Soldiers Field Park Wind Turbines

On September 22, Harvard Real Estate Services installed two 10-kilowatt Bergey Excel wind turbines on the top deck of the Soldiers Field Park Garage. We were on-hand to witness the installation and talked with the project manager (Chris Packard of JLL) and contractor (Tom Dowd of North Shore Solar and Wind Power). The turbines atop their 40 foot towers look great and are noticeable from a large part of Allston and Cambridge. The poles are mounted to steel supports that go through the top deck and down two more floors. The turbines automatically track the wind and are set to veer away from the wind if it is too high. The garage was recently retrofitted (project managed by our group - the Green Building Services of the Office for Sustainability) with all new vapor tight super T-8 fixtures and occupancy sensors and is testing some pole mounted LED fixtures on the top deck. The new lights are predicted to save about 40% in energy costs, greatly increasing the percentage of the building powered by the new turbines. The turbines are are expected to produce enough electricity to power six average American homes. A link to a Harvard Gazette article can be found here.

Holyoke Wind Turbines

Early this year, Harvard Real Estate Services installed 6 of the AeroVironment AVX1000 architectural wind turbines. Each of the parapet mounted turbines is rated for 1 kilowatt and can spin in winds as slow as 4 mph. Last week I took some time after a meeting to take a few pictures and they were spinning rapidly. While in the meeting in the building's 10th (top) floor minutes before taking the pictures, I didn't notice any noise or vibration. The turbines' inverter has not been connected to the internet yet, but when it is we will be able to monitor their effectiveness.

More information can be found here.