They just keep getting bigger!

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I'm on another stage addition job where we are building an addition to an existisng 230 kv substation to tie a 220 megawatt wind farm into the the East grid. The turbines on this job are the biggest I've ever seen.
137 meter blade diameter and 137 meter hub height.
The turbines are GE on shore 3.83 magawatt. And the cranes that are setting these mofos are the biggest I've ever seen on a wind project. How big is too big? One huge public objection to a wind turbine is the big assed rotating shadow that the blades give off in low light. These pigs are going to cast shadows over a giant foot print.
Luckily the turbines on this job are several miles from our job site as these early and late day blinking shadows are nauseating for us. Also I heard that the state will not allow them to run the red lights at night. They have some sort of system that will only turn the lights on when aircraft are low and near the farm.
Seems to me that they are pushing the limits of several aspects of public acceptability.
What do you think?
 
I think this is going to go off track real fast and possibly get folks banned.

Ive never encountered the issue of nauseating shadows. Of course, driving down a wooded interstate with low angle sun causes such shadows and flashes of sun too.

Ive never been opposed to their look. 137m is longer than. A football field with end zones. That's big! Not sure how much bigger these are than any others I've seen.

It's not clear to me what the objective standard of public acceptability is, and therefore it's not clear that this can be answered without becoming an opinion piece that goes nowhere.
 
Originally Posted by P10crew
The turbines are GE on shore 3.83 magawatt.

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I think I like air conditioning a lot.

But if one of these popped up and cast shadows on my house, I would sell and expect the turbine owners to cover the loss in property value.

I don't think I need to worry though, this place is dead still in the summer.
 
JHZ it's called shadow flicker. At sun rise and sun set it is a big problem near wind farms. Shadows are cast for miles. Flickering shadows do weird stuff to those subjected to it. Now YouTube search flicker shadows.
I personally hate working in flicker shadow.
 
Originally Posted by P10crew
JHZ it's called shadow flicker. At sun rise and sun set it is a big problem near wind farms. Shadows are cast for miles. Flickering shadows do weird stuff to those subjected to it. Now YouTube search flicker shadows.
I personally hate working in flicker shadow.


I would imagine that that could trigger seizures in certain people as well.
 
Where is "the hinterland"? We've seen what look like huge turbines along I-8 and I-10 in western Cali but no way to know how big they are. Blade tip speed is a concern as well isn't it, killing unsuspecting birds flying by..
 
The farm is in central So Dak. Smack in the middle of the central migratory fly zone. The blades have some new 3m laminate that reflects light and supposedly deters bird strikes???
 
Originally Posted by JHZR2
I think this is going to go off track real fast and possibly get folks banned.

Ive never encountered the issue of nauseating shadows. Of course, driving down a wooded interstate with low angle sun causes such shadows and flashes of sun too.

Ive never been opposed to their look. 137m is longer than. A football field with end zones. That's big! Not sure how much bigger these are than any others I've seen.

It's not clear to me what the objective standard of public acceptability is, and therefore it's not clear that this can be answered without becoming an opinion piece that goes nowhere.


So far so good. Glad you didn't preemptively decide guilty and lock it down.

This is an interesting subject. Never knew about the shadow flicker problem, how does the utility and/or turbine manufacturer spin (ha!) it? Does other land use go on around these big towers there in S.D. or is it off limits?
 
The public objection groupthink here is the whooom whooom whooom noise. I hadn't thought about the shadows.
 
Around me in Central Illinois the wind turbines take up about an acre each with road and transmission infrastructure. Not much noise with the new ones unless you are right under them. Shadow flicker is an issue. But the biggest issue is the blades falling apart and/or ice being flung off of them. So now they want nearly 3000' from occupied buildings. People don't want them if they can be seen it seems. They had a very hard time getting the transmission towers in with the last farm. And this is all rural settings.
 
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Originally Posted by AZjeff
Originally Posted by JHZR2
I think this is going to go off track real fast and possibly get folks banned.

Ive never encountered the issue of nauseating shadows. Of course, driving down a wooded interstate with low angle sun causes such shadows and flashes of sun too.

Ive never been opposed to their look. 137m is longer than. A football field with end zones. That's big! Not sure how much bigger these are than any others I've seen.

It's not clear to me what the objective standard of public acceptability is, and therefore it's not clear that this can be answered without becoming an opinion piece that goes nowhere.


So far so good. Glad you didn't preemptively decide guilty and lock it down.

This is an interesting subject. Never knew about the shadow flicker problem, how does the utility and/or turbine manufacturer spin (ha!) it? Does other land use go on around these big towers there in S.D. or is it off limits?

That was my question too-can conventional farming still go on around turbines? Can't imagine the shadows would prevent growing conventional crops around them.
 
Originally Posted by bullwinkle

That was my question too-can conventional farming still go on around turbines? Can't imagine the shadows would prevent growing conventional crops around them.


yes no problem here in Illinois, at least with turbines and farming.....
[Linked Image]
 
There is enough power flowing down the Mississippi River to supply power for a good portion of the nation but we won't harness it.
Take a look at the CFS flows of the Mississippi just down stream from where the Missouri contributes.
 
Originally Posted by P10crew
There is enough power flowing down the Mississippi River to supply power for a good portion of the nation but we won't harness it.
Take a look at the CFS flows of the Mississippi just down stream from where the Missouri contributes.


OK, but we're learning about wind turbines...
 
Originally Posted by P10crew
There is enough power flowing down the Mississippi River to supply power for a good portion of the nation but we won't harness it.

It doesn't have enough drop. Power = flow x pressure. Getting any pressure on such a flat river would require flooding huge areas of occupied/fertile land. Very expensive including buying out landowners. Hydroelectric is pretty tapped out in the ConUS. Most places that are practical to dam up for power were done 80 years ago.
 
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