Wind and nuclear sound

[Paul Lavely <lavelyp@uclink4.berkeley.edu>]

You are correct. You could hear this wind turbine very clearly in the 
area "near" it (near being within several [or more] miles).

The wind blows here (Benicia, CA) ALL the time (or so it seems). This 
was a two blade design with the generator at the top of turnable 
tower. I heard that it was 20 megawatts. How big was it? From the 
road (I-680) I would see this strange "fence." Using binoculars I 
discovered that this "fence" was actually power/telephone poles.

As I understand the blade speed was limited to no more than 18.5 rpm 
because at higher speeds the tips of the blades would have traveling 
at greater than the speed of sound and would have damaged the unit 
had this happened.


By the way, radioactive effluent releases are not the only way that 
your neighborhood nuclear power plants can make itself unwelcome. It 
can also be a noisy neighbor. Once I was eating dinner at a friends 
house across the Indian River from the St. Lucie plant (near Ft. 
Pierce Florida). Our host said that on nights when the wind was just 
right he could hear the plant page (public address system) VERY 
clearly. He asked me "who is this guy HP they keep calling for over 
and over - day and night - don't you every give him a day off?" I was 
rather reluctant to tell him.

Just a few weeks later we had a deputy sheriff show up at the plant 
gate at about 1 AM and told me to "turn off that public address 
system you'll have - its disturbing your neighbors."  Through the 
security gate I told him it was a system important to our safety and 
plant safety. I asked him what would happen if it stayed on (the "Or 
what?" question). He responded that if it stayed on "I'll have to 
arrest someone."  The fix? Until 7 AM every time someone used the 
page there was a page announcement asking that people not use the 
paging system. I'm not sure we got the concept.  The officer never 
returned. Since the Shift Supervisor would have sent me to the gate 
again, I was just as glad that he never came back.

Paul Lavely <lavelyp@uclink4.berkeley.edu>

>That's the same one I mentioned.  The area was actually part of Suisun City.
>I don't doubt that it was inefficient, but the complaints I heard about it
>had to do with the noise - Looked like it was barely turning, but when you
>calculated it, the tip speed was over 200 mph, and it made a very low
>pitched 'wuump ... wuump ..." like cars passing on the freeway. Except that
>these were precisely timed with no variation, like the renowned Chinese
>Water Torture. :-)
>
>Dave Neil		neildm@id.doe.gov
>
>Friends help you move. Real friends help you move bodies.
>
>On Tuesday, May 02, 2000 1:29 PM, Paul Lavely
>[SMTP:lavelyp@uclink4.berkeley.edu] wrote:
>WIND?  PG&E shut down one of the largest wind turbines in the world.
>It was near Benicia CA along highway 680. Reason? Not a cost
>effective method to produce power
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