52:2013 Week 7

The theme for week 7 is Rotation. I made a trip out to West Wind, a wind farm about 40 minutes from my home. The wind farm has 62 turbines and generates enough electricity in a year to power 71,000 homes. The sign next to the car park suggested people park facing the wind so that their car doors don't get damaged when people open them but the wind was not that strong this morning.

This shot was taken from the remains of what was once a Post Office run radio receiving station located near the car park.  The light was poor but I waited for a sunny patch to shine on the turbines in the middle. The area features cycle tracks and walkways and is a popular spot on a nice day.

Most of the turbines are not accessible to the public but there is one exception, this one:

To get some idea of the scale of the turbines the towers are 67 meters high and the blades are 40 metres, reaching 111 metres when a blade is vertical. This is the only one with public access and overlooks the small village of Makara, barely visible lower right of the image. The road access is extremely  narrow and winding so a temporary wharf was built and the turbines offloaded there and transported up the hill.

Here is a shot standing directly beneath this turbine looking skyward:

Processing was minimal for the main shot at the top of this post - it was cropped and small contrast adjustments in made in Lightroom. You can see a larger version in my Flickr photostream here.