Inspired by the open designs of small wind expert Hugh Piggott, the appropriate technology movement of the 1970s’, the current makers movement, and the values of openness, collaboration, and conviviality in technology production, WE aims to support rural electrification through open technologies and the local manufacture of small wind turbines (SWTs). It provides a global platform for knowledge sharing with the overall aim of empowering more people across the globe to be able to harness the power in the wind for self-managing their energy and providing access to sustainable electricity to underserved and marginalised communities.
WE brings together practitioners, researchers, and organisations whose activities span from research and development, education, and knowledge transfer to the local production and provision of products and services. WE members operate based on openness and collaboration in knowledge and technology production, making WE a global database of distributed knowledge and a place of synergistic knowledge creation on wind energy. Today Wind Empowerment represents 37 member organisations, consisting of wind turbine manufacturers, NGOs, research groups, social enterprises, cooperatives, training centres, as well as hundreds of individual practitioners and researchers across the world.