In keeping with one of the City of Easthampton’s expressed goals of remaking the former manufacturing town into a regional pioneer in renewable energy production, the municipality can now point to a local company that is working to make low-cost wind energy technology available to anyone who wants it. Urban Power USA, Inc. plans to begin the research phase of field trials for its first product, a 10-foot commercial wind turbine for smaller buildings, using a patented vertical turbine model that’s easily adaptable to urban rooftops, and may eventually be made viable for residential use as well.
The company, located on Pleasant Street, hopes to expand its production as well as offer other, bigger versions of its product (to commercial entities that have the rooftop space to support them). Urban Power USA projects that it will add more than 100 jobs in the next two years.
In a written statement on its website, Urban Power USA sets out its goal of “promoting low cost environmentally friendly wind generated electricity to all people,” saying it will “contribute a portion of corporate profit to local and regional communities for social reinvestment and share its profits with its employees.”
One of its main goals is to keep power affordable. The company notes that wind power’s cost per kilowatt hour is expected to be the cheapest source of energy for decades to come; Urban Power USA’s most compact model (8 feet in diameter and costing about $7,000) produces up to 2 kilowatts and can pay for itself in less than three years. Larger models (such as the UT-10) are 16 feet in diameter and can produce up to 12 kilowatts of power.The units are also capable of being wired into net metering devices that allow the power producer to sell excess electricity back to the grid.
The nascent corporation is the brainchild of turbine inventor and Easthampton resident Mark Maynard and business partners Michael Garjian and Kimela Webb. Largely founded with Maynard’s retirement savings, the company is currently vying for grant money to place some of the turbines atop Easthampton city buildings, with the aid of Easthampton Mayor Michael Tautznik.
Urban Power USA is actively seeking both investors and a local business with appropriate rooftop space available to further test the potential of its products—offering to “make significant financial considerations in return for collected data and testimony of performance.” The company’s website also features something of a tutorial on how a group of residents in an apartment or condominium building might go about forming their own power co-op by jointly purchasing a unit, placing it on the building’s rooftop and sharing the power that’s produced among their various residences. For more on Urban Power USA, its products and plans for the future, visit www.urbanpowerusa.com.
