WIND TURBINES … AN UNEARTHLY STATEMENT OF HOPE
I visited the Prince (Ontario) Wind Farm this week-end to get a close look at the wind turbines that we can see from the Michigan side of the St. Mary’s River. They jut above the trees, massive gray columns topped by slowly revolving propellers, each lit up at night by a red blinking light.
They should be an eyesore, particularly for those of us who prefer nature to be left alone. I’d probably have opposed their construction if given the opportunity. The Canadian horizon of gently undulating hills is no longer an uninterrupted view of northern wilderness. Now it’s more like the driveway across the road from me at Christmas when it’s transformed into a festive scene with giant blow-up balloon figures and lights strung helter skelter as far up the trees as a ladder can reach. I walk my dogs down the road at night to let them sniff and try to out-pee the owners’ dogs. The glow is so powerfully exuberant that I can’t help but laugh.
I feel the same sense of unexpected surprise and delight when I spot the wind turbines. By day they’re beautifully graceful and at night, a tasteful display of red Christmas lights blinking calmly and steadily at the bottom of the sky.
The road to the wind farm winds northwest out of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, passing through a forest for several miles. The turbines appear with startling unexpectedness … 30-story-tall towers rising sleekly above the trees. They're huge, quiet, unearthly … so unlikely in this setting, that they seem alien.
There are 126 of them. Their propellers sweep 148 acres of air. The gearbox and generator are housed in what looks like, from the ground, a smallish box where the props intersect. It’s actually the size of a bus. If conditions are perfect, each turbine can generate enough energy for 330 households.
I stood on the deserted road among the towering structures. The air was still. Snow lay on every branch and twig. High above me the propellers hummed, rotating smoothly, propelled by invisible wind. If I listened carefully I could hear what sounded like distant surf only more regular … a disturbance of the air by something powerful …whup, whup, whup. It felt hopeful, calming, like these giants had their strong arms out capturing an energy given us for free. Our environment is in danger and they were doing something about it in a new and less destructive way.
They should be an eyesore, particularly for those of us who prefer nature to be left alone. I’d probably have opposed their construction if given the opportunity. The Canadian horizon of gently undulating hills is no longer an uninterrupted view of northern wilderness. Now it’s more like the driveway across the road from me at Christmas when it’s transformed into a festive scene with giant blow-up balloon figures and lights strung helter skelter as far up the trees as a ladder can reach. I walk my dogs down the road at night to let them sniff and try to out-pee the owners’ dogs. The glow is so powerfully exuberant that I can’t help but laugh.
I feel the same sense of unexpected surprise and delight when I spot the wind turbines. By day they’re beautifully graceful and at night, a tasteful display of red Christmas lights blinking calmly and steadily at the bottom of the sky.
The road to the wind farm winds northwest out of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, passing through a forest for several miles. The turbines appear with startling unexpectedness … 30-story-tall towers rising sleekly above the trees. They're huge, quiet, unearthly … so unlikely in this setting, that they seem alien.
There are 126 of them. Their propellers sweep 148 acres of air. The gearbox and generator are housed in what looks like, from the ground, a smallish box where the props intersect. It’s actually the size of a bus. If conditions are perfect, each turbine can generate enough energy for 330 households.
I stood on the deserted road among the towering structures. The air was still. Snow lay on every branch and twig. High above me the propellers hummed, rotating smoothly, propelled by invisible wind. If I listened carefully I could hear what sounded like distant surf only more regular … a disturbance of the air by something powerful …whup, whup, whup. It felt hopeful, calming, like these giants had their strong arms out capturing an energy given us for free. Our environment is in danger and they were doing something about it in a new and less destructive way.
18 Comments
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Comment by Hybrid Home Guy on December 4, 2008 at 10:35pm - Good Picture Eric. How many gaping wounds in the forests have power poles created? I bet placing miles of power poles is at least 100 times more destructive than a wind farm.
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Comment by Eric Hughes "The Green Home Designer" on December 4, 2008 at 10:38pm - Great point Adam and no loss of crops.
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Comment by Eric Hughes "The Green Home Designer" on December 4, 2008 at 10:43pm
- Plus how many Squirrels get kill every year my power poles transformer and substations
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Comment by Hybrid Home Guy on December 4, 2008 at 10:50pm
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A proven fact, is that a window is 10,000 or more times deadlier to birds than a wind generator. Or how about the people in Onekama whose argument was that they were worried that their grand kids would get sucked into them. I know, that is ridiculous, but that is how ignorant some people can be.
What I am excited about, is that regardless of if you are for or against them, people are actually talking about them now!
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Comment by Eric Hughes "The Green Home Designer" on December 4, 2008 at 10:54pm
- Great point Adam ! It is great to see people talking about them. I wonder what there toughts are on small scale residential wind tower?
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Comment by Hybrid Home Guy on December 4, 2008 at 11:03pm
- From my experience with legislation and working with municipalities, everyone is for them, but 'not in their backyards'. Things are getting better by the day thou. Portage Michigan recently passed a residential wind ordinance that will allow any residence in Portage to have a wind generator on poles up to 60 feet. They are also one of the first municipalites to recognize house mounted units and have language in that ordinance that states a house mounted unit can not be any higher than 10 feet above the highest part of the house it is on. That is pretty progressive and wins them my "OH YEAH!" award this week....
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Comment by Russell McConnell on December 6, 2008 at 7:04pm -
Hi Leslie,
Very interesting article. I have seen a 'wind farm' off the 10 Freeway just east of Palm Springs, CA. It's in a gap
between some mountains. (There are a number of them here in California.) I saw what I'm sure were more than 100 wind generators, although I don't recall any being 30 stories tall. They were much smaller. Their strictly functional appearance is what's probably most off-putting. After all no one would say an old Dutch windmill doesn't add charm to a landscape. It's too bad the great designer /stylist Raymond Loewy isn't still alive. I'm sure his approach would be interesting. The real issue is of course too many people, but that's for another day.
Russell
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Comment by Jim MacInnes on December 8, 2008 at 11:14am - yes, Steve Smiley's community power ideas are great! He really knows what he is talking about with respect to this idea. We need a lot of different kinds of energy supplies including wind, solar PV, biomass power, combined heat and power (CHP) all localized.
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