Why Lackawanna's turbines don't always blow in the windhttps://buffalonews.com/2019/11/16/w...w-in-the-wind/Ever notice how many of the wind turbines on the old Bethlehem Steel property along Lake Erie don't rotate, even on windy days?
Now we know why.
The company that manufactured parts for the turbines went bankrupt, and the owner of the turbines in Lackawanna and Hamburg can't get replacement parts.
"They have replaced these windmills two-and-a-half times over, and they're still not functioning," said Sean Doyle, executive director of the Hamburg Industrial Development Agency.
An attorney for Erie Wind told the Hamburg Planning Board recently that the new blades will be longer, but he said the company is proposing several features to make them safer for birds and bats: feathering the blades and curtailment, so they do not operate at lower wind speeds when birds and bats are typically flying.
The New York State Thruway Authority last year filed a lawsuit over four wind turbines at area highway exits that don't work. Those turbines were installed in 2013 and 2014 with the aim of saving energy costs.
Apparently they don't work.But four of the turbines in Chautauqua and Erie counties stopped working. The French manufacturer of those turbines, Vergnet, went into receivership in 2017.
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