The Glyndebourne wind turbine offered up a dramatic ‘reminder’ that wind energy is not always as reliable as it might be.
Glyndebourne has long been a byword for British opera. Its opera house is in the grounds of a grand old English country house and is famous for its summer festival, which this year includes Handel’s “Saul.”
The Guardian’s Tim Ashley was impressed:
The Glyndebourne season continues with a revival by Donna Stirrup of Barrie Kosky’s 2015 staging of Handel’s Saul, widely regarded as one of the festival’s finest achievements and the production that cemented Kosky’s reputation in the UK as a director of remarkable originality. This is the first time I’ve seen it, having missed both its opening run and the 2018 revival, and it strikes me as an example of Kosky’s work at its finest: probing, insightful, sometimes witty, sometimes dark, always utterly engrossing. . . .
Sometimes dark, eh?
Glyndebourne, like much of the British cultural establishment, is proud to brandish its green credentials. These include such feats as “increased use of recycled paper” and a “cycle-to-work scheme for Glyndebourne staff,” as well as “adjusting toilet flushes to save water.”
Otis B. Driftwood (Groucho Marx): “And now, on with the opera. Let joy be unconfined.”
In 2021 Glyndebourne “joined the global Race to Zero [carbon emissions].”
Towering above all this has been Glyndebourne’s wind turbine.
As Glyndebourne explains:
The biggest step we’ve taken was the installation of a 67-metre wind turbine a short distance from the opera house. Our Enercon E44 wind turbine has a highly efficient design, which allows it to generate more energy per unit of wind compared to some other turbines.
The turbine was launched in January 2012 by Sir David Attenborough and between 2012 and 2023 it has generated the equivalent of 102% of the electricity used by the company in the same period. On launch it reduced our carbon emissions by 50%.
The wind turbine directly reduces our environmental footprint by electricity generation. It also provides a visual reminder to us all to do all we can to tackle climate change.
As euphemisms for propaganda go, “visual reminder” isn’t bad.
But the essence of good power supply includes reliability as well as affordability and adequacy. And just the other day, the Glyndebourne wind turbine offered up a dramatic “reminder” that wind energy is not always as reliable as it might be.
Power cuts compelled Glyndebourne to abandon a performance as the opera house’s wind turbine offered little back-up in the still summer air.
The production of Handel’s Saul on Saturday was plagued by power outages before organizers pulled the plug on the whole show.
Organizers said the production had been hit by six blackouts while the audience was present, each requiring a 15-minute pause to restart the stage technology. . . .
“As we left, I gazed up at Glyndebourne’s solitary but enormous wind turbine, magnificently motionless in the still and balmy evening air,” an attendee told Slipped Disc, a classical music publication.
Glyndebourne was dependent on electricity from the grid at the time, as its turbine was not meeting the needs of demand and its short-term back-up generators were unable to cope with the length of the disruption.
A spokesman for Glyndebourne commented that:
“We aspire to be energy self-sufficient in the future and are already reviewing the investments and infrastructure needed to make this possible. This is now a heightened priority. We are now working to increase our resilience in this area.”
The 230-foot turbine stands on a hill in the heart of a national park, as indeed a “visual reminder” should. As mentioned above, it was launched by the biologist and broadcaster David Attenborough, something of a secular saint in the U.K., who said at the time that:
“Wind power can never provide for all our wants but every bit of power generated by wind must be welcomed. . . . Even if we only generate a fraction of what our country needs in this way, then we must.”
Cost/benefit analysis has never been climatists’ strong point.
Meanwhile (also via the Daily Telegraph):
[Energy secretary] Ed Miliband has unveiled plans to make it easier for homeowners to install wind turbines in their gardens as part of a mass expansion of green power.