Speaking in favor of nuclear at DEQ clean power plan listening session 1

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  1. Interesting. I don’t suppose there are transcripts of the listening session? I’m particularly interested to hear more from that man who grew up in Tehachapi, California.

    1. Any questions you may have, as a resident of Tehachapi, I would be glad to attempt to honestly answer. If you want , I can arrange for a wind farm employee to answer your questions. He works in the field, not in management. I think he has the integrity to answer questions honestly. He has worked wind farms for years. Also, another friend is a technician, employed by GE. I’m reasonably sure he would be willing to participate. But I would request that they be treated courteously and with respect. In fact, I would ask that I get Rod’s word to that respect.

      Absent that, ask me any question, and if I don’t have the answer, I will attempt to find it. Realize, of course, that technical or scientific questions are above my own abilities to answer. But as far as social impact, and community sentiments, I feel I am pretty much up to speed.

    2. Also, Ike, I will take some pictures in the next coupla days, and email them to Rod. If he likes, he can go ahead and forward them, or post them. I hope if Rod is interested in doing neither of those options, he says as much, so I don’t waste my time. Let me know, Ike and Rod, if you are interested in engaging with these wind farm employees, and I will do my best to set it up.

      1. @poa

        I’m interested in both photos and discussions with wind farm employees. I will give my word about treating them with respect.

        By the way, the guy who was the best man in my wedding and is still one of my best friends worked with GE’s wind energy group for a number of years designing and building control systems. It’s not the wind or the technology I oppose, it is the way it is being marketed and paid for.

        1. Ok…Rod….seems I’m able to access again.

          I will speak to the wind farm guys, and see if they can join in. Give me a day or two. I’ll shootbya some pics via email as well, soon as I can put it together.

    3. @Ike Bottema

      We were told that the session was being recorded. I plan to contact the DEQ to find out how to obtain a copy. Normally, I make my own recordings, but the sound conditions were not conducive to recording from the audience.

  2. Rod…..

    Your photograph of the Tehachapi windfarm is extremely dated. That array has long since been dismantled, and replaced by larger turbines and towers with a far greater separation distance.

    And I suspect that ex Tehachapi resident, if bothered by noise, did not live in Tehachapi at all. More likely, he lived in the very sparcely populated areas of Oak Creek, or out towards Willow Springs. You cannot hear the turbines if you live in Tehachapi itself.

    There is an ex senator, Phil Wyman, that owns extensive land south of Tehachapi. This land is comprised of mountains the overlook Tehachapi. Pine covered, not chapparel. Wyman wanted to rent the land to the wind companies, and the community blocked it. The hills to the east, that do have towers, are more chapparel and grazing land. Out towards Willow Springs the wind farms share land with an extensive herd of wild horses. The hills to the east of Tehachapi recede through Willow Springs into the Mojave desert, where the wind farm facilities are increasing exponentially. They also extend into an area north of Highway 58 known as “Sky Rivers”. This is an area where it can be argued that the wind farms are truly intruding on pristine natural environment. In an unpopulated locale, and not on the beaten path, these “Sky River” wind facilities are expanding unseen by the public eye. Huge deer are taken in that area, not sure if they’re Blacktails or Mule deer. Also, some record sized black bear come out of that area. BLM land or private? Really don’t know. I’d like to drive back there some time, but gates in are kept locked

      1. Thats a question that I haven’t really done enough observation to answer with any expertise. Honestly, I’m not really sure how much power the town of Tehachapi recieves from our local wind farms. Just because we can see them doesn’t necessarily mean they’re turning our lights on. Hopefully, in the next coupla days, if I can get some wind farm employees to comment, they can better answer questions such as that.

        Yesterday we had pretty brisk breezes, and the temps were in the high eighties. Not unusual for this time of year. Tehachapi is high, about 4800 ft, and is between the Mojave desert and the San Joaquin Valley. Because of its geographical position, it is breezy to windy fairly consistently.

        Yesterday I took a short detour so I could shoot a coupla pictures of what the wind farms look like from the east end of the Tehachapi Valley. A couple of things came to mind in doing so. First, the most westward turbines are a good three miles from any neighborhoods. The guy that Rod mentioned, if he was truly bothered by blade noise, could not have lived in Tehachapi proper. He would had to have lived on one of about five rural homes on Cameron Canyon or Willow Springs Road. Also, I noticed that the more modern turbines, the huge ones, were almost all turning. Although I did notice an occassional one with its blades feathered, not turning. But the older arrays on the ridges, for whatever reason, had large numbers that were not active. These are smaller turbines, on girder style towers, that are very densely packed together. They are seemingly being fazed out as more and more of the huge modern turbines replace them. I was also struck by the fact that in the act of taking pictures, I had to admit to myself that these wind farms are a bit uglier than I had previously noted. Particularly on the ridge lines, where the older tightly packed arrays have not been replaced by the modern towers and turbines.

        I’ve noticed too, that the modern turbines require just a very light breeze to rotate. They are truly huge, one single blade requiring a lowboy style semi trailer, extended, with pilot cars, in order to transport it.

        I’ll email the few pics I took to Rod. He can do as he wishes with them. And I should be seeing a couple guys that work for the wind facilities tonight. I’ll see if I can’t get them to offer comments.

  3. I recently made the drive from Eastern Washington down through Portland and to the Oregon coast for a little family vacation. This wasn’t my first time, but for some reason seeing those incredibly ugly wind turbines polluting the beautiful scenery that was created millions of years ago by the great floods seemed to be even more hideous this time. I can only assume the cause of this was the fact not one….NOT ONE of the hundreds of turbines I passed had moving blades. Four days later on the return trip I counted 15 wind turbines (all on the Washington side of the Columbia River) with blades in motion.

    Its depressing……not that the turbines were not moving, that they are there in the first place.

  4. You spoke about “the tiny quantity of byproducts after 14 years of powering a large submarine”. Can you elaborate? How tiny?

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