28 Nov 2010

And Then They Flew Over Again….

Fighting my way through a further six inches, and still falling, of global warming, with the trash, I chanced to look up and there they were again, the gooses.

Assuming this is the same gang as yesterday, I do believe I may have been pretty close to the mark with my ‘Lots a Lost Lady Gooses’ idea ‘couse today the formation was decidedly ragged, they were very quiet, just the odd grumble, which may or may not have been, “You sure we don’t go south for winter?”, and their arms looked tired.

My helpful shouts of, “Yo! Gooses! The water’s that way!” and, just in case, “You’re going north for heavens sake. You sure you don’t go south for winter?”, were met with no discernable change of course.

As for the snow, and she be a good snow, it’s interesting to see it’s falling straight down. By that I mean there isn’t a hint of even a light breeze. This would lead me to believe that ‘Propeller Head’s’ windmills in this area will either not be windmilling or windmilling so slowly that they’re barely kicking out enough juice to keep my power socket remote switch thingies LED’s lit up. Oh dear me.

Anyhoo, you know the drill; feet up the fire, favourite drink to hand, headset on and enjoy.


Quote; Eric Rosenbloom.

“It's not like riding a bike and leaving the car in the driveway. Wind energy on the grid is more like riding a bike and having someone follow you in the car in case you get tired.”

Jeffrey Skilling, Enron.

“Mike, we are a green energy company, but the green stands for money.”

2 comments:

Caratacus said...

Glad she be a good snow...

Recall driving through Cornwall earlier this year - the sun was out, the day augured well and I noticed that the hedges remained unruffled by even the merest hint of wind (unlike the inside of my truck, but that's another matter entirely). I looked at the grass - no movement. I studied the outermost twiggy bits on the trees - nothing. Then I passed a set of windmills about 15 miles this side of Redroof, and they were spinning like billy-o. Fit to bust. And I thought, Now that's clever. They must have so much electrickery stored up, they have to burn some off - just in case like. They surely wouldn't fire them up just to kid on that they work even when the wind's not blowing - would they??

Mac said...

Interesting. Back feed to prevent the shaft sagging on one spot of the bearings? Then I found this;

“As far as I'm aware basically all wind turbines designed to supply electricity to a grid are designed using a synchronous machine generator to convert the rotational energy produced by the wind on the fins into electrical energy.

Synchronous generators work by spinning at constant speeds and what happens when there is a lack of wind, the generator will actually TAKE electricity FROM the grid to supply the energy required to keep the wind turbine spinning, rather than letting it stop. This is to do with 3-phase AC electricity and magnetic forces. The same actually begins to happen if the wind begins to spin the turbine too quickly, power is provided by the grid to slow down the turbine.”

All in all, seem like a top hole plan - get ‘em spinning to generate power to keep ‘em spinning.....