As environmental concerns have focused attention on the generation of electricity from clean and renewable sources wind energy has become the world's fastest growing energy source. The Wind Energy Handbook draws on the authors' collective industrial and academic experience to highlight the interdisciplinary nature of wind energy research and provide a comprehensive treatment of wind energy for electricity generation.

Features include:

* An authoritative overview of wind turbine technology and wind farm design and development

* In-depth examination of the aerodynamics and performance of land-based horizontal axis wind turbines

* A survey of alternative machine architectures and an introduction to the design of the key components

* Description of the wind resource in terms of wind speed frequency distribution and the structure of turbulence

* Coverage of site wind speed prediction techniques

* Discussions of wind farm siting constraints and the assessment of environmental impact

* The integration of wind farms into the electrical power system, including power quality and system stability

* Functions of wind turbine controllers and design and analysis techniques

With coverage ranging from practical concerns about component design to the economic importance of sustainable power sources, the Wind Energy Handbook will be an asset to engineers, turbine designers, wind energy consultants and graduate engineering students.

British scientists, two from industry and two from academia, synthesize the current knowledge about using wind energy to generate electricity for graduate or advance undergraduate engineering students and professionals involved in the design, manufacture, or operation of wind turbines. They confine their discussion to horizontal-axis, land- based turbines connected to a large electricity network, which comprise the overwhelming majority of those in use. They also focus on commercially viable and well-established topics.
Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

"...a very rounded introduction...good value for money for a book of this detail...an essential textbook..." (Intl Jnl of Electrical Engineering Education, Vol 41(1))

Acknowledgements.

List of symbols.

Introduction.

The Wind Resource.

Aerodynamics of Horizontal-axis Wind Turbines.

Wind-turbine Performance.

Design Loads for Horizontal-axis Wind Turbines.

Conceptual Design of Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines.

Component Design.

The Controller.

Wind-turbine Installations and Wind Farms.

Electrical Systems.

References.

Index.