Although I knew the basics the details were very hard to find in one place online, so someone on my Facebook group did the full accounts so the total can be easily shown to demonstrate wind turbines use as much power as they create, ie they do not do anything at all. --------------------------------- Yaw mechanism to turn the rotor into the wind. 20kW Pitch mechanism to adjust the blade angle to the wind 15kW Lights, controllers, communication, sensors, data collection, etc. 10kW Heating the blades during winter. 250Kw Heating/cooling and dehumidifying the nacelle. 10kW Oil heater, pump, cooler and filtering system of the gearbox 25kW Hydraulic brake to lock the blades when the wind is too strong. 5kW Thyristors for power conditioning and connection. 25kW Magnetizing the stator to keep the rotor speed constant 25kW Using the generator as a motor to help blades start to turn when wind speed is low or, as many suspect, to create the illusion the facility is producing electricity when it is not, particularly during site tours. It also spins the rotor shaft and blades to prevent warping when there is no wind. 50Kw. TOTAL Installed. 435kW. Not all items will be used at the same time, although they may be. However, we can generously assume 50% usage, for a parasitic consumption of approximately 215 kW. Turbine rated wind speed is 12 mps. Cut in speed is 4 mps. Rated power is 2 mW. Power varies as cube of wind speed. Therefore Power at 4mps is 2,000,000/3x3x3 = 74kW Nett output is â??141kW Power at 5mps is 144kW Nett output is -71kW Power at 6mps is 250kW Nett output is +35kW This shows that the machine does not start to produce useful power until wind speeds reach around 6mps, assuming that 35kW from a 2mW machine can be considered as useful. Published figures for average wind speeds locally (Banbury area. It will vary depending on actual location) at masthead height are 6mps. There are subsequent losses such as transformer inefficiencies and transmission losses to take power from turbine to grid. We can assume approximately 6% to 15%, depending on the type of equipment and transmission line lengths. ---------------------------- If anyone imagined they actually produced any power then here is the full consumption which has to be subtracted once the small amounts they do produce has been totted up. It is actually no different from using motors to turn the turbines directly. The reason we have them in the EU is because the owners are paid to use their land with taxes, and the countries are fined more if they don't use them, so has no bearing at all on generating any power, but does generate (well move actually) massive amounts of cash.