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Originally Posted by Tim Deegan
If that was the case, then I doubt that there would be so many on the top of the hills in the middle of the pennines, or off the coast, as both areas often experience far higher wind speeds.
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It is the case ,that's why in medium to high winds you will never see a wind turbine turning .It's logical realy because if you think about the speed that the gears and generator inside the nacelle will be turning with a max speed of 30mph wind speed they would just burn out ,and then think about the g force at the tips of the blades they would tear apart
http://www.bwea.com/ref/faq.html#blow
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How strong does the wind have to blow for the wind turbines to work?
Wind turbines start operating at wind speeds of 4 to 5 metres per second (around 10 miles an hour) and reach maximum power output at around 15 metres/second (around 33 miles per hour). At very high wind speeds, i.e. gale force winds, (25 metres/second, 50+ miles/hour) wind turbines shut down. For more information, see the BWEA factsheet on wind energy technology.
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There's a interesting report here about accidents involving wind turbines one of the biggest problems is blade failure.