Hacker News Reader

I had a friend that lived in the Outer Hebrides (Northwest coast of Scotland).

He said it wasn't unusual to have gales in the winter, with >100Km/hr winds.

Seems to be a rich local resource.

Wind turbines have a max windspeed beyond which they stop generating, as it's too risky to let the blades spin that fast.

Cut off wind speed is typically around 25m/s steady, so almost 100km/h. Beyond that indeed they stop producing.

iirc newer, bigger turbines are rated for higher windspeeds and dont have this problem.