July 31, 2008 @ 8:17 pm | Filed under: Family,Travel
We left on vacation late yesterday afternoon. But before beginning TRUE vacation, Mike has sales calls to make in West Texas and in New Mexico. So I am tagging along for the ride, armed with books and magazines to keep me occupied while he does all the workerly stuff.
Today we visited two windmill farms where he had meetings lined up. I have to say that this was almost like a field trip for me. Totally interesting. These white mills are visible for miles and – once you’re on the farm itself, they stretch for as far as the eye can see.
The towers stand up to 160 feet tall and each of the three blades are up to EIGHTY feet long! The towers – though they look like skinny trunks in the picture and from a distance – actually are anywhere from 8 feet in diameter all the way up to 12 feet.
Wind energy is definitely the wave of the future. But this future is still quite a long way off. The US ranks second in wind energy, second only to Germany. But even so, wind AND solar energy combined only make up about 1% of the energy on our country’s grid. And wind alone only makes up about 1/2 of 1%.
Still – it’s pretty cool to look at these beautiful (they really ARE beautiful) windmills that line the West Texas ridges and know what they are capable of producing.
