Are wind farms beautiful or ugly? It depends on who you ask: Those in favor of wind energy extol the visual virtues of the turbines' graceful sculptural lines and view them as symbolic of an exciting, modern age of clean, renewable energy. Detractors begrudge them for destroying their pastoral views like 'machines intruding in a garden.'
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Dear EarthTalk: I don’t understand why many people oppose wind power just because they have to look at the turbines. If you ask me, wind turbines are much nicer-looking than coal-fired, waste-to-energy or nuclear power plants.
—Michael Hart, via e-mail
Whether it’s a wind farm, a coal-fired power plant, a nuclear reactor or even just a big box store, there are always going to be locals opposed to it, declaring “not in my back yard!” (NIMBY).
As to the attractiveness of wind farms, people do seem to come down on one side or the other rather vehemently. Those in favor of wind development have been known to extol the visual virtues of a horizon full of windmills not only for the turbines’ graceful sculptural lines but also for the fact that their very presence advertises the coming of a modern, almost futuristic age of clean, renewable energy.
Writing in the online magazine Contemporary Aesthetics, Yuriko Saito waxes eloquent about the visual appeal of wind farms when created thoughtfully. “[I]t is possible to create an aesthetically pleasing effect by choosing the color, shape and height of the turbines appropriate…to the particular landscape, making them uniform in their appearance and movement, and…arranging them in proportion to the landscape,” he says. “One writer admires the windmills in Sweden as ‘graceful objects’ because ‘the slender airfoils seem both delicate and powerful…while their gentle motion imparts a living kinetic nature’.”
On the flip side, detractors begrudge wind turbines for destroying their views—a classic NIMBY stance. According to Saito, opposition to wind farms stems from their being sited on previously “open, unhindered lands” and as such “are viewed as machines intruding in a garden.” He adds: “[T]hey are almost invariably decried as ‘marring’, ‘spoiling’, ‘ruining’, and ‘intruding on’ the otherwise relatively natural landscape, such as desert, open field, mountainside, and…ocean, and for creating an ‘eyesore’.”
Respondents to a survey by the British magazine Country Life listed wind turbines as the most egregious type of architectural blemish across England. They disliked wind farms even more than other “eyesores”—such as highway service areas, conventional power stations and ugly office buildings—because of the size of the turbines, some of which are 300 feet tall, and their intrusion on the landscape.
Opponents of a proposed wind farm in the waters of Massachusetts’ Nantucket Sound cite similar gripes. The builder, Cape Wind Associates, has campaigned for seven years for approval of the development, to be located 16 miles off the shore of Nantucket Island. Homeowners, politicians and some evidently conflicted environmentalists have mounted stiff opposition to the facility, which would appear from shore as distant white smears on the horizon. The decision rests with the U.S. Interior Department which, despite stated desires to expand offshore wind energy, is taking its time on the highly contentious matter.
But with wind now the hottest renewable energy source going, those opposed to seeing windmills better get used to it. In 2008 wind power provided 1.5 percent of global electricity—having doubled its output every year now for five years in a row—and should account for as much as eight percent by 2018.
CONTACTS: Contemporary Aesthetics, Country Life, Cape Wind Associates LLC
EarthTalk is produced by E/The Environmental Magazine. SEND YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL QUESTIONS TO: EarthTalk, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; earthtalk@emagazine.com. Read past columns at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/archives.php. EarthTalk is now a book! Details and order information at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalkbook.
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Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:PaiuXpNc6ezoRM:http://www.wireie.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/wind-turbine.jpg
worse than?
http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:rG-yy25wUgojzM:http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/upload/2009/07/2012_the_real_milestone_the_real_danger/coal-power-plant.jpg
i took the first google image from: wind turbine, and coal power plant
Why are there not more vertical column style wind turbines? You could hide them in columns, lamp poles, cel l towers, etc.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy are there no vertical column wind turbine designs? If there were you could hide them in plain sight as lamp posts, cell towers, columns, etc
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI often get the opportunity to drive through the wind farms in Indeo Cali. Perhaps it is because I only do so twice a year, that I appreciate the esthetics and like them as not eye sores, but as graceful innovations to man's ingenuity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would not mind them where I live, but I doubt they would be practical. lack of wind and too many trees are the main reasons.
Economics is a better reason to hate wind farms. Without federal subsidies the cost to build and maintain turbines is considerable compared to the money to be made selling the power. Imagine a gearcase fire on a 100' stick!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo me, the fact that they kill birds and bats due to downdraft is much more significant than how they look. That said, I kinda like 'em.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy former brother-in-law, an HVAC contractor, explained the problem with vertical designs to me. He said the bearings at the bottom of the column are very quickly worn out on a vertical windmill of any significant size. Because of the maintenance costs for these designs, they are eschewed by the industry. Magnetic bearings may help, but are very expnsive, I believe. Any comments from those with real, practical knowledge on this issue would be appreciated.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou could, of course, use Michel tilting pad thrust bearings for a vertical windmill (http://www.michellbearings.com/) . As they provide fully hydraulic lubrication, they don't wear out. In the USA they are referred to as Kingsbury bearings; it's an early example of simultaneous invention. They are used in most hydro-electric turbine generators and also in submarines (because of their silent operation).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese (dis)-"graceful additions to the landscape are here to stay" - so long as there are energy sources available to re-build them. The design of these objects is so out of tune with the physical reality of what they are intended to do, that they are not capable - thank God - of supplying, during their entire lifespans, enuf energy to replace them. They are politically-motivated window-dressing , and nothing more.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Wind Info"
========
Data from public meeting at Llandeilo, uk July 2005
Cost of farm -------------- 160M Euro
Annual return from energy supplied ------- 220k Euro
which is less than 0.15 % p.a.
Meanwhile swea.co.uk will have us believe that they provide a return
of 200 to 300% p.a. !?!
Why invest in anything else ! ?
The Good news
----------------------
It is quite possible to get several Whole percent of cost
returned - annually - from a SENSIBLE design of Turbine-ALTERNATOR Device.
I stress "Alternator", to highlight the fact to which you may
notice, reference is never made in talk of "windfarms".
A fat lot of use is a turbine without an alternator ! hence I call
the complete thing a "TAD"
The Simple Facts
------------------------
There are two simple ( but not to find ! ) reasons which account -
very well - for the disparity in these figures i.e. C 5% (from
a sensible design) cf C 0.13% from current "technology".
Look away now, if you think it will be easy to find them !
They are:
1) TADs have an unusual "Economy of Size",
The cost of facing a given area of weather, is necklace-shaped
function of (log) SIZE of the TADs deployed, because the two
components (T and A) have Opposite "Economy of Size".
Viz.
One T to replace 4 of half the diameter will require 8 times the
quantity of materials (of any one of the 4) to make. The cost of 1/4
as many turbines of twice the diameter, is therefore DOUBLE that of
the 4 times as many which they replace.
Meanwhile
One A of 4 times the thro'put, costs only about twice as much as any
one of the 4 which it replaces, in my experience. The Alternator bill
is therefore HALVED by doubling the diameter of the TADs. (and making
1/4 as many)
Lowest farm-cost ocurrs around sizes where the Ts costs about the
same as the As. This certainly happens at around
One metre diameter. Just under this and the geabox
============
disappears !
2)
Current (80m high) "technology" runs at constant revs. which progessively wastes the higher winds, causing the power taken from the wind to be more or
less "pro-rata" with windspeed. They still manage to be wiping-out
the last few Golden Eagles in Italy, though, so "that's quite useful
if you farm sheep" I guess.
The power taken from the wind, by a TAD running at a speed
which varies to suit the wind, ( instead of changing the angle of the
"blades" (wings)) is Cubicly related to windspeed.
----------
Why would anyone on the shore complain? According to my elementary geometry, a tower 200 feet tall would be below the horizon at 17.4 miles away, (300 ft, 21.3 miles) . To see the full tower you need to be on a 20 story building at the shoreline.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisQuite a big waste of really bad Art then
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn inherent problem with wind power is that the biggest turbines tend to be put way out in some rural location like West Texas or even offshore far away from any beach where rich people live, which means that hundreds of miles of transmission lines will be needed to convey the energy to where it will be consumed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe problem is that transmission lines are inherenly resistant to the passage of electricity, which means that the longer they are the more they will have fixed losses built right in. Back in the 1970's I was part of a neighborhood group fighting some 90 foot tall powerline support towers, one of which was going to land in my backyard. We found an alternative route that was actually almost two miles shorter than the original BPA routing, and a helpful electrical engineer was able to testify that over the lifetime of the powerline the shorter route would save millions of dollars of electricity each decade.
It was also interesting why the BPA chose the longer roue in the first place. They were trying to avoid crossing a section of U.S. Forest Service land which would have required an E.I.S. that could have taken a decade to obtain, (although in the end no green group filed suit and forced that outcome.)
"But with wind now the hottest renewable energy source going, those opposed to seeing windmills better get used to it. In 2008 wind power provided 1.5 percent of global electricity—having doubled its output every year now for five years in a row—and should account for as much as eight percent by 2018."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this-------------------
Yep....get used to it all you opposed to clean and green RENEWABLE ENERGY, especially graceful large wind turbines!
I love my smaller wind turbines, and they are quite the conversation piece between visitors and those just traveling by, not to mention a great addition to a solar hybrid system!
I quote loosely from a booklet on wind energy by Dutch engineer, and expert in the field of power generation, Halkema.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe formula E = f. m. v3 indicates how the kinetic energy (E) of wind, as the driving force of a wind turbine, is dependent upon the (tiny) specific mass (m) of air and upon the cube of the velocity (v) of wind. An understanding of the consequences of this natural law make it clear that a wind turbine no matter how ingenious its design - will never produce a substantial amount of electricity in a reliable and consistent manner. For example, if the wind speed halves, the energy output drops to 12.5%.
A report published by German power generation company E.ON, which operates 7,000 wind turbines from the Baltic coast in the North to the Swiss and Austrian borders in the South shows the variation in power feed from the total of all wind turbines in operation over a one year period (2004). Proponents of wind energy often claim that the erratic nature of energy generation from a wind turbine can be cancelled out if many wind turbines are spread out over a large area. The E.ON report clearly disproves this assertion. This is what is to be expected because weather systems are often very large, easily stretching over as much as 2,000 km. There exists no technical solution for this problem. This means other power generation plants have to be adjusted to compensate for the erratic behaviour of the wind turbines. This is far from trivial, and actually means that more CO2 is emitted than would be the case without these wind turbines feeding into the grid. On at least three occasions, already, this erratic nature of wind has led to major problems in the German power distribution grid.
And if more than approximately 5% of the total installed power is in the form of wind turbines, CO2 emissions go up instead of down, because the conventional power generation plants have to be operated in a less efficient manner to compensate for the peaks and troughs in the wind energy supply, which can vary greatly in a matter of only minutes.
Conclusion: it is an illusion to think that wind energy could ever be a major contributor to any modern societys need for reliable electric power.
The formula E = f. m. v3 indicates how the kinetic energy (E) of wind, as the driving force of a wind turbine, is dependent upon the (tiny) specific mass (m) of air and upon the cube of the velocity (v) of wind. Anyone with an understanding of the consequences of this natural law will understand that a wind turbine no matter how ingenious its design - will never produce a substantial amount of electricity in a reliable and consistent manner. Simply because the laws of nature cannot be defeated.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn excellent report published by German power generation company E.ON, which operates 7,000 wind turbines from the Baltic coast in the North to the Swiss and Austrian borders in the South, shows the variation in power feed from the total of all wind turbines in operation over a one year period (2004). Proponents of wind energy often claim that the erratic nature of energy generation from a wind turbine can be cancelled out if many wind turbines are spread out over a large area. The E.ON report clearly disproves this assertion. It shows that the total power of these 7,000 wind turbines varies between 0.2% and 38% of peak power, and further shows that the aggregate power output can vary greatly over just a few minutes. This means other power generation plants have to be adjusted to compensate for the erratic behaviour of the wind turbines. This is far from trivial, and actually means that more CO2 is emitted than would be the case without these wind turbines feeding into the grid!!! This is so because the conventional power generation plants have to be operated in a less efficient manner to compensate for the peaks and troughs in the wind energy supply.
It is therefore an illusion to think that wind energy could ever be a major contributor to any modern societys need for reliable electric power.
On the aesthetics of wind turbines, I agree with the following quote which has been attributed to Prince Charles, that wind turbines are a carbuncle on the beautiful face of the English landscape. But more importantly, they are a danger to a secure supply of electric energy, they do not contribute to making our society more sustainable, and they produce energy that costs 4 to 10 times more than energy from conventional power stations. These wind turbines run on subsidies from tax payers, not on wind.
Short answer -- NO
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisShort answer -- NO
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, Aesthetics is indeed a valid argument and a lot of scenic sites has already been destroyed and more will come.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo, why are they so intrusive?
The main reason seldom mentioned is a simple visual phenomenon: An eye locks to moving objects.
So a few moving windmills will instantly dominate any landscape and turn it to a industrial area.
Another factor is of course it, s enormous size.
This should be compared to it's limited power production.
So the ratio visual dominance/power yield is ridicuously low.
It shouldn't be allowed at any place where people live.
Neither at any place with scenic value.
Yes, the bird problem may also be significant?
Solution: Limited wildmills, some solar power, a lot of delveloped and safe nuclear power.
And finally, continued delvelopment of environmentally friendly energy sources and storage methods for electric cars.
Did I mention that Nuclear Power Plants are vastly energy efficient conpared to it's footprint?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe security and storage issues shouldn't neither be exaggerated.
The reason storage haven't been solved is simply because there is no urgent need.
Energy density in nuclear matter is vastly high. They may stay in temporary storage areas until suitable solutions will be found.
I find it rather amusing to hear folks complaining that the wind turbines in the Altamont Pass east of San Francisco are a blight on the beautiful countryside when they are viewing this countryside from a traffic-choked eight-lane freeway.
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