Windmill Blades

[Redbirds Fan]

My office is near the terminus of a commuter railway (electric), and just beyond it is a stretch of a fairly short rail line. Just then, as I was walking by a window, I saw a train passing. All of the flatcars, and there were a lot of them, were carrying windmill blades made for the production of electricity. Setting aside the obvious poetic juxtapositions and irony, it was a pretty impressive sight. I don't know how much of a role wind will play in our future energy supply, but I know that solar and wind have been growing fast in some parts of the country. I read something the other day about Tesla's huge plant out west that was pretty interesting in this regard.

Anyway, a slow afternoon.

[revo]

There's a wind turbine in my town. It was actually out of commission for a good six months because some tiny part broke and there was a fight over who was responsible for it. It's back up and running now, however.

[Redbirds Fan]

Yeah, I should have said turbine. Windmill sounds like a kid's toy or something out behind an old farmhouse.

[revo]

And this one towers over my boys' LL field. It's incredibly imposing!

[Pogues]

Yeah, I should have said turbine. Windmill sounds like a kid's toy or something out behind an old farmhouse.

Are you the little boy who stuck his thumb in the dike?

If you drive on I-65 between Indianapolis and Gary you will come to a point where you will see hundreds of these turbines, on both sides of the road. My wife and I call it the wind farm, as they are in what appears to be nothing but farmland. It's an amazing site, and one I wish would be duplicated across the country. That and solar farms and other clean energy sources.

It's cool you got to see that. I saw a few on the back of some trucks once. It looked like for one turbine, but they were stupid long.

[chancellor]

If you head east on I-10 from SoCal, you'll see the largest wind farms in the nation. I've done that drive a few times and it's always impressive.

[onejayhawk]

This is a big deal in Texas, where the wind blows constantly. It's very impressive to drive past. One irony is that there is a big wind farm is next door to the Alon refinery at Big Spring, literally within eyesight.

[MrFurious]

This is a big deal in Texas, where the wind blows constantly. It's very impressive to drive past. One irony is that there is a big wind farm is next door to the Alon refinery at Big Spring, literally within eyesight.

I drove my family from Dallas to Colorado during summer of 2015. We drove into Amarillo at night. It was an odd sight to see all red lights out in the distance east of the city and not know what they were. We drove back through during the day and got to see all the turbines. I counted hundreds of them out in a field. It was impressive to see.

[Redbirds Fan]

Denton's city-owned electric utility (DME) gets 40% of its power from wind. Texas triples the wind capacity of the next closest state. (No Louie Gohmert jokes, please.)

[Steve]

This is a big deal in Texas, where the wind blows constantly. It's very impressive to drive past. One irony is that there is a big wind farm is next door to the Alon refinery at Big Spring, literally within eyesight.

Actually that's a coincidence. Irony would be if the refinery were powered by the wind farm.

[Redbirds Fan]

Actually that's a coincidence. Irony would be if the refinery were powered by the wind farm.

I thought irony was like rain on your wedding day.

[onejayhawk]

No. Rain on your wedding cake.

J