But not with envy.
Windsave®, a Scottish company founded in 2002, is helping homeowners and small business in the U.K. cut their energy costs by up to 30%. Their micro-wind turbine systems are designed with SolidWorks and SolidWorks Simulation Professional.
An exerpt from a SolidWorks press release (found here):
- Founded in 2002 in Glasgow, Windsave is the largest micro wind turbine installer in the U.K and at the forefront of a movement to bring green energy choices to consumers.
- The micro wind turbine stands just over three meters (nearly 10 feet) tall with a bladespan of 1.7 meters (5.5 feet) and is attached to a building.
- As wind spins the blades, the turbine generates electricity that supplements the incoming electricity from the grid, reducing the amount the customer has to pay for, and decreasing overall carbon emissions.
- Windsave has reduced the number of prototypes to test new products or features from four to one, saving up to £3,000 ($4,400), using SolidWorks and SolidWorks Simulation.
- The company has also reduced the prototype production and testing process from eight weeks to two.
- As the company expands sales internationally in 2009, Lumsdaine and his team will explore the possibility of mounting smaller versions of the micro turbines on street lights so municipalities can cut energy costs.
- The Global Wind Energy Council predicts that the global wind market will grow by over 155 percent to reach 240 gigawatts (GW) of total installed capacity by 2012.
- The amount of wind energy produced globally will represent nearly three percent of global electricity consumption by 2012, according to a Global Wind Energy Council report.
- More than one third of European Union electricity must come from renewable resources by 2020, according to the recently signed Renewable Energy Directive. Wind power will account for most of that renewable energy.
I’d like to see these things popping up on this side of the pond…
