Breath of Fresh Air: interview with Ward Van Hout

EWEA: Why do you support wind energy?

Van Hout: I support wind energy because it is the future. Wind energy will help us to overcome the shortage of fossil fuels. There has been an enormous increase in world population which means a drastic increase in energy consumption. And with this comes more and more pollution, higher CO2 concentrations, etc. An excellent alternative is wind energy. On Earth, sufficient wind is available for our energy needs. Strikingly, there is 200 times more wind energy available than current energy demand. Wind power is solar power, meaning that as long as the sun is giving us heat, we can make use of wind turbines to collect that power. It is clear that wind energy is the driving power of the 21st century – the renewable energy age!

EWEA: Where are you from and is there any wind energy in your area?

Van Hout: I’m from Geel in Belgium. In my hometown region there are a lot of wind turbines creating green energy, but in the region of Delft, the Netherlands – where I study – there are almost no wind turbines. In the future, I would like to see more wind energy in my region, more wind energy in Europe and more wind energy in the world!

EWEA: Where did you hear of our campaign?

Van Hout: I heard of your campaign by reading EWEA’s Wind Directions magazine. I immediately thought it was a good idea to participate in this campaign. And so I adopted my own wind turbine. I think this campaign is a very good way of making decision makers in the world wake up. I hope many of them will be interested.

EWEA: Do you have any other comments or stories about wind power?

Van Hout: To conclude, I want to tell you some other comments. Wind energy has existed throughout time. The Persians started using windmills in 2000BC. From then on, people started experimenting with different rotors and different mill concepts. Even my own grandfather was experimenting and reading books to build his own wind turbine. Nowadays, the airfoils of modern windmills are still based on the experiments of hundreds of years ago. Isn’t it fantastic that after so many years people are still helping to create more windmills to provide humanity with energy, and help the Earth breathe again?

By Zoë Casey, blog.ewea.org