Thursday, August 9, 2007

CNE Windmill stops traffic

While driving across the bottom of the city this morning, I ran into more traffic than usual. No, not another truck rollover. The CNE windmill was actually turning, a sight so incredulous that people just had to slow down to look. Of course, with a temperature of only 23 degrees Celsius, its wind power was no longer useful to offset imports of power from the US to keep all of those enemies of the kilowatt, the air-conditioner, humming. Its highly subsidized output ( according to the Windshare website, they are getting $0.11 per kilowatt, while Toronto Hydro is selling it to consumers at about $0.05 ) will just keep a few more empty streetcars on the road, or the billboards along the Gardiner lit up. And generate some cash flow for the investors.

It will probably run until it gets cold enough for people to turn on their baseboard heaters and radiant floors. At which point it will again be a monument to the flakiness of relying on the wind in this part of the world. If it actually does turn tomorrow, I will get a few time lapse photos to document this event for posterity.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well, it was on and off during the weekend - more off than on when I saw it.