The History of Wind Energy Research: Wind Energy: Eco20/20

The History of Wind Energy Research

Wind power is one of the most promising new energy technologies in our society. Giant wind farms are being built in areas all over the world and everyone is very excited about the potential of this new resource. Wait…new? Although exciting and promising, wind power is anything but new. In fact, the history of wind power dates all the way back to 500 A.D.

As early as 500-900 A.D., windmills were being built to automate the tasks of water pumping and grain grinding. Although very few details have been found explaining the complexities of the entire systems, documents have been found that describe the construction of some early windmills. The designs were very basic, made of a vertical shaft, horizontal struts, and sails made of wood or bundles of reeds. Although simple, they were effective and helped early people complete tasks more easily. Similar systems are documented as being used in China and in Crete, where hundreds of sail-rotor windmills pumped water for the people, crops, and livestock.

By 1270 A.D., windmills had made an appearance in Western Europe. By this time, the most commonly used design had changed from horizontal to vertical axis. Although the reason for the change is unclear, the new design was much more efficient. The windmills had to be manually turned to the wind and skilled tradesmen, called windsmiths, were responsible for optimizing energy output and furling the sails during storms to prevent damage. Over the next 500 years, changes and improvements were made to basic windmill design. Finally, windmills had achieved all the major features that are now considered to be crucial to wind power systems. Their main purpose had grown by this time as well. In addition to grinding grain and pumping water, these windmills were also used to saw wood and to process spices and coffee.

Windmill technology had moved to America by 1854, starting with the Halladay windmill and eventually moving on to the Dempster and Aerstar designs, which are still used. The main function of these windmills was for subsistence water pumping. They largely used wooden blades until the introduction of steel blades in 1870. Between 1850 and 1870, there were over six million small windmills in operation in America, still mostly used for pumping water. A few larger units were also in use, with the primary use being to provide water for steam engines. Then, sometime late in the 19th century, the first electricity producing windmill was designed.

You can see, though the advances in wind power technology in the 20th century are amazing, this is certainly not a new idea. For almost as long as people have existed, they have tried to harness the power of the wind. Without these early green energy pioneers and their important developments, wind energy would not show such promise today.