The March of Progress: My New Skyline

[JohnI]

Amazing what can happen in a month . . . just before I left to the US I noticed a number of pieces of heavy equipment on the hill at the head of the valley. "Hmmmm", I wondered, "wonder what that is all about?"

I came home to this:





The wind farm project that I thought was somewhere in the next valley over is busy usurping my skyline.

Mind you, turbines are in all respects better than the horrors of offshore drilling or its evil little twin, fracking, just to name a couple of other methods of power generation. Nonetheless, a skyline which was likely the same some four thousand years ago for the people who lived here, a familiar landmark at the head of this valley, is now dominated by a somewhat unnatural forest.

Put another way, are wind turbine the new standing stones, arrayed in alignment with the winds rather than sun and moon?

So I consider my new horizon . . . and all that it implies.

John

[Ulfric M Douglas]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

I always wondered how (in what order) they put those things up.
Trunk first then bolt on the blades, or all together lying down then lifted up.

[JohnI]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

I always wondered how (in what order) they put those things up.
Trunk first then bolt on the blades, or all together lying down then lifted up.

I've been watching, and went up there and took a closer look.

First, they put down a monster deep concrete footing with what looks like the cable conduits and a transformer vault built-in.

Next they position that big crane and lift up and assemble the tower in sections.

Next they lift up the turbine head and bolt it on (I suppose - haven't seen any sign of welders or arc welding).

Finally the blades are attached one by one. To give you an idea of the scale of the thing, those blades are 20 metres or a little better in length. Each assembly is huge if you are standing at its base.


John

New edit: Holy Fanblades, Batman! Just did a little research and found out those turbines are 2.3 megawatt Enercon E-82's. With, get this, an overall head diameter of 82 metres, which means each blade is pushing 40 metres in length. Wow.

Heres the site: http://www.enercon.de/en-en/63.htm

J

[Zuiko]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

The question is, are they a necessary evil or a waste of space? The economic and ecological case does seem to be unproven and open for debate.

[Ulfric M Douglas]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

So we'll be seeing gypsies with tunnel-boring machines next ... mmmm, cables ...

[timg]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

When people complain about these I always think would you rather have these or a nuclear power station at the end of the road?

Unfortunately, everyone needs energy, even if you do live a remote spot and it's got to be generated somehow.

[DJMC]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

The question is, are they a necessary evil or a waste of space? The economic and ecological case does seem to be unproven and open for debate.

Like I said elsewhere "every action has an equal and opposite reaction."

Perhaps these are sucking the wind out of the sky, depriving our weather system of movement and leading to prolonged bouts of sunshine and rainfall?

We had all the notices from our local planning department about a wind farm being built miles away which we would never see/hear, then another bunch of turbines appeared in a different location across the fields at the rear of our house. Perhaps further away, but more annoying, and no 'by your leave' at all.

[Ulfric M Douglas]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

When people complain about these I always think would you rather have these or a nuclear power station at the end of the road?.

Move to Cumbria : you can have both

[Fearless Leader]

Re: The March of Progress: My New Skyline

You can always clone them out!