Eli5: Why do some windmills turn while others aren’t?

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Eli5: windmills

Why is it that in an entire group of windmills all facing the same direction and all right next to each other, you sometimes only see one or two moving and the other windmills aren’t moving at all?

I’m driving through California and noticed this, which is prompting my question. I would expect all of them should be turning, so I think they’re either immobilizing most of them, or manually spinning those windmills somehow. In either case, why? Or am I wrong in my assumptions?

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8 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Electricity, when produced, needs to go somewhere. It needs to be used. It runs through the wires on a loop, basically. Produce a lot more electricity than the system is using, it starts to cause problems.

Turning off a windmill and stopping production of excess energy helps avoid the problems.

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