Wind
Wind power is the conversion of wind energy into useful form, such as electricity, using wind turbines. Wind energy is plentiful, renewable, widely distributed, clean, and reduces greenhouse gas emissions when it displaces fossil-fuel-derived electricity. The intermittancy of wind seldom creates insurmountable problems when using wind power to supply a low proportion of total demand, but it presents extra costs when wind is to be used for a large fraction of demand.
The Earth is unevenly heated by the sun resulting in the poles receiving less energy from the sun than the equator does. Also the dry land heats up (and cools down) more quickly than the seas do. The differential heating drives a global atmospheric convection system reaching from the Earth’s surface to the stratosphere which acts as a virtual ceiling. Most of the energy stored in these wind movements can be found at high altitudes where continuous wind speeds of over 160 km/h (100 mph) occur. Eventually, the wind energy is converted through friction into diffuse heat throughout the Earth’s surface and the atmosphere.
