Comments on: Toronto Hydro Windfarms off Scarbourough Bluffs (Part 2)

By: andrew

andrew — Wed, 20 May 2009 02:45:08 +0000

Hello

I came across your blog while researching the windmill issue. I have a accurate rendering of what the windmills will look like from the bluffs if you are interested.

Take care
Andrew

By: John Chew

John Chew — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 12:18:15 +0000

I was googling the wind turbine at the Ex a while ago and was surprised to find I used to work for the man responsible. Ed Hale used to run Trigraph, a Unix-based typesetting company he founded in the 1980s.

By: rae

rae — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:17:23 +0000

And another from the same site:

Floating windmills: energy from the clouds — http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2007/11/floating-windmi.html

By: rae

rae — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:13:33 +0000

Interesting, somewhat-related link:

Small Windmills Put to the Test — http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2009/04/small-windmills-test-results.html

By: lp

lp — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 20:21:59 +0000

Here’s how Reid and I calculated how high the windmills will look from the shore:

Assume the wind turbines are 2km out from shore = 2000m
Assume the wind turbine is 100m to the mid section, or 100m to the top of the blade (according to the presentation given by Toronto Hydro - the slide showing the wind turbine in relation to a sailboat)

If you’re looking out from the base of the bluffs, the formula is:
tan(x) = Opposite / Adjacent
tan(x) = 100 / 2000
x = arctan (0.05)
x = 0.049958396 radians
Which is 2.86 degrees

If you use 150m (the top of a blade) instead of 100m, you get 4.289 degrees.

So let’s round it out and say they’ll be between 3 to 4 degrees high. According to this website, http://optics.kulgun.net/Observing, “.. the width of you finger at arms length is about 1 degrees. The width of the sun and moon is about 0.5 degrees”

So, if we stand at the base of the bluffs (or at the top, it’s close enough), and hold out your hand and tilt it, the windmills at 2km out will be the width of 3 or 4 fingers.