Controversial Beauty?

I came home on Monday from a weekend in Wanganui playing in a Croquet Tournament (about which I'll probably blog despite promising a moratorium on such blogs). I decided that, instead of coming through the Manawatu Gorge, I would come across the Saddle Road slightly to the North from Ashurst to Woodville. It comes over the top of the mountain ridge instead of though the Gorge which separates the Ruahine Range (which runs down from Hawkes Bay in the North) from the Tararua Range. The ranges house the largest wind energy farms in the Southern hemisphere: the Te Apiti Farm and the Tararua Farm.

Looking South to the Tararua Wind Energy Farm (The Handbag in the foreground). The windmills are visible through 360 degrees from the point at which I was standing.

Majestic beauty

Whether one is in favour or against generating energy by using wind farms they are likely to provide an increasing amount of New Zealand's electricity. This Country adheres very strictly to a non-nuclear policy to the extent that warships which are powered by a nuclear reactor are not permitted in territorial waters. New Zealand does, however, have supplies of geothermal energy to tap in addition to plentiful hydro sources: Electricity production by source (2001): fossil fuel: 31.6% hydro: 57.8% nuclear: 0% other: 10.7%. These figures were prior to the establishment of the main wind farms. Wind generation currently provides about 2.5% of New Zealand’s electricity. On an annual basis, this is enough electricity to meet the demand of 145,000 homes.