What I really have wanted to write about, and have hesitated, very politically incorrect, especially in the midst of “Greater Newburyport Earth Day Celebration,” is my research into wind turbines in Copenhagen, one of the world’s, if not the world’s greenest city, and Costa Rica, one of the world’s, if not the world’s greenest country.

I was told about Copenhagen by a reader of the Newburyport Blog, who also sent me the video of Jay Leno demonstrating his wind turbine (see previous post). And always liking a good learning curve, I was very much interested in reading about how such an old European city would incorporates large wind turbines in a populated area.

Well they don’t.

They have a beautiful arch of large wind turbines out in the bay. Photograph of the turbines here and here.

And I came across this quote:

“There are many advantages in placing these big electricity factories in the ocean where the wind blows at maximal speed. Also, the Danish public seems to approve of wind turbine energy as long as the turbines are not too visible and standing in their back yard!”

From www.copenhagenexclusive.dk here.

Would this makes us in Newburyport rethink our wind turbine ordinance, erecting large wind turbines so close to the population of Newburyport, MA?

And from what I can make out, Costa Rica has their country’s large wind turbines away from populated areas as well.

I get it, the argument is that smaller wind turbines like the one Jay Leno was demonstrating in the previous post, just do not have enough oomph. But my question would be, even Copenhagen, with a claim to the greenest city in the world, doesn’t want large turbines in their back yard. And any large wind turbine in Newburyport’s Industrial Park would be in Newburyport’s back yard, so maybe in Newburyport it would be Ok if we had a wind policy that was in scale to where we as a city live, work and play, and that we might think about having less oomph as a way to go.