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Published on October 18th, 2012 | by Jake Richardson

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99% Natural Timber Tower for Wind Turbines

October 18th, 2012 by  

Timber Tower makes wooden wind power towers up to 200 meters tall for wind turbines. Their test tower at Hannover employs a 1.5 MW Vensys wind turbine, which has been estimated to generate electricity for about 1,000 homes. The turbine weighs one hundred tons.

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The timber tower support structure is a wooden hollow column with a multi-sided cross-section. Hexagonal, octagonal, or dodecagonal cross-sections are used. The timber used to make the wooden pieces are sourced from ecologically and economically responsible forestry practices. The certificates of the wood suppliers guarantee that the raw material used originates from ecologically, economically and socially responsible forest management.

One of the main advantages of using wood for wind power towers is cost. Steel can by very expensive, but locally sourced timber typically is much cheaper. Another advantage is transportation of the tower materials and pieces to challenging locations. Wood materials are easier to carry via large trucks than tubular steel sections.

Timber Towers are guaranteed to have a minimum life cycle of twenty years. Once a tower has exhausted its usefulness, the materials can be recycled.

Image Credit: Timber Tower

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Hello, I have been writing online for some time, and enjoy the outdoors. If you like, you can follow me on Google Plus.


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  • Are you saying metal towers can’t be recycle? That is nonsense. I see no advantage of wood over metal. Both require energy to make the tower and today’s energy comes from hydrocarbon (which creates CO2). Also, metal is much stronger than wood.

    • Luke

      The reaction to make & smelt steel is much more carbon intensive than any process conceivable required to build a wooden wind turbine tower.

  • And using timber is a great way of sequestering carbon.

    • Sorry Mike. Are you going to whittle that tower with your knife? It will take carbon producing fuel to make that wood tower.

      • Martin: In spite of great efforts by the steel industries, it is very hard to make steel without burning coal (coke).

        Yes, fossil fuel is required to cut down trees but generally steel is recognized as requiring far more fossil fuel than lumber.

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