Last month I went to Palm springs for the Faire, and there was no
noticeable difference in the numbers of windmills in operation.
=====================
Having seen these machines near Palm Springs ,they seem to be rather small
and of an older design.
Modern machines are much bigger (up to 2 MW rated capacity) and more
reliable.
In the Netherlands they are now planning a number of 2MW machines offshore
,approx 8 kms off the coast placed on seabed based stuctures.
Their designers are focussing on minimum maintenance ( only once every 3
years) .

To date land based machines produce on average only 16% of their rated
capacity ,due to periods without adequate wind and to technical outage /
maintenance. Yet they seem profitable. In the Netherlands many farmers have
them on their land ,especially
in the northern provinces.

Frank GM0CSZ / KN6WH