-to-reach locations, away from urban areas where the electricity is most in demand. This requires lengthy lines of transmission to be distributed which can be costly. At the same time, opponents will argue that the land where wind turbines are set up can be more profitably used. This argument is begging-the-question, however, and does not really pertain to the legitimate discussion of wind energy's efficiencies. If the land were used for farming, how would that add to the discussion of wind energy? The point is that wind energy is a viable alternative to other forms of energy that are less clean, and people have a right to discuss it and not be waylaid by logical fallacies such as this one.

Essentially, as time goes on and technology improves, wind energy becomes a more and more efficient source of power, and the arguments against it are rendered null and void. Cost used to be an issue, but today it is less so, and critics merely cite the cost of initial investment as a reason not to utilize it -- but compared to the vast amounts of money pumped into shale oil, for instance, how can one determine that wind energy is a less attractive solution? One cannot. Indeed, the advantages of wind energy far outweigh any disadvantages that still exist. For example, the "aesthetic' disadvantage (an absurdity in and of itself when compared to the aesthetic "advantage" of oil dykes) is hardly anything to balk at when the advantages of wind power are that it is clean, sustainable, domestically abundant, as the increase in cumulative power in the U.S. has shown, climbing at rates of 30% per year; it is cost effective and can be employed in rural areas, bringing revenue where it is needed -- and it has the potential to support half a million jobs, too (U.S. Department of Energy, 2015). Plus, as Boyle (2012) notes, wind energy is a great renewable energy source that continues to improve year over year and offers an added benefit when discussed within the context of providing clean energy for the health of the planet and its people.