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Re: PHYS-L Digest - 19 Jan 2001 - Special issue (#2001-23)



----- Original Message -----
From: "S.Goelzer" <sgoelzer@COEBROWNACADEMY.COM>

In California, we have a number of wind farms. There are undesired
side-effects - visual pollution. The windy valleys are some of the most
beautiful areas - the wind generators are large and ugly, scarring the
hills. There would be much opposition to the siting of millions of
them.
Plus I think they can be noisy.

snip-

I remember being impressed by the wind farms when visiting Ca. but I also
remember
noticing the seemingly high number of mills off line at any one time. Over
8 weeks
in the summer of 90 I made a casual (driving by) survey and found that 1
in 10
were broken? at any one time. Does anyone know of any real stats. on the
mechanical reliability of these things?

I don't have stats handy, but be aware that these large wind farms went up
at a time when there was a big tax advantage to do so. Later, that tax
incentive went away and consequently the farms became economically
unattractive. What you may have been seeing is the result of this--broken
mills _not being_ repaired.

Rick

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Richard W. Tarara
Associate Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
rtarara@saintmarys.edu

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