Wind turbines might save the planet, but they ruin the look of the countryside.?

Question

Should we take this arguement seriously?

Answer 1

Well, you should take any argument seriously, because it has the potential to be a roadblock. However, just ask those people if they would rather have a few wind turbines here or and there, or a massive coal plant spewing smoke? The whole point of wind turbines is that they are NOT a centralized source of power. They are a decentralized source of power that contributes to a diverse array of power generation facilities that comprise the whole energy portfolio. But really, do they ruin the countryside more than high voltage power lines, more than cellphone towers, more than another super center or 8 lane highway?

In order for them to work their best, windmills are placed near where they are needed, in other words already developed areas. I don't think virgin countryside is being bulldozed for windmills, however we are leveling the Appalachian mountains to meet our hunger for coal.

Answer 2

No because we have this bigger problem of how can we make them more efficient? Wind turbines are a cleaner energy source, but we could cover all of the land on the earth with wind turbines and STILL not meet the world's energy needs. At this point, we wouldn't just ruin the look of the countryside... we'd completely cover it.. hehe.

Answer 3

No.

The countryside looks a lot worse when the majority of the species on the planet die.

"Prior major warmings in Earth’s history, the most recent occurring 55 million years ago . . . resulted in the extinction of half or more of the species then on the planet."

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2008/State...

In the course of some past climate warming and extinction events, fungus became the dominant form of life on the planet for years, due to all of the dead and decaying biological material.  In my opinion a wind turbine or two would look a lot nicer than a thick coating of mold and fungus.

Answer 4

There are pros and cons of everything

Pros                                                        

Does Not Polloute                              

Looks quite good                                  

Renewable

Cons

Huge amount of space

Depends on weather

Answer 5

Well, no.

The idea that wind turbines are inefficient as a central power source and are infeasible for most georgraphical locations. There's an argument to take seriously.

Answer 6

No...I go to Holland a lot and the turbines are very cool to look at while driving by.....also there is no chance of them leaking nuclear fuel or creating smog.

Answer 7

Well why not? When someone tries to argue in favor of drilling for oil anywhere it always comes back to destroying the pristine beauty of the environment or killing native species.  So it's ok for environmentalists to use that reason by not for people who contradict their opinion?

And by the way, wind turbines are inefficient and extremely land intensive.  They've also been known to emit ground shocks to those who reside in the proximity of them.

Answer 8

No, it's an absurd argument.  Wind power is completely green, other than the energy and materials that go into the initial construction.  The energy return on investment (EROI) for a wind turbine is 5 to 35, meaning they produce a lot more energy than is required to build them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_energy...

Studies have shown that they actually kill very few birds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_energy...

There are so many benefits to wind energy that saying it ruins the look of a countryside, which is such a subjective thing, is a completely weak argument.  Personally I think wind turbines look cool anyway.

Answer 9

They are a poor solution.

Pros

- Clean power.

Cons

- take up huge amounts of space that could be better used for farms or left as nature intended

- make very little power on their own (you need hundreds to make any useful amount of power)

- noisy

- kill birds

Answer 10

no however i have serious concerns about wind power...

energy can neither be created nor destroyed simply change form...

nature abhors waste...

both of these are LAWS of nature we know and live by... we accept these as fact...

if this is true then the HUGE amounts of energy involved in the wind can not possibly be wasted...

nature is using the energy in some manner that we simply do not understand...

in the 1700's the sailors had no problems throwing stuff overboard... after all the oceans were huge and the amount involved was minimal so no need to worry..

today we say the amount of energy mankind would use is minimal... have we learned nothing in almost 3000 years?

Answer 11

Of course we should