Guardian
Wind turbines at Royd Moor in South Yorkshire. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/Guardian
Wind turbines coated with similar material to make stealth bombers invisible to radar could soon be used to address long-standing concerns that wind farms could disrupt air traffic control systems. From BusinessGreen.com, part of the Guardian Environment Network
Fears over disruption to radar signals is one of the most common causes of opposition to wind farm plans, with aviation objections currently holding up more than 5GW of wind energy in the planning system and a further 5.5GW in early stages of development.
A spokeswoman for DECC told BusinessGreen.com that the 19-month R &D project will be looking at both hardware and software solutions," she said. "First up they will look at the wind turbines themselves and see if they can be coated with material that does not interfere with radar. For example, they will look at the material used by stealth planes to make them invisible to radar. Second, they will look at tuning the software so it does not pick up the signal from the wind turbines."
Wind turbines at Royd Moor in South Yorkshire. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/Guardian
Wind turbines coated with similar material to make stealth bombers invisible to radar could soon be used to address long-standing concerns that wind farms could disrupt air traffic control systems. From BusinessGreen.com, part of the Guardian Environment Network
Fears over disruption to radar signals is one of the most common causes of opposition to wind farm plans, with aviation objections currently holding up more than 5GW of wind energy in the planning system and a further 5.5GW in early stages of development.
A spokeswoman for DECC told BusinessGreen.com that the 19-month R &D project will be looking at both hardware and software solutions," she said. "First up they will look at the wind turbines themselves and see if they can be coated with material that does not interfere with radar. For example, they will look at the material used by stealth planes to make them invisible to radar. Second, they will look at tuning the software so it does not pick up the signal from the wind turbines."