The drama of raising a wind turbine's blades played out on Parisville Road and Kipper Road yesterday. I watched the three blade asssembly with hub as it was lifted to the top of the monopod where it is attached to the turbine.
Guy lines attached to vehicles and a small crane on the ground guide the blade assembly as it begins to rise from the ground.
The entire process is slow and deliberate and can be seen for quite a few miles since the Manitowoc crane that does the lifting is gigantic.
The blade assembly is slowly guided toward the turbine. This unit was raised right around noon on Wednesday. Later that afternoon, thunderstorms crossed the Thumb and put an end to construction while the weather cleared through.
Workers on top of the turbine watched as the hub of the blade assembly joins the turbine. Windmills are being constructed south of Laker High School, between Pigeon and Elkton. A set of windmills just went up north of Pigeon. This set of turbines is on the east side of Huron County in Bloomfield Township.
It's exciting to see the new blades rising as windfarms spread across the Thumb. I imagine our grandparents and great-grandparents felt a similar sense of change as barns were raised here and there on this eighty and that forty. I often wonder, too, how people felt about electric and telephone poles being strung along country roads.
It is good to see the energy possibilities that the Thumb can now export onto the grid. Our farms have helped to feed the world; now they will power it, too.
August post about windfarms: More Wind
Copyright 2012
Wanda Hayes Eichler
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