I flew my gyropcopter with a 30 foot rotor and showed him what a 265 foot rotor looks like! They are erecting 240 of these giant wind turbines SE of Bloomington, IL. They are 30 miles from my airport and I could see them as soon as I lifted off.
Stan
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Wind farms. Love it! How 'bout those K people in Hyannisport MA that fought against the wind mills withen their site line. Hope you get your replica by D-Bug soon.
Chuck S
live, work, build, ...better with wood
Special Ks from Mass?
the drunks, the Kennedys
Yea, and their reputation for driving over bridges isn't all that hot either.
Steve:
Before you get to far out of line perhaps you ought to check out some details of the project. Things like they are going to be built in the middle of one of the richest recreational & commercial fisheries left in the North East. That the local airlines, ferry companies, the Coast Guard & The Air National Guard have all expressed concern about their effect on the safety of boats & planes transiting the area, especially now that they have amended their application to raise all the towers an additional 40 feet to aproximately 450 feet (that's substantially taller than the statue of liberty!) total height above the water. No one seems to know whether the towers will be a benefeit to marine life like offshore platforms or detrimental somehow. And just as an aside, how do you deal with a private comapany erecting this project on public land and making a profit off of it, should the taxpayers be compensated somehow, what about the fisherman? Now I'm no big fan of the Kennedy family and I do believe that we need to find ways to get away from our dependancy on foreign oil but there are a lot of unanswered questions that need to be addressed before I'll sign on to this one.
Maybe this is the perfect solution and maybe all my fears are totally unfounded but... maybe they're not, and if this project does a giant face plant are we going to be stuck with 160 monuments to our desire to rush through the process? I'd rather put the brakes on a little bit now and get some real answers before we put this thing up and get stuck with a giant white elephant.
Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox now.
BILL
That's a pretty good summary of issues noted with that wind project. There is a project here in the exploratory phase to sink some tidal energy generators in some of our straits many of the same issues exist. OTOH there are numerous wind farms going up in eastern Washington and I'm getting a fair amount of my juice from them.
...concern about their effect on the safety of boats & planes transiting the area...
Bill,
I don't know anything at all about the proposed project you referenced.
With that in mind, how are boats going to be affected by the windmills? Are some going to be located in the sea?
Yes they will, they'll be sitting on a piece of sea floor known as Horse Shoe Shoals. As far as the wind is concerned, it's a great place to do it but there are an awful lot of unanswered questions left.
It's funny, I wouldn't really care whether the answers were the answers I wanted to hear but they're not answering them at all, at least not yet. I think it would be great to have a source of environmentally friendly power nearby. I just don't want to muck things up or create some kind of furball down the line somewhere.
BILL
Bill,Thanx for pointing out things I was unaware about.Stan, Great pics. How do you fly and focus the camera at the same time?Chuck Slive, work, build, ...better with wood
The Cape Wind is the ultimate NIMBY project. I'd love to see it go, just to irk Teddy. The best argument I've heard against it is just how economically unfeasible it would be without all the subsidies. That and the estimated energy savings for a typical new england household is something like $.10 a month. Once you weigh in all the factors, the miniscule benefits don't seem to outweigh the cons.
Stan, those are some awesome pictures. We always seem to relate to our surroundings in a human scale. The turbines really give you a global scale.
Chuck: I can fly hands and feet free for miles in that thing....but when near the ground I keep my hand on the cyclic. The camera is just point and shoot.
Stan
Stan,
Those windmills are all over Holland and Germany. I don't know how much power they produce but a TV add by Shell Oil (I think) says that it would take 20,000 of them to power Paris.
I suppose they're a necessity but between them and the cell phone towers the landscape is pretty industrial looking. I suppose it is needed to reduce oil dependency but I hope that it can be limited to certain areas so we can conserve some parts of the planet as they were.
There's more to being human than just procreating and consuming..."War is God's way of teaching Americans geography." Ambrose Bierce
amazing sight, Stan....and the farm land looks completely harvested. As the past month has shown Your scouting advantages with your gyrocoptor is a real asset. I cant help but think that this aircraft could not be used for number of surveillance usages. stinky
Stinky: The Department of Defense has many of these SparrowHawks on patrol on the Mexican border. Many police departments are using them as well. Its a very serious machine and not just a toy as some think. I would take an engine out in one of these over any kind of airplane or helicopter hands down.
I have been into more of the toy type gyrocopters until I built my RAF2000....and especially this machine. Today...the winds are forcast to be 30 mph. Not even an issue with these machines....the biggest thing to watch is rotor management on the ground...meaning keeping the tip path plane tilted into the wind. Otherwise....takeoffs are almost vertical......you can go straight up......fly backwards and land a blanket size pad.
I use mine for hobby and business and it has never let me down except soflty....ha.
Stan
Stan:
Your pics from the Gyro are always so great!
Sorry about the Wind Farm Hi-jack.
BILL
eeka neeka
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We were chaining up in a truck stop in Oregon - there was a specialized rig with one rotor arm on the "trailer" it was 125' long iirc. Up close it took a while to figure out what the thing was.
I too have heard they don't produce much power - a friend with the electric company monitored a homeowners backyard unit - it made $11 electricity a year! So much for payback.
Anyone know the facts on these monsters?
Treat every person you meet like you will know them the rest of your life - you just might!
All I know is that they must be worth doing, even in an area where there's a lot of hydro. Maybe population growth in this region is driving it, I dunno... but here's a few facts.
http://www.res-ltd.com/wind-farms/wf-9canyon.htm
http://www.planetark.com/avantgo/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=37921
I passed a windmill vane riding down the highway on the back of a looonng truck this summer, it was kind of difficult to figure out what it was at first because it was so huge.
I'm not sure how much power they each produce, but it does add up...Xcel Energy here in Minnesota has over 1,000 megawatts' worth of them online, and is planning on doubling that number by the end of 2007.
I think the largest units produce 3Mw.ooops, it looks like 2.5Mw for Clipper and
3.6 for GE
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.Wer ist jetzt der Idiot
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Edited 10/31/2006 8:12 pm by maddog3
I've always worked with small tactical systems (5-50 kw), so 3.6 megawatts seems huge until...
An average size coal fired plant goes 300 megawatts (about 170,000 homes)
then
Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station in Arizona generates more electricity annually than any other U.S. power plant of any kind, including coal, oil, natural gas and hydro. The three-unit, 3,804-megawatt nuclear plant generated 25,807,446 megawatt-hours of electricity in 2005. Palo Verde generated more electricity than all of the wind and solar plants in the U.S. combined in 2005.
I like the environmental aspects of the wind turbine but also recognize the economic factors of constructing and especially maintaining the number of wind turbines required.
I understand that the designs are finally becoming mature enough to get the maintenance costs down to a reasonable number.
The big improvement was adding the ability for the turbine to turn into the wind (yaw). Before, the turbines were fixed pointing in the direction of the "average" wind direction. Whenever the winds were appreciably off average direction, it would put a significant load on the bearings and shafts (consider that a 1.5 MW generator requires over 2000 horsepower of input power no matter what the energy source).
I'm personally impressed by the demonstration of technology that the wind farms present when I look at them.
I'm looking forward to the day when they provide a significant portion of our energy needs.
Thanks,
Marc
I cant help but think this is the latest craze with Utilities, since the peaker frenzy seems to have died down, besidesI was under the impression the national grid was "full " and new Distribution is what is needed...not merely more Generation.
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.Wer ist jetzt der Idiot
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Marc,
As far as I know 1.5 mw is as near as nothing the same as 2000 hp. What did you mean when you said the wind turbines needed input power of 2000 hp?
Ron
Ron,
I was suggesting the forces involved on the shaft and bearings when the wind was blowing from off-center before they added yaw to the turbines using a measure of power familiar to most everyone.
I used the value for one of the smaller commercial turbines just because it came out with a reasonably sized horsepower value. Most of us can visualize what 2000 horsepower means saying to ourselves "Well, that's six 18 wheelers" or "That's a small locomotive engine".
Marc
Marc,
I get it. Thanks. I'm not really as slow as everybody says.
I thought you were saying that the energy input was the same as the energy output.
Ron
IIRC, the steel tube ones can go up to 5megawatts. jt8
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree." -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
IIRC, the steel tube ones can go up to 5megawatts.
Sure, but what is the payoff - do they cost more to build than they produce, or do they make it before they wear out? Are their gov't subsidies that cloud the facts?
I don't know how to wade through the politics/spin on this issue - there seem to be so many wild claims - about bird deaths, about "free energy", about payoff.
I was interested in a home unit (its windy here) but I doubt it after I heard the $11 story.
btw stan - great pics, sorry to hijack...
Treat every person you meet like you will know them the rest of your life - you just might!
I live in town down here in Central TX so I won't be putting up one of the personal turbines.
There have been some articles in the paper lately and quite a bit of info on the Internet.
If you're in an area with steady winds, you can see a long term payback on the home size wind turbines but we're talking 7-10 years till you break even.
The power companies don't like them because they are required in most locations to buy excess power from the homeowner. I find it hard to blame them; probably costs more in administration costs than it would ever be worth to them.
It's something of a personal decision to make a large initial outlay to reduce the recurring costs.
won't be putting up one of the personal turbines
One of the other considerations of/for home units is variability.
You wind up having to add some sophisiticated power management "downstream" of the generator, to cope with carying windspeeds. That's why the clippers & their ilk are so large, they get to "even out" some of the peaks & valleys out od sheer inertia.
This is harder in smaller units. Then you get into, how much juice are you really drawing in the house? If your windgenny is only averaging 15% of use, that looks kind of nice, except on those days when it's 5% or then 20%, or some other value.
Al the power management eats up soem of that "free" energy too, mostly from inverters & such "wasting" energy as heat. Ideally, a nice bank of batteries would help this all out, but, then you need a vault, and ventilation, and somebody to check for leaks & such (about enough room on top for a full tennis court, though, if a person has that much room on site).
Make a person swear sometimes. Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)
Sure, but what is the payoff - do they cost more to build than they produce, or do they make it before they wear out? Are their gov't subsidies that cloud the facts?
Really depends on what kind of wind they have. If you're in a bad wind area, they may never pay off. But presumably they do some testing prior to putting them in. Seems like I read somewhere that 4-5 years was the target pay off time period, but I'm not sure of that.
Wind power is 'green' power and utilities are increasingly looking to buy a certain % of green power (so they can keep polluting with their other %). It will be in demand for at least the next decade. Kinda like the ethinol plant craze, you have a turbine craze.
But even if the craze cools off, I think it still benefits everyone. The more of them that go in, the cheaper it is to make them and the better the technology becomes. People whine about turbines being an eye sore, but I tend to think a smoke stack belching out yellow smoke is a bigger eye sore.
jt8
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree." -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
There's a ballot measure here that would require the major utilities supplying the state to use 15% non-air-polluting power. I don't know what 15% is versus what we have now, but it's safe to say it's more, and it looks very likely to pass.
http://www.yeson937.org/
Hereabouts, at least for the very near future, wind power is likely to bring a premium price. Anyone with their turbines online right now are likely to make a good profit. I assume this will level out as more turbines come online, and there is a greater supply for the utilities to meet their minimum non-polluting %.
But for the moment, forced-demand is going to far outstrip supply.
I don't know of any other non-polluting tech that could be as easily implemented. Solar is expensive and we're not in a sunny area. With all the regulation, dams are tooooo hard to get built. What else is left?jt8
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree." -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Well, conservation and improving efficiency have got to be the first, but I hope/think we'll see continuing developments in a lot of new or underused technology. Coal may get new legs, unfortunately, although there is some promising 'gasification' technology.
Check out the attached pic. They're talking about throwing some of those in around here, where the currents are swift.
Coal may get new legs, unfortunately, although there is some promising 'gasification' technology
Gasification has been around for over 100 years. There was a big lawsuit a few years ago about some kids who got some strange disease because a 100 year old gasification plant had polluted what became their subdivision. Lawyers got involved and they were able to find a company link that even though the modern company had nothing to do with the polluting, they were still able to sue them. The American way.jt8
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree." -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
I don't know of any other non-polluting tech that could be as easily implemented. Solar is expensive and we're not in a sunny area. With all the regulation, dams are tooooo hard to get built. What else is left?
How about geothermal heat? Haven't we got about six or seven "dormant" volcanoes in western Washington alone? I don't imagine it would be a cakewalk, but I don't know why we couldn't tap into that heat and use it to produce power.
David,
I don't know if you heard about this, but the city of Seattle recently made a big announcement that they were going 100% carbon free -- meaning that they were sourcing all their energy from non-fossil powerplants.
In short, I think they're getting all their power from the hydro dams now. Personally, I have no problem with hydro dams, but it's amazing how much whining I've heard over the last 10 years from local politicians about the dams, and how much yelling I've heard from environmental groups to tear them down.
Doing a 180, I guess these groups have decided it's better to reduce carbon emissions than to worry about the perceived problems of hydro dams.
Sometimes I just gotta laugh.
Wonder what kind of foundation those monsters need? Quite a crane to errect 'em. hate to see the per hour charge on that one!
jt8
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree." -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Stan, we were driving from Texas to Roswell NM and off to the north saw a bunch of Windturbines, about 3-4 mi off and arranged along a long bluff. After a bit I decided to count them. A few minutes later I got tired of counting after I was over 200. They went on for quite a few more miles.
Those who remarked about the viability/feasibility/ cost efficacy of them, remember, it only takes a very small reduction in oil consumption to drive the price per barrel down a good bit. Then, when all prices drop, OPEC will be considerably less of a problem.
Stef
GE builds the windmills in Greenville Sc.
who makes those in the pix?
oodly enough, I work in a foundry that makes the hubs for both GE Wind and Clipper and they are both very heavy , the Clipper hub weighs >40,000lbs when it ships out.
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.Wer ist jetzt der Idiot
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